It's Not About Right and Wrong When It's About Survival with Maleek Jackson

In this episode, I speak with Maleek Jackson, owner of Maleek Jackson Fitness Boxing Gym in Philadelphia. Maleek spent 10 years in prison from ages 16-26 and in our conversation, we contextualize criminal behavior, interrogating how, for those in the streets, it is not about “right” or “wrong” but about doing what you need to do to survive with the limited opportunities available. We discuss how chaotic environments, resulting from racist systems and structures, tend to muffle positive messages promoted through community-based programs, mentors, and old heads. Maleek describes the individuals who influenced him throughout his life, for better or worse, and emphasizes the multifacetedness of each individual’s identity. Ultimately, this conversation serves to humanize those so often demonized, complicate deficits-based narratives about those deemed “bad” and provide insights into the influential and often conflicting roles of mentors and environments.

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Transcript

Maleek: [00:00:00] Please listen carefully. 

Abbie: [00:00:02] Welcome to critical conversations. My name is Abbie Henson and I'll be the one conversing with our guests. And I also serve as an assistant professor in the school of criminology and criminal justice at Arizona state university. After the killing of George Floyd, my social media blew up.

I kept seeing posts and reposts as stories, all about criminal and social justice issues. However, much of what I was seeing were just. Flat words that lacked voice and depth and nuance. And so I wanted to create a space where those words could come alive. I wanted to engage in dialogues with people who had actually been impacted by the criminal justice system, whether through their own experience research or both, I felt this was the moment to think critically to examine the complexities of our system in place today.

And to figure out how to move forward in a way that allows for equity through justice. So I started hosting live webinars, both in an attempt to have the audience be active participants either by raising their hand and joining the conversation, or by contributing a question to the chatbox and to also build a sense of community and togetherness in a time when we were.

So isolated through quarantine. So all of the episodes that you're about to hear on this podcast are converted from those lives streets. And while it can be really overwhelming to think about how to change a massive system, that seems so ingrained in the fabric of our society by participating in these conversations.

And yes, You just listening to this podcast is participating. That is where we see true change beginning. Hey everyone. Thank you so much for joining me in this critical conversation with Malique Jackson, owner of Malique Jackson fitness boxing gym in Philadelphia. Malik spent 10 years in prison from ages 16 to 26.

And in today's episode, we contextualize criminal behavior interrogating how, for those in the streets, it's not about right or wrong, but about doing what you need to do to survive with the opportunities available. We examine the environment in which behavior deemed criminal is occurring and discuss how chaotic environments.

Resulting from racist systems and structures tend to muffle positive messages, promoted through community-based programs, mentors, and old heads. Malique describes the individuals who influenced him throughout his life for better or worse and emphasizes the multifacetedness of each individual's identity.

Ultimately this conversation serves to humanize those so often demonized complicate deficits based narratives about those deemed quote unquote bad and provide insights into the influential and often conflicting roles of mentors and environments. I hope that you enjoy this episode feeling engaged and please as always continue the conversation.

Once the episode is up. 

Maleek: [00:03:22] Thanks for having me. My name is Molly Jackson, South Philly, South of native all my life, a gym owner. I've been in the fitness industry now for about seven years. Same amount of time. I've been home prior to that, I was a gym freak. I got playing hobbies. My first love is boxing. My second love is dancing.

Um, I don't know why I can't dance, but just a little bit about myself and who I am and, um, a little insight into my personality. 

Abbie: [00:03:50] So you grew up in South Philly. You are one of how many siblings? 

Maleek: [00:03:56] I got nine brothers and 

Abbie: [00:03:58] four sisters. Okay. So nine brothers and four sisters. So where do you fall in line? Yeah.

So tell me, tell us a little about just what it was like growing up in your community, who were the people that you looked up to in your family, outside of your family and why? 

Maleek: [00:04:19] I was raised by my aunt. So my, I had one child of my own. And she raised about nine or so, and my mom kids. So my mom was on drugs and my father was on drugs.

Um, and my aunt took us out. So that was my situation, like come in from the get-go. So, um, you can kind of imagine that so far. And then to all my other siblings and one household, the priority was education, but not so much of. Pushing it through the system, like my Maisha, we went to school to make sure, um, we have the, essentially the necessities that we need to survive in life and it was the bare minimum.

So that was our situation growing up. And of course, then you're in this environment. That's so toxic. When you grow up in an environment like that, you become. You become part of that environment. And so you start to emulate and imitate the things that's around you and there's no, it's really no goddess to know what's right.

