A Tale of Two Teens
By Keith Boykin, in pop culture
Wednesday, September 7 2005, 1:00PM
Michael Williams Jr. and Leon Hall probably never met each other. But the two Illinois teenagers, both black, have been in the news lately. Williams, 14, was murdered in Chicago last month and Hall, 15, disappeared in Belleville, Illinois during the same time.
Williams was last seen by his family on August 17. Some time after that, he was sexually assaulted and suffocated and then left on a street, 20 miles from his home, a place where he had never been before, according to his father. Williams's father believes his son was lured to the area by someone on a telephone chat line. The father believes his son was using chat lines because his cell phone bill was extremely high. The media have tiptoed around the issue of whether the chat lines were gay chat lines, but the local gay paper has already picked up on the story.
The younger Williams was a junior deacon at his church and was about to begin the eighth grade at Vernon Johns Community Academy, according to news reports. Now those dreams are forever dashed.
Meanwhile, further down state, another young black teen disappeared last month. His name is Leon Hall, and the 15-year-old boy has been missing from Illinois since early August. Hall disappeared from his home in Belleville, Illinois on August 3.
Leon Hall's disappearance may be completely unrelated to the murder of Michael Williams, Jr., but the two cases in the same state illustrate an important point. Our lives are still at risk.
If there's one unintentional benefit to the hurricane coverage, it's that the media have finally stopped obsessing over the missing white woman de jour and finally started paying attention to black people who are missing too. Thousands are missing in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. And many others are missing elsewhere.
If Americans has learned anything from the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina, I hope we have learned not to segregate our concern based on race. Black lives are just as important as white ones.
Sources
Comments conceal
Mel Smith
September 8 2005, 1:02PM
These stories make me very sad. It's possible that there is a serial killer stalking young black males. We have to be careful with these chat lines.
earnest hite
September 9 2005, 12:29AM
This young man was seeking out attention and the exploration of internal desires and curiosities. It has ended in a terrible tragedy of loss, shock and awe. This individual also was attempting to define himself and should remind every one of us of the struggles young men must assail in order to understand their emotions and behaviors.
While not explicity stated it is plausible that this young man found himself face to face with an individual who sought to violaste him sexually and leave him wisth on only a sock to sparsely cover his body.
Now that we have this report how do we come together to prevent further occurences.
The ultimate response is how we connect with young men who are in their developmental stages and what we each do to change our lives to reflect the perception of a safer community.
If we do what we always done will get what we always got. This life taken to soon will not be the last and we all must do more to lessen risk and end the madness.
Terry V.
September 9 2005, 5:05PM
Any situation such as this one is tragic, but it really brings a tear to the eye because this tradgedy involves a young man who had so much life ahead of him, only to have it "snuffed" out by some pyschotic individual. Was this a "hate" crime...who's to say?
As parents and adults , we need to educate our children...fully, about the dangers of perverts who lay in wait! Keep your young ones off of chat lines and the internet chat rooms!
These vessels are full of older, perverse people waiting to take advantage of our youth!
NancyP
September 9 2005, 10:08PM
Belleville is 225 miles from Chicago, as KB is well aware. The murders may or may not be related.
Still, I hadn't heard of the Belleville disappearance in the major newspaper on the St. Louis side of the bistate, Post Dispatch.
Regan DuCasse
September 10 2005, 5:39PM
dear god....this is horrible.
As someone who works with LAPD in the forensic photo unit and tries to study bias in reporting as well...is the sexual assault on this boy the only clue that this might involve a gay angle at all?
I need more info to draw a conclusion.
The questions I would raise are:
1. Is the media less interested because these are black youngsters?
2. How do the law enforcers want to see it? Would it matter if these kids were known to be gay at all? Would the parents want something like that revealed?
3. If this was a gay chat line, could straight men have been cruising it as well to look for gay victims?
4. What sort of sexual assault was it? Abner Louima was sexually violated too and it didn't involve the body parts of his violators.
Many still make way too much of the Jesse Dirkishing case as if there were some controlling influence by gay media or organizations.
But the truth is this:
Jesse Dirkishing's parents weren't willing to admit Jesse had gay tendencies, nor their own familial failures and dysfunction that made him vulnerable.
As a minor, the press and legal people involved could well have been gagged by the court and couldn't report on the case.
Dirkishing's murder was an accident, not deliberate, nor aimed at him BECAUSE he was gay, but because he was a vulnerable child, period.
When disseminating crimes against or by gay people, the public and the mainstream media are usually unable to make clear and concise analogies.
When it comes to crimes against children, even less so.
The gay press has a vested interest in accuracy, of crimes that may or may not have a gay angle.
The sad part is, investigators can't reveal all the evidence at hand to the press. It might compromise the case.
So it leaves the rest of us to speculate.
But it sure makes innocent gay men vulnerable to the whims of public fears and hostility.
Don Fraynd
September 11 2005, 2:27PM
This story deeply saddens me too. As an educator, I constantly wonder if we provide kids with environments where they can grow into the identities that are truly in their hearts. Michael was drawn into some very risky sexual behavior. If he did feel like he may be gay, did he have a society around him that let him know that it was OK and that he could lead a healthy and fulfilled life? Or, was he surrounded, (particularly as a young man of color) in a world that forbids such an identity? Whenever we have to push things under the surface, they come out in unhealthy ways. People who seek out the young as predators are sick whether they are gay or straight. I guess what I wish for most is that gay youth or those who are questioning may find healthy and supportive environments in which they can grow to healthy potential. I hold Michael and his family in my heart...