SNY And the Mainline?
SNY has been “represented”, we’ve been building and growing for years. I personally came from the mainline after 15 years of the madness. I’ve been there with the Black Guerrilla Family, Nuestra Familia, Mexican Mafia, and Aryan Brotherhood. I was at Calipatria when the “East Coast Crips” stormed the program office. I’ve also walked the level IV yards with Elmer Geronimo Pratt, Ruchell Magee, as well as the comrade Askari.
The inmates on SNYs are not your enemies. “We know the enemy.” A lot of us made a conscious informed choice to step away from the gangbanging and go home to our families, are we less because we made a choice best for us? Moreover I stand with you, and look for your next essay so we can build together. Check Under Lock & Key No. 40,53,55, just to start, but I’m all over. Revolutionary theory without practice ain’t shit.
Dear sista, you and I know that the mainline is full of people who have no honor or respect, and the class of people are not the same as in the 1980s or 1990s, so I’m not missing the line at all. What I do miss is the respect level. But just like the mainline, SNYs have strong revolutionary comrades, it’s who you have around you, just as on the line, we also know there are child molesters as well as rapists there too. One of the reason I left was because I was a part of the “Damu Car,” Piru in fact, and when someone known to be a rat, and all the homies know, but since he has the drugs and he’s paying rent he has a pass. I was good, not to mention the so-called homie that rob and rape another homie’s wife and we have to let this unknown dude keep walking around us left a fucked up taste in my mouth. So there was only one step I could take in good conscience.
We as Damus we moved in a political motion anyway. So me becoming revolutionary was just the next step in my evolution as a man. When I hit the prison in 1992 I was taught about my history: George Jackson, Frantz Fanon, Huey P Newton, Fred Hampton, The Almighty Black P. Stone Nation and all the letters because they were all here FOI-NOI-BGF-KUMI-DAMUs–Kiway’s- all of that, SNYs are the way they are because when you come to this side all of your old homies consider you a rat, even if you never said a word to the pigs.
G.P. is a capitalist community; who ever has the drugs can call the shots, who ever has the phone is the big homie. That’s a very tainted and corrupt political line they’re pushing, I also agree with the comrade in Georgia, that the contagious disease of backbiting needs to stop. I feel the same way. The real is that I’ve been in the mix with a lot of the Damus on the mainline and they know where I stand, and have told that they see the improvements in me and we’ve had serious political talks about the state of the line vs the SNY yards.
When I was at Richard J. Donavon (see Under Lock & Key issue no 40) I created a cadre that consisted of SNY and mainline comrades, Black, white and Hispanic. And what the Georgia comrade said is right, everyone on this backbiting shit should take a long and serious look at themselves and really pay attention to the way Willie Lynch syndrome has been effective. When he instructed the slave masters to always keep them divided, separated, and distrustful of one another, and at odds with one another.
Posting up essays and articles on the wall is a go0d move, and I will add that to my get down. Anyway, I’m going to end this the same way I entered it by stating that the loss of my heroes Fred Hampton, Huey P. Newton, and George Jackson represented a most tragic set back not just for the Black Panther Party, but also for the liberation movement in general. These men who were potentially heir apparent to fallen leaders like Malcolm X, and Che Guevara.
The real shit is “SNY and the mainline,” may never be able to get past the emotional hatred that comes from mainline prisoners, but will that stop SNY inmates and political prisoners from being a leading force in building the bridges that can we can cross to make the revolution? No! We are just as focused as you if not more because we have a role to play in this movement, I only live to make the revolution. So I understand my life may be cut short, but I will live and die for the people.