And what's wrong. It's like what you have to do to survive. And that becomes what right. What's right. And what's wrong. Right. Um, and so that was, that was what led me to. Get involved in to the things I got involved to a life of crime rivalry, selling drugs, smoking, weed, doing all the things that would ultimately lead me up to my incarceration.

Abbie: [00:05:45] Right. So you characterized your neighborhood as toxic. Why, what, what, what do you feel like made it toxic? 

Maleek: [00:05:54] I mean there's no, there's like a war zone. And it's only toxic. It's only toxic that you only know that it's toxic after you leave it and come back. As long as you understand what I'm saying, you grew up in an environment that is, um, it's like a jungle.

You become, you become the jungle or whatever you need to survive in the jungle, whatever, whatever title or whatever, where you fit. To see that you, you know, you see the next day, you see the next book, you see the next to know. And that's what I mean by being toxic. It's no way that you should bring the child up that, um, a child should go without food should go without education and things like that.

Abbie: [00:06:35] Right. So I think something that you said that was so important to note is that. It wasn't about right or wrong. It was about surviving or not. And I actually, in another conversation I had with Dr. Yasser pain, we were talking about the idea of resilience and how resilience is often. Value-laden like we think of someone who's resilient as someone who's doing the right thing as someone who's doing the moral thing.

But really if we break it down, the idea of resilience. Is just someone enhancing their survivability. So choosing to deal drugs, choosing to Rob is a resilient act in this, what you're saying, a toxic environment, where this is what you have to do to a feel supported by the people around you doing the same things, to feel a part of a community, and then to also get what you need to survive.

Maleek: [00:07:34] It's like, it's like, it's like the saying, like you was right, but you was wrong. Like you had to do what was right. The Avenue you took 

Abbie: [00:07:42] was wrong. People that you came across that influenced you to Rob or to smoke weed or to do any of these things. Like where did you learn it from? Who did you see doing it?

Maleek: [00:07:59] Me, Robin people growing up. I, I seen everybody do it. I was never influenced by it per se. I always had my own mind. So anything that I did was through my own judgment. Of course it was from what I seen, but I was never, nobody could tell me, Hey, do this, do this, do this, do this. And I was so proud of person to do such because I'm not, I'm not easily influenced.

I never been, always had my own mind, but as far as like me getting into robbery, it was a, um, the incident that, that happened. Um, when I was about 15 on new year's and I came home probably like three in the morning left, my kids knocked on the door, knocked up, was trying to get into my house, knocking on the door and turned around.

And a guy had gotten in my face and robbed me. And he took everything by my pockets, all the money that I, and my cell phone, he even take my, my, my code that motivated me. I dare somebody to do that to me, I'm going to do that to somebody else. So my motivation to being around people was different because when I did for money, I sold drugs.

Also, we, as far as robbing people, I didn't really do it for me. I had a different reason for doing it. 

Abbie: [00:09:05] Right. And I think again, when we talk about what's right, and what's wrong, right? Like we have to also note that what's deemed wrong and punishable is malleable. And the fact that you were dealing weed, which is now decriminalized and legal in some States, right?

Like this isn't inherently a moral act that you were doing. And it's important to note that. 

Maleek: [00:09:32] Yeah. I mean, that's true. We know where the injustices is. Um, and we can say we can save them today. Uh, with the, um, with the marijuana business is legal. Now you can make millions and millions of dollars, but you know, some odd years ago, you know, the vast majority of people that was getting penalizing from laws, for people who were like me, So we already know that those things is there and we try to, that's what we try to clean up.

And we try to hope that people wake up in 2020 was a big enough year for people who were like, Oh, y'all see what's going on. And all the back has to be, you must be having conversations like this 

Abbie: [00:10:07] again, just trying to think about the role models that played into your life in your adolescence and prior to your incarceration, like, why do you think certain people.

Were influential in your community. Why, who, who were the people that you thought had power? 

Maleek: [00:10:28] The guys that had money, the guys that had cars, the guys who had all the girls. And then people that may, that went out in may away from them, like that went out of may away from themselves. And I don't life right.

Due to the situation. When you grew up in the hood and you don't have nothing, you see somebody with a nice car and you're like, there's no opportunities. And the other, you starting to look at what opportunities they seek to get to get through. They got that become your goals that become your, um, what you want to do with yourself when you grew up.

That's why people. That's why we, that's why we love the right thing. That's why we love rappers. That's why we love. That's why we love the things that we love. And we idolize the people that we idolize because in our community where we come from, they represent somebody totally different from the other side of the wall of America.

