The Freedom Writers Diary: Another World Just Outside Our Doors

Reading The Freedom Writers Diary has completely changed my view on America. I always hear stories on the news and in school about the horrible violence going on in other countries. I am constantly hearing about the monstrosities occurring in Uganda with Invisible Children and about the ongoing attacks in nations such as Iraq and Afghanistan. It is rare, however, that I hear stories of the violence occurring within my own nation. I live in a safe, upscale community where I don't have to worry about being shot on my way to school or gunned down at the gas station. I am blessed to live in such a sheltered community but I let that make me ignorant of the violence and heart break that kids my age, in my country, and even in my state, are suffering from. The Freedom Writers Diary has opened my eyes to the reality of this nation. The students who wrote this book were fighting a war. Not a war like the ones going on overseas in Africa or Iraq, but the kind of war that goes undeclared and ignored by the government. A war where kids are killing kids for no other reason than the color of their skin, their family's origin, or their religious affiliations. All across America, gang violence is taking the lives of hundreds, even, thousands, of innocent children. This is a world that I never was able to understand, and perhaps never will be able to if I never experience it first hand, but thanks to these students' incredible bravery and willingness to open up to complete strangers, I am able to understand this undeclared war among America's youth better than ever before.
Within the first few diary entries, it became clear that the teenagers I was reading about were experiencing a completely different adolescence than I had ever known. It was an entry from a young boy, talking about the death of his best friend. One of the most frightening parts of the entry was that this was not a shocking and tragic event in his community. I learned this right off the bat when he wrote that "Someone said, 'Not another one,' while his friends were swearing that they would get revenge. 'An eye for an eye… payback's a bitch.'" (14). A young boy, still in the prime of life, had just been murdered and to the community it was just another death; another opportunity for violence. There have been several accidents in the last few years in Deerfield that have taken the lives of teenagers and almost every member of this town could say the name of the girl or boy who died, a brief description of who they were and what they were like, as well as the story of how they died. In Deerfield, the death of a minor is a tragedy that sticks with the community and is remembered for years. It was difficult to wrap my mind around the idea of this being a common occurrence in a neighborhood. The writer of this journal entry went on to describe the scene of the murder and what it was like to find his best friend dead. He wrote, "They didn't know that he was my friend and that he had this whole life ahead of him. He was gunned down for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I didn't pay attention to what they were saying. I just stood there, looking at my friend's blood on the floor. He had never harmed anyone is his entire life. What were his parents going to do? What was I going to do?" (15). Thousands of kids all across America see these kinds of sights in the first few years of their lives. They see their friend's blood splashed across the pavement and know that their best friend's life was taken simply to show that one gang has more power than another. One senseless death after another and it makes no difference to the person who killed them. I thank God that I do not have to live in this kind of fear of losing my best friends or my sister at any moment simply for crossing the street. I had only just begun reading the touching stories of Erin Gruwell's students, but already I could tell that this book was one that would stick with me; one that would teach me the truth about the nation I live in; expose me to the life I could have had simply by being born just a few dozen miles away, in the gang violence that destroys the youth of Chicago.