08/04/2025
DETROIT, MI - Brandon Ware, 18, and William, 19, were arrested last Wednesday after an investigation by the Detroit Police Department into the drive by killing of a precious 4 year old baby boy. This story is both tired and demonic.
Detroit’s Children Are Dying. Let’s Talk About Who’s Killing Them.
This week, once again, Detroit mourns the death of a child. This time, a 13-year-old girl shot down in her own city, her life ended before it even began. And while we mourn her, while we grieve the promise extinguished and the future lost, we must also face a terrible truth that too many are too afraid to name out loud:
The killers are young Black men.
Yes, I said it. Because not saying it changes nothing. Not saying it only allows this rot to fester beneath the surface, cloaked in silence, misdiagnosed by fear. Over 90 percent of these killings are carried out by males between 14 and 30…..young, Black, confused, and angry. And unless we confront that head-on, unless we ask why, these funerals will continue.
This is not about condemnation. It’s about context. It’s about understanding the pathology we helped create. These young men aren’t born broken. They are born into a country, state, and city that made them this way and left them there. Born into fractured households, where the only thing more absent than structure is a father. Raised by women who, many times, are doing their best while fighting their own battles, but sometimes are simply unable, and/or sadly unwilling to intervene.
By the time these boys are teenagers, they’ve already been suspended, expelled, labeled. They’ve already learned that the system has no place for them unless it’s a jail cell or a grave. They are told they can be anything, but ultimately shown they are nothing.
And into that void steps rap, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, screaming at them that they are only as valuable as the money in their pocket, the girl(s) on their arm, the car they drive, and the gun they flash. These platforms and angry demonic rap lyrics become the new fathers, teaching young boys how to “be a man” without ever being one.
So they hustle. They steal. They kill. Not because they are inherently evil, but because they are starved of love, guidance, purpose. And because they’re terrified of being broke, of staying broke, of being stuck in neighborhoods that at times feel like war zones while the rest of the world flexes riches on their phones. They don’t want to survive. They want to thrive. And no one’s ever told them that there’s a difference.
They see success as immediate, not earned. They don’t believe in work, they believe in “getting to the bag.” They believe the lie that says all you need is a little drip and a little hustle. And when that lie doesn’t pan out, they turn violent. Conflict arises and no resolution in site, besides the gun. Because the rage doesn’t go away. It just waits.
That’s how you get a child shot in her sleep, because some 19-year-old decided a drive-by was the answer to his beef. And the terrifying thing is, he doesn’t even feel it. Empathy? That’s for the weak. That’s what the nation and his rap idles taught him. That’s what social media reinforced. That’s what happens when the only thing you know about manhood is that it doesn’t include crying or caring.
So what do we do?
We stop throwing outdated solutions at a modern crisis. These young men don’t need basketball leagues. They need income. They need skills that put cash in their hands. Real training, real jobs, real plans with real results. They need mental health services that meet them where they are: angry, confused, traumatized, and pull them out. They need mentors who have been them, not saviors who pity them.
But most of all, they need us to see them, not just as criminals or statistics, but as sons we failed to raise, brothers we left behind, futures we forgot to protect.
And if we don’t change that, if we keep pretending this isn’t a war, if we keep ducking the hard conversations, we will keep burying our children. I have penned a plan that unites the amazing organizations and individuals working in this space to convene and plan. To share resources. To launch a strategic and unified attack on this evil attached to our young men.
I’ve begged and pleaded on multiple posts for those of you who can connect us with the amazing organizations and individuals working in this space. Well, I am asking again. I am asking for them to set aside three (2) hours on Saturday, August 16th at 10am for a digital meeting in an attempt to unite in discussing a unified front in preventing the killing of our children, of our people.