Everybody 

Abbie: [00:11:21] else is looking through. Right. And I think something that I've heard too is like the. Black academics and lawyers and doctors, those who are also making money and have opportunity are not visible in those communities. Right? Like they're not living, they're not living there on. And so the people who you have access to visibly who are the ones that you're going to look up to, because they're close to you, they're proximate to you.

Maleek: [00:11:52] Right. And not only that though, you always look at there's no opportunity. There's no opportunity. So for the people that create opportunity, they, they, they become the people that people are Meyer, the drugs, getting our neighbors out of getting our neighborhoods. And then once they get in our neighborhoods, we gotta make a living.

So they always criminalizing us for what we do. And there's never a little backlash for how the drugs out in our communities. And we gotta survive. And we ain't saying this right. We're and saying this wrong. I mean, my mother was on drugs. My mom smoked drugs. 

Abbie: [00:12:28] When we think about again, like going back to this notion of resilience and thinking about the values that we place on certain actions and activities, when we think about what's right and wrong, like when we call someone resilient, who's, you know, quote unquote made it out of the hood and is quote unquote doing the right thing.

It's almost like we're saying. Man you you've done so well with the trauma. We've imposed on you, you know, like we're going to work, we're putting it on you, right? Like you were putting it on you. You're going to have to figure it out. And if you figure it out one way, we'll applaud you. If you figure it out another way we'll demonize you, but either way in order to survive, you have to figure it out.

So, okay. So then you get incarcerated when you're 16. Tell me about the bus ride up to prison 

Maleek: [00:13:24] when you locked up? I mean, well, not got locked up. My son was eight to 16, so it was a minimum of eight years. Um, a maximum 16 years in prison for the crimes that I committed, um, which I was spend 10 years of, of that time period is numb.

It's not my main, you don't remember a ride except for, you know, staying out the window. It's like having a distant memory. I don't, in my case, um, the discretion is this is this blurred. Is this me shackled up? Me? This man, me being young so far for a life and just like, Having those thought paths looking out the window and just like being like wild, be wild about my situation.

And you know, they know me for a number of years. 

Abbie: [00:14:11] What do you think snapped you out to feel again? Well, 

Maleek: [00:14:15] more and more when I was locked up, lost a lot of, um, a lot of family members to the streets. There's a vine where in my, myself, or what I'm going to do upon entry in society. And that's a big question cause I was still coming home young, even though I did a substantial amount of time in prison.

I was still going to be a young man with a whole lot of life to live. And if I was to, um, you know, To get into the thoughts of, you know, revenge and the things that drove me to the prison in the first place. If I was to keep on having those thoughts and keep on being that, that type of person, then living a, a, um, a substantial and a fulfilling life was like this out the window, because I had so many hands that was the ball from this looking at guys that was coming in and doing two years long, go home coming back.

Coming back to prison with a life sentence because they didn't, they XYZ. I just looked that day and I just wanted more for myself. So, you know, I just started working towards a bigger goal. So to say, 

Abbie: [00:15:20] what did working towards a bigger goal look like 

Maleek: [00:15:24] personal development? Like. Self-reflection um, who employed my, I found out who am I?

What's my license. What's my dislikes. What's my Thomas was my goals. How can I monetize that? And stuff like that and finding my strengths and my weaknesses, um, ironing, my strengths and trying to build my weaknesses as strong as possible. So that's what, that's what that whole, that whole phase look like.

Abbie: [00:15:46] Did you come to that on your own or did you have people in your ear helping you along the way? 

Maleek: [00:15:52] Right. No, I mean, you still have as a teacher, um, I was just lucky enough to, um, a lot of people, a lot of people took a liking to me and I always tell people that, Oh, I asked one of my good friends and brother ties.

She took me on his own. When I first met him, we met him present and we became the best of friends and he was years older than me. He had experienced. The life experiences that I didn't have, we talked a lot. So he knew a lot about me personally. Taj used to have me work on the way I thought. And for example, right.

He came to me one day. He said he was going home tomorrow. You know what you're going to do when you go home. So I'm like, I don't know what you mean. You know, I'm like, I don't know. But th the question, you know, is selling me and that was scary. I'm like, damn dope. I'll be right back. All right. I'll be right back.

All right. So that's when that whole process really started. Cause he was like, I, I want you to, he used to give me like more little exercises to do. I want you to, um, show me how you can spend a thousand hours. All right. Cool. Now show me how you can make it though, as long as well, working with traditional non five, because when you go home, that's going to be the hardest thing to do because.

You want to come in and work it. So those things, those have exercises news conversations about, yeah. It's helped me develop a sense of what I wanted to do based around what I was already talented at, what I had a love for him, desire and a passion passionate dude. And that's what sports, the sport of boxing, anything that had to do with combat fight, because I took karate as a kid.

