Good spirits, like Sharif, upon emerging from prison,
feel much like the baby emerging from his mother's womb:
new to an amazing world, ready to grow and learn. 
He feels like the repentant sinner emerging from the baptismal pond: 
He is clean of sin; forgiven and embraced, and anxious to rejoin society.  

It's not Sharif that is the problem:
It is the society that he wishes to return to.  

WHAT IS A JOB TO YOU?  An annoying jangle of the alarm clock? Doing things you don't particularly enjoy? A paycheck at the end of a long week that keeps a roof over your head and food in your belly?

To Sharif, and other ex-prisoners who are determined to be productive, contributing members of the world around them, a job is so much more.  Gainful Employment is the difference between the survival of their dreams and being just another recidivism statistic. They would gladly wake up to the alarm, happily do whatever work necessary to earn their own paycheck, be more than willing to do anything it takes to make a new life.  

Have you have met Sharif - or someone like him?  Statistics are that one out of every 33 people you meet in this country have been in the system at one time or another, so whether you know it or not, yes, you've met someone like Sharif.  

Sharif committed a drug crime 10 years ago, and as good citizens are supposed to do, he paid his debt to society.  Now he's been released - no parole, full time served, and he is determined to make it to a productive place in society.  He's intelligent and eager and friendly.  So - full of hope and faith - he begins his search for a job to sustain himself in this wonderful new life.

Then he finds out its not going to be as easy as that.  While the self-righteous have told him that the end of his sentence meant the end of his debt, he finds out they've been lying.  There is no forgiveness, no welcoming back: to society he is just another criminal who's finished one sentence and is only waiting to begin another one.

For the past year, Sharif has taken every menial odd job he could find while pursuing a REAL JOB that could satisfy his basic physical needs. But every time he checks the snoopy little box that asks, "FELON?", he's been immediately rejected.

So, when Sharif filled out the form for AdvancePCS at the Campbell Texas Call Center, when he came to the little box that asks the question that always destroyed his chances, he sought legal advice.  "No", the lawyer told him, "You don't have to check the box unless your felony relates to the duties of the job you are seeking."

It's a telemarketing job, one you probably wouldn't even want, but it offered Sharif everything: gainful employment with benefits, a new beginning, HOPE, and by golly, HE wanted it.  So, he didn't check the dreaded box, he got the job and performed two weeks of dedicated work for them.  Then they found out he used to be a felon and fired him.

We tried to send dozens of letters of recommendation, but not only did they refuse to rehire Sharif, they also refused to give him his check for the honest work he had done for them.  Although that company behaved like the criminal Sharif once was,  Sharif is the one who is suffering.  

Thanks to them, he now continues his job search with his electric turned off, in jeopardy of having his rented space yanked from him, not knowing how he will be able to get to work everyday until the first paycheck comes, EVEN if he does get a job.  His belly is empty, he's scared, he's alone and he's still trying.  

When people like Sharif fail, we wrinkle our nose and say oh so smugly, "Once a criminal, always a criminal."  We'll gladly pay the $22,000 a year to send him back to jail, rather than give him a helping hand to stay out, because if he makes it, he will prove us wrong. 

What a society we have become!  We'll pray a thousand times in our own lives, "God forgive us", even as we feel content in refusing our forgiveness to anyone that ever offended us. All I can ask is who is the real criminal here?

If we don't want to look foolish when we cry for less crime, fewer criminals, we've got to make 'repaying your debt to society' mean something.  If a 'criminal' knows from the outset that nothing they can ever do is going to regain them an acceptable place, what reason do they have to make the effort?

What right does society have to complain about their criminals when they do everything possible to create and maintain them?  I want you to really think about what our hard-nosed attitude is doing:  I want you to listen to Sharif's words... 

"I'm feeling stressed as if I were in prison and the walls are closing in on me with each passing hour. I know things will change but right now it looks very bad, and I hate being in this situation and feeling this way. Please let me hear from you." 

Sharif and I talked, I nurtured, he regained the strength to keep going:

"I have a little good news, and that is, the landlord has agreed to give me till 03/09/02, to pay rent and I'm working on a payment arrangement with the utility company. Thus, I'll have a roof over my head and can try to get myself back on track. I've also filled out forms to return to college. I did receive an Express Mail from Charles Swan, so I do have some money which I've been using for food and transportation etc."

But he feels just like we would in that situation (I've been there - I know):

"Time's running out..." 

You and I and Sharif all know he could fill his empty belly by returning to the black market-street corner dealing that prohibition makes so profitable.  He's resisting that and we should be grateful.  Many in our position couldn't, many in his position wouldn't.  So when is someone going to give him a job?

Sharif's email address is amirsharif1@hotmail.com
His mailing address is: Lakeith Amir-Sharif
P.O. Box 853051, Richardson, Texas  75085-3051

If you want to help, feel free.  Gifts of Love are never wasted.  But most of all, what I want? When Sharif's story is told, I'd be most happy to find out he made it because 1. He didn't give up, and 2.  Society opened its arms! 

Only we can make it reality. Please rethink your beliefs about recidivism and why it happens. 

                 WHAT IS A JOB TO YOU?

Wednesday, March 06, 2002 1:24 AM 

WHAT IS A JOB? by Lakeith Amir-Sharif

Lakeith Amir-Sharif 
amirsharif1@hotmail.com 

A job is a method of survival. We all have a God-given right to survive (or do we?). If we all have a God-given right to a job, then denial of this basic human right is undeniably a denial of the right to life. Inside America, the right to survive isn't a right being enjoyed by all. For those jobs that are available, many of them do not provide adequate income upon which to survive. The God-given right we have as human-beings to survive is via a job that is free of oppressive and discriminatory conditions, and which provides adequate income for an individual to survive within the mainstream of the society in which we live.

When jobs that are free of such destructive conditions and which provide adequate income are not available, then, in order to survive, people are forced turn to other options, such as illegal jobs and illegal methods of survival. This is a basic human right, not a criminal act. The criminal act is in the creation and maintenance of a society (like north America) that does not provide "everyone" in society who wants to work with non-oppressive and adequate paying jobs so they can operate within the mainstream of the society; irregardless of the persons background. Those who create and support such an unjust society/system are the true criminals.

The establishment of employment with livable wages for everyone in the usa is needed more than any new crime/drug/terrorist bills or smart bombs and defense spending increases. Providing "real "jobs would drastically curtail crime, prison populations, homelessness, hopelessness, underemployment, unemployment and welfare case.

I've struggled hard and long since my release from prison, a year ago, for a chance to do well and turn my life around. It's hard to believe that dismissal from a job (due to my background )and lacking 300-400 dollars for rent and utilities would take me from being a happy, hopeful and content man, to a man that is hungry, homeless, and hurting inside with a pain I cant even begin to describe. Tell everyone, never ask why the suicide and crime rate is skyrocketing. Tell everyone don't bitch about repeat offenders and to hell with all those 1,2, and 3 strike laws because they don't mean a damn thing to a person who is forced to survive" BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY".

My name is Lakeith Raqib Amir-Sharif, and I am an ex-offender who began doing non-violent petty crimes to survive and care for my family. So yes, America, I am guilty; guilty of trying to survive.