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Read the press release here.

Russell Simmons Teaches Youth to Meditate at Anti-Violence Event in Queens

By Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska | July 17, 2015 10:43am
 Simmons also announced a grant for local anti-violence program LIFE Camp.  
Russell Simmons Teaches Youth to Meditate at Anti-Violence Event in Jamaica
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QUEENS — Hip-hop entrepreneur Russell Simmons came to South Jamaica Thursday to support a local anti-violence initiative and to teach area youth how to meditate.

Simmons, who grew up in nearby Hollis, came to a peace event held at I.S. 72 Junior High School in Rochdale Village, a neighborhood in which several people were shot in recent months.

He met with about 300 campers between the ages of 8 and 17 from South Jamaica and Far Rockaway, as well as volunteers for LIFE (Love Ignites Freedom through Education) Camp, a South Jamaica-based anti-violence program.

Simmons, who has been practicing yoga for about two decades, asked everyone to meditate for seven minutes by closing their eyes and repeating a simple mantra based on the word “rum” to quiet their minds.

“When the mind is quiet, you can learn, you can excel,” he told the young people. “When the mind is noisy you can’t do nothing.” 

Simmons has, in the past, organized meditation sessions in various prisons and rehab centers.

"If all people meditated, the planet would be dramatically different," he said later. "It’s a very important tool for helping kids to learn, to be happy, to be adjusted."

Simmons also announced that his company RushCard, which offers prepaid debit cards, will donate $25,000 to LIFE Camp, led by activist Erica Ford. 

The group is one of several organizations nationwide that have developed successful models to reduce youth violence and will receive grants from RushCard this year.

Its volunteers, who wear orange T-shirts, the color which Ford said symbolizes peace, go to crime scenes and try to convince gang members not to retaliate against each other.

They also monitor local neighborhoods and try to engage young people in order “to slow them down from their anger and rage that have built inside of them and give them something else to do,” Ford said.

In the organization’s target area, which stretches between Sutphin and Guy Brewer boulevards and between 111th and 118th avenues, no shootings have happened since December, Ford said.

Recently, the group also started monitoring Rochdale Village, said Ford, whose organization received financial support from Simmons in the past.

The event also sought to connect local youth with police officers, who participated in the event. Some played basketball with LIFE volunteers. 

“We are playing this game not only because we want to beat NYPD, but to show that we can work together, we can have fun together and we can change the culture that exists in our community of both sides disrespecting each other,” Ford said.

Sgt. James Clarke of Patrol Borough Queens South was one of the lawmen shooting hoops. He said events like that can change attitudes. 

"The kids and the police officers see each other in a different light — instead of out in the streets they see each other playing ball, doing other things together and they see that they have more in common," Clarke said.

Simmons also said that investing in other local programs, such as teaching art, is another way to prevent violence. But he also spoke against putting nonviolent first-time offenders in jail, because that only “educates them in criminal behavior,” he said.  

Earlier that day Simmons, who is vegan, appeared at another event during which, according to published reports, he advocated for animal rights, criticized the mayor for not banning horse-drawn carriages and stirred controversy by comparing animal abuse to slavery and the Holocaust.