And as I recall. Oh, these life lessons, boxing and karate and combat has always been a part of my life. Like he would organize, organize a Fort Fort in the streets for a school for the playground for anywhere I could write fighting was like breathing before. Right. That's where that mindset came from type I've exercised with tops.

Abbie: [00:17:59] Did you ever have anyone before your incarceration? Like, were there any teachers, any people in the community who. Encourage you to think that way? Like, did you have anyone who is asking those kinds of questions who was interested in your perspective on that? 

Maleek: [00:18:18] Yeah, we had, we had people like that in our community.

Like a lot of our teachers, Mr. Adams, a lot of Mr. Bingham, a lot on teachers, even my own, my own teachers, um, parents and, Oh, here it is. I'm from only, but they got us as the best as the best they could. I mean, but you gotta understand my situation. I got locked up when I was 16, so I wasn't listening to nobody that sent me down.

So it tells you the first person that had really had the opportunity to sit with me for years. And this is years, years, years, and years, this is not no one day thing. And the thing about president president is you have zero outside influences. So when you're out in the world, I can tell you something, but it's.

Everything else won't swallow up. And if I'm not hitting you, I'm like, if I'm not hitting you with that same information, Tom and Tom lawn, and they got to be hit hard than whatever set you on the outside, then ultimately you're going to be overpowered by that if you're not strong within yourself. So my situation was kind of unique.

Abbie: [00:19:21] So I think something that's really important that you're saying, I really like how you just said that, that those messages have to hit harder than that, which is going on around you. And I think that is why. When we keep trying to implement these programs, like, you know, big brother, big sister, any other kind of mentorship program.

It's so difficult for those programs to hit hard enough when you're not addressing the unstable housing when you're not addressing addiction in the community, when you're not addressing the difficulty of finding a nine to five or breaking into the mainstream, right? Like. These programs can only do so much when they're all of these systemic issues, pushing you to the place where you would have to deal drugs in order to survive.

Right? Like it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how many times someone says do the right thing, do the right thing, do the right thing. If you're hungry, you're going to figure out how to eat. Even if, even if you have that belief that this isn't the thing that I necessarily want to be doing. Growing 

Maleek: [00:20:31] up in an urban and urban cultures.

So like relatable to everything. Like, because if you don't take your job away and you got to do something that's against your values, it might go against your character. You fit. Your daughter, your son to make sure your mortgage payments is straight, right? What's the chances you're going to do that.

Right? You're going to do that. Most people execute on those thoughts, right? If the, if the situation is dire enough and that's like, okay, if life gets tough, but life never gets up. So we ain't gonna play with what, what else? What about the people that the, what else is there every day? No, this is what we got to go.

When you go out the door and you ain't, you is when you hold your own, the way you're going to eat. 

Abbie: [00:21:14] Right. And I think something for me, when you just said that my initial reaction was, well, I have people to fall back on who would be able to support me because they have that generational wealth from.

Being a product of white supremacy. Right? Like, and, and so if you're in a position where you have generational poverty, because again, a system of white supremacy, then exactly, how can you, who would you lean on? And if the people that you're leaning on are the people who are the ones creating opportunity in these toxic environments, then what are they doing?

Maleek: [00:21:50] And I'm glad you, um, you said that because. That's the, the mindset is already, there is nobody to lean back on so that you say, you know, hold up. Let's let's let's let's backtrack. Let me hit mom up to mid dad up. Let me see what I can have this account. It's better even cross, cross our minds. 

Abbie: [00:22:13] So, all right, so we got Taj in prison.

We got anyone else who takes you under their wing. I know you said that there was. There was a boxing coach. Well, he wasn't necessarily a boxing coach, but tell us about him 

Maleek: [00:22:30] Brown. And I came out of a hole for fire, 

Abbie: [00:22:34] explain to our listeners and viewers what the hole is. 

Maleek: [00:22:38] It's the prison within a prison that you get penalize for when you break the rules court on a court off.

So that's what the old is. So it's. There's a cell. I don't know, five by seven cell with it, with a car it in the light. They don't go off all night. I went to the hole for fighting in the pond, on my release from it. The way, a postman in the prison yard. And he's just like, Hey man, like I see you always fighting all the time.

Um, you should let me train you. You know, you know, he actually was out boxing. I'm like, no, I'm not a box. I'm not a fight dog. Always been in the gym and my brothers, um, he used to always do practice stuff with me, but I ain't, I ain't no boxer. He's like, well, you got the facebow box. So, you know, just let me train you.

And that's how. Develop a love for training people in boxing, boxing training. Right? So, but lose training, you become a box and he was a strong influence in my life. And I'll tell you a story that, um, He was about to be released from prison. And we was walking to the prison yard. I was going to be released shortly afterwards.

We had this whole goal. Cause I'm like, when I come home, this is what I'm going to do. This, that third we've been trading for some gears. So I need you just as much as you need me. So that's, that's what the conversation's about. Right. I stopped on the track as we was talking and I turned to him. I said, you know, what guarantee can you get me that once you go home, you won't.

Where we from the plan, Alinea, all this stuff, right? And he looked at me, he said, always not always, no guarantees. That's still life. You gotta live your life. You know, what I do is my life. And that always stuck with me. Always. It always stuck with me. It shows you that you got to be an individual and you don't follow nobody.

Now, no road. Yeah. So that's, that's one of the things that, um, that Lou Brown, he was very influential in my life. No, my incarceration just as well as sides. 

Abbie: [00:24:42] So you said earlier that fighting was breathing. Do you feel like. When he was training you, and then you also had Taj in your ear that this was a time where you were just like almost in a moving meditation that you were just like on this path.

And, and how do you think if so, how do you think we create those conditions outside of prison? Is it possible. I 

Maleek: [00:25:14] think that tides with tides and Lou Brown did for me was they spoke life into me. And because I was already, um, a young man who wanted so much more insane, so much, right. That, um, being in prison at a young age, is it kinda like.

Shouted me, I'm away from a lot of, a lot of things. So I wasn't exposed to a lot of things such as a party in and stuff like that. So my discipline levels. So I think that having those two guys in my every day, for years, yes. And not wanting to let them down and then don't believe in him believing in me and to my, my belief system kicked in.

It was, it was 

Abbie: [00:26:00] amazing what you just said, them believing in you. I think that is a key to like anything that we do in the community. So often the programs that we're talking about that are supposed to help kids in the inner city are starting by saying, okay, You're at risk. You're either going to be your problem or you are a problem already.

And so you're already in their head saying you're already criminalizing them. You're already demonizing them. It's almost like this backhanded compliment of like, we believe in you because you're likely going to be a problem and we're going to try and fix you. And so I think we have to think about a way to.

Creates programs and create mentorship. That is just it's, it's just believing in someone rather than having to take someone under their, under a wing because they're statistically more likely to be a problem. 

Maleek: [00:27:08] I agree. I agree. I think, um, that we should look towards resources and we should look towards programs that can help neutralize and bring and bring those things into fruition.

And especially the way we label people and how we talk to our youth is very important. You know, kids is firstly from older kids. I mean, I don't know. I don't know how people used to talk to talk to me when I was out. I remember it. Growing up and knowing that being black was going to be an issue for me, it wasn't coming from like, Hey, you know, you got to watch out because this would be you all in the streets and people would treat you a certain type of way.

And he talks to you. It's unbalanced pipe. So I think the way we speak to our youth is very 

Abbie: [00:27:53] important. Yeah. I think that's such a good point. And I I'd be curious what that lesson was, what you just said about. Being told about how your blackness would affect the way that you would move through the world and how people would respond to you.

Who, who were the people, having those conversations with you and what were they saying less than Bain 

Maleek: [00:28:21] was a schools. Um, security guy. He was a sharp, sharp old man. Right? Everybody used to love him pants. Nice suit, nice Gator shoes. And we haven't seen this. Right. So you also used to tell his jokes and everything.

So, um, he's always telling us like, yo, we got one strike against you, black, you know? So you got to get your education. You got to do X, Y, Z. And the school that I went to, I went from kindergarten to eighth grade and then I went to us. So he worked all the time. So this is Rama reinforcing these types of conversations since when he was a young and.

So we grew up until we leave, um, you know, the school and go to another school. So that's why I used to have those types of names from you have 

Abbie: [00:29:07] these people in the community. You're looking up to them because they're creating opportunity with the limited opportunities that they have. Then we get to prison.

You. Have these two men who are mentoring you, who are in your ear, who are saying, they believe in you, who are changing your mindset, who are having you create a plan to come home. I think something too that's important is that men will say often men will say prison saved me. And for me, that doesn't necessarily demonstrate that our criminal justice system is right.

It shows that our. Structures and systems that are creating a toxic environment in the community are wrong, right? Like if prison is the place of solace for you, then that's a problem 

Maleek: [00:29:59] we understand, um, from what context is being said. 

Abbie: [00:30:03] So then you get out you're 26, you're riding up to the prison. You're numb.

You're coming home from prison. What are you feeling? 

Maleek: [00:30:15] Oh, man, I come home from prison. Yeah, you kind of like get lost in the world if you get everything, because it's like so much stuff coming at you and that you gotta regather yourself. So it was like, just like feel the excitement and just like, just like amazed.

Uh, to be honest, I was just amazed about it. It was like, life was so fast. You know, you come from a place where it's like, there's no cars, people walk in and people talk and you don't. You don't talk to people in prison like that keep your mouth closed. Right? So unless you let's, you normal force type of bond.

So, you know, you got to going back to society and be social with people. So you gotta learn how to do that. You gotta learn how to be open to having conversations with people to say, like, how did he work? Like, how are you going to get to know some of that basic stuff? But. Those are the things that you are the proud from when you, I mean, the problem dub when you're in prison and people don't look at it like that.

So when a person say that he might think a person talking crazy, but it's not, it's not crazy about what's going on. You know, when you take a person, you ma you box them in, you know, and you take them out that box. You know, it's somebody, they see some of the same things for, for the first time in a long time.

So they got to get acclimated 

Abbie: [00:31:35] to that. I just had this visualization of like, You being in a literal box and like your body morphing to that box and then the boxes taken away, but it takes time for your body to fully form back into its human shape. Right? Like as, as different experiences are coming at you, it's, it's, it's re forming who you are as a person.

Right. Okay. Then you start training at Joe Hans. Yes. 

Maleek: [00:32:09] Yes. It's not a training that Joanne's about, I want to say maybe six, six months as I came home. 

Abbie: [00:32:19] Who caught you when you came home, where did you live? 

Maleek: [00:32:22] Um, other than say that I grew up with, I mean, grew up in, excuse me. Um, across the street from the school, I lived on the same block that my school was on.

So. Do you know how like houses across the street from each other was one sidewalk houses and across the street is our school. So that school might work that for like 20 years, I think it was the elementary school that the neighborhood elementary school. And we, um, I went through my incarceration. So I went right back in the same environment to the same house, to the same room.

Abbie: [00:32:56] How was it returning to the toxic environment with this new mindset? 

Maleek: [00:33:03] It was, it was hard. It was hard in the sense of trying to, just trying to get ahead and trying to get everything right. Like just trying to find a placement, right? The stars need to do, when you come home till you get a job, I'm going to get a job.

Nobody will hire you. So, you know, um, The show, world being phone world, hasn't disciplined not to given to certain things and, um, just to make a living on a dollar. So those types of things is, is, is the issues that I faced when I came on. Um, how long, how I'm going, gonna make money, um, how I'm going to eat one more sleep.

And, you know, Baylor being a man, 26 years old, being a man wanting his own, you know, I wanna, I want to have this. I want to have that. I think I shared this. I think I said this at this age and having to sit myself and sit myself down and tell myself like, Hey steps, you gotta go. You gotta go through these steps.

You can't skip these steps. You skip these steps. You might, you might monitor back here. Those are the types of, um, Things that I face reentry back into my society. 

Abbie: [00:34:14] This is where it gets complicated, right. Because you're demonstrating them that it is possible to be in this environment and not engage in those activities, even when you're desperate.

So what. 

Maleek: [00:34:32] Only fair. So it doesn't make the environment fair. So you can't, you can't, you can't create a rhyme environment. Does tie the socks and it's like, So messed up and throw people in there and say, um, Oh yeah, this guy didn't do nothing wrong. So what we say about that, it's not the people in the environment, you know, does that, it's the environment, you know, um, some people for us, some people don't, some people don't, you know, I fell victim and I just happened to get up on my feet.

Some people not as strong as me, some people don't have the opportunities to get up when they feed, you know, I had a separate episode, I'm going to jail. I'm going to get killed by that. Killed the wife. You know what I'm saying? So. When you, when we talk about stuff like that, it's always, how do we change the environment then?

Second. How do we change the individual 

Abbie: [00:35:19] six months in you start training at Joe hands. Yes. And now you've had your gym for how many years. Okay. So you open your own boxing gym and you are now an entrepreneur who has. Created an opportunity for yourself that won't lead you back into prison. So do you feel as though you have become a mentor and how, what does that mean to you?

Do 

Maleek: [00:35:55] I froze, I froze. I became an example that people can pull from. That's that's, that's true with any walk in life, right? You talk about, um, uh, the story of triumph, how to overcome adversity. I mean, who can't relate to that, but 

Abbie: [00:36:11] are there like, are you still, cause I know that, you know, live outside of South Philly, do you still have connections?

Two younger generations in South Philly. Like, do you try and pull from your community to bring them up to where you are and train them? And like, is there any kind of connection? Cause I think what's hard is that when a lot of people want to break out, they leave and you can't knock them for leaving because who wants to be in a toxic environment, but that's what.

It's not on the person to change the invoice. It's not on a person, necessarily from the environment to change the environment. It's about these bigger systems and it's, it shouldn't be on the backs of those people. But do you feel like you had to cut ties in order to create a new life? Or do you still feel connected or what's that relationship like for 

Maleek: [00:37:07] you.

I still do with my people. Um, absolutely. Um, some of the, some, some of the people that, um, was negative was a negative influence in my life. Y'all might call the system. I should say, might call commerce is some, some people in my family. It's not a question of, do you go back and do you try to reach out and touch people?

Like I got family that's still active in the streets. I got nephews. That's still active in the streets. So for me to just sit back and act like. I came to a place where I can, you know, go back over the line and, you know, trying to touch them some, some young boys and some souls. I mean, I don't either. No, of course, of course, like, man, I'm, I'm an example is that was, I'm keep on doing this.

I do what I can. I do what I can. And when I say I do what I can, I mainly mean by about his ankle that I said. You understand what I'm saying? Because I'm still acting, you are still catching me playing basketball and some of the time, if I feel like I need, if I wanted, if I won the game real quick. Yeah.

I'll do as much as I can for the, um, for the 

Abbie: [00:38:15] community. What others would deem quote unquote criminals because yeah, or we're talking about people like Taj who were such a positive influence, but this is someone who went to prison, right? Like this is someone who would be considered a criminal. And, and so often we blanketly label these people and view them as solely bad influences or solely.

You know, negative people, but there's such complexity. And that's, that's really why I enjoy having these conversations because people really like to put things in pretty. You know, bow tied categories because it's easy. It takes work to think critically about these things. It takes work to understand that someone in prison can be, uh, an amazing mentor and challenge someone to be their best selves inside and coming out.

And, and I think it's important to note that, like you said, These people like the people that were labeling criminals are also family members, their brothers, their dads, 

Maleek: [00:39:30] they, some of the grades, they people live their life. According to the end that they was dope. And some for majority is unfair. It's unfair hand, you know, these are some of the people that's the most level, the most giving them any community going to protect you.

Right. This, you won't even have the businesses down the street. Don't even do that to you. That that doesn't make it all the money from the community. What's the, what I said, but so when you told him the character, the guys that's done with the things that they, they need to do to survive some of the most upstanding people in our community and it's reasons as to why.

Abbie: [00:40:10] Right, right. Absolutely. I think that's such an important point because again, it's, it's not about right or wrong. And, and most of the people who are quote unquote doing the wrong thing, no, like I've never. I've interviewed many people who are still involved in the streets and I've never met a crack dealer who thinks it's right to deal crack.

I've never met a dude who shot someone who thought it was good, good to shoot someone, right? Like there's, there's a, there's a cognitive understanding of, of right and wrong. These aren't people totally void of a moral compass. It's just dealing with the. Situation. And, and we have to understand that and stop blanketly, labeling people and taking a more holistic view of why people are engaging in these activities, 

Maleek: [00:40:59] dislike conversation like this.

Instead of talking about the problem, in addition to something about the promise, talk about the origin, another problem, and then we can get the understanding of Oh, snap. Now we understand why is this, why is this such a problem? Because it's the origin. So we try to take the origin, hopefully the prom book.

Abbie: [00:41:21] Especially in America where we live in such an individualized society. And it's so Protestant work ethic, pull yourself up by your bootstraps. We so focus on individual change rather than focusing on changing the environment in which people are growing and changing and learning. And so I think it's really important as we strategize on what to invest in and what to change.

It's not just. I just, I love what you said about the message having to hit harder than what's going on around them, because that is so true. Like we, as much as we can do for the individual, there's still going to be a struggle. And it's like what trauma outweighs, 

Maleek: [00:42:04] right? Yeah. Yeah. Because I mean, outside noise is always going to be more incapacitate than the inside noise.

So it don't matter if your mom, your dad said what to do, right. And what not to do right. When you go outside to outside forces, it's always incapacity. You go with your friends, just out doing things for in-store friends, hang out. Right. That's the things that, um, if the pharmacist is not as strong, as strong as the, as the, um, as the voices.

Abbie: [00:42:35] To tie everything together that we've spoken about tonight in thinking about the influences that are coming at you when you're young, right. Thinking about how to survive, having a moral compass, but also again, doing what you need to do. You, you were living in a home with 11 children, right? Two of your aunts and nine of you.

Yeah, there's a lot going on. You're enduring generational trauma through your parents' addiction. There's there's a lot going on. And so I think we need to, it's so important to contextualize because if we didn't have this conversation, right. Like, and someone and. Malik Jackson applied to a job and they didn't know this story and they saw your criminal record, right?

Like we have to contextualize people beyond just what they look like on paper, especially with a criminal record, you know, like we have to understand that your story is not unique. Most people is not most people in prison. Right? Most people in prison have endured very similar circumstances as you have.

And so when we think about who's in prison, it's the most traumatized, the poorest people, the people who have been marginalized. And that's not to say they're the weakest people, but it's the people who have been dealt a hand that has inherently criminalized 

Maleek: [00:44:08] them. That's true too. And then just looking for like ways that the outside influence can, the voice can be shut off.

We don't need to have like mental health programs. You know, you all think a God has spent 10 years of his life in prison, generally speaking. Right. Because my situation is not unique. Right? You only thing, a guy who's spent 10 years of his life, a present by adolescent to, um, a young adult or for adults.

Right. You come home and put them back in society. God never been. And you got millions of juveniles across America. That's similar to my situation and I know thousands of person. Right. So, so we talked about gearing up programs, mental health programs. How do they get dealt with, with every entry in back, back into society and things like that?

Um, suicides people spend years and years and years in solitary confinement. No, they get medication. That's how they, Oh, Oh, Oh, take this medication. You'll be okay. As far as like common outside voices and find a balance and how we can try to, um, neutralize the situation, having those mentors and having mental health programs in play.

In society, it'd be a big deal change, I think in my opinion. 

Abbie: [00:45:29] Yeah. Yeah. Not only for those reentering, but also before, right? 

Maleek: [00:45:33] Like yeah. It before, as you said 

Abbie: [00:45:36] before. Yes. Right? Like you didn't, you've witnessed people close to you die. Yeah. 

Maleek: [00:45:44] Yeah. So my brother gets shot right in front of my face when I was seven years old.

Numerous people get shot before I, I even turned 14 years old. So. 

Abbie: [00:45:55] But you were just always the kid who was fighting and no one goes good. Right. So there was a 

Maleek: [00:46:01] reason there's always a reason. Right. 

Abbie: [00:46:04] But did anyone ask, um, 

Maleek: [00:46:07] well, I used to fight so much. Yeah. Uh, no, I just liked to fight. I like to fight. I mean, I fought for, for, for reasons that you shouldn't fight for like, Kids don't fight other kids, but when you growing up in the streets, I just learned to fight.

So if you decide to tell me the first thing I want to do is fight. It's like, it's like dressing up for me. It's like, when you go get your hair, now you look good. I look good when I fight, I wanna fight. That's what I wanna do. I wanna fight. So that's why I fight. It was such a big part in my life. Cause I just, I just like to combat so much.

I was in karate. I was probably active, um, in the streets. Every type of social event, I think before, afterwards, 

Abbie: [00:46:54] A rumble, a duel after the event.

Right? So services, environment breaking up, dualisms understanding complexity, understanding everyone has a story. I think. Your story has really highlighted all of that. And so I really appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you so much for participating in my critical conversation with Malique Jackson. I thought Malik's point about how chaos tends to overpower positive messaging was so important when thinking about where change needs to occur.

I think it's important for us to understand and acknowledge that an individual can very well know right from wrong, but we'll still do what he or she has to do with what's available in order to support themselves and their family. I also really appreciated Malick's perspective on the problematic ways in which people who made it out of the chaos in an acceptable or legitimate way are used.

As examples as Yasser said, in the last episode, these individuals are statistical anomalies. Who were often provided some opportunities, not often provided to others. And as Malik explained, putting the responsibility to get out of the chaos on the individual, allows the chaos to persist. If we are to applaud individual resilience and successes, we need to simultaneously denounce the systems and structures requiring resilience and cultivating frequent failure.

I thought Malise description of. Prison as a place to shelter him from potential murder or chaos. And as a place to finally take a breath was really interesting. And as I've explained in previous episodes and experience that eternally stigmatizes, criminalizes, and limits, you should not be the only option for solace.

And if it is that says something more about the conditions of the community. Then the functioning of prison. Next, episode's going to be a little different. I'm going to do a short bonus episode, synthesizing the last 10 episodes, identifying the consistent threads throughout and discussing the key takeaways from each thinking about how to move.

Forward with the information we've gained from these conversations. I hope you'll tune in, expect new episodes every other Monday. And don't forget to subscribe rate, and please leave a review. I really look forward to reading your feedback. I'm Abbie Henson, and this was critical conversations.