Use Your Mind: Matthew Jones Detroit Story of Rage, Redemption, and Fighting Racism with Wisdom

“Aneb and I met in 1974 when I was incarcerated in prison,” Matthew D. Jones Jr., LMSW, ACSW tells Detroit is Different—and from that first line, this episode becomes a masterclass in how Legacy Black Detroit culture survives, adapts, and teaches. Jones walks us from Black Bottom (“Chene & Gratiot”) to Forest & Van Dyke, where “seniors… looked out for the kids” and community love was “the normal process for black folks at the time.” He doesn’t dodge the hard truths: the “Big Four” police harassment, the anger it produced, and the 1966 case that changed his life—plus the haunting image of a military tank rolling through Detroit during the 1967 rebellion. But the heart of this interview is transformation: “the only way I was going to get out… was education,” reading thousands of books, earning degrees inside, and being guided by elders like Dr. Gloria “Mama Aneb” House. When a freedom fighter challenges him—“violence is not going to save us… use your mind”—Jones turns pain into purpose, and his memoir Fire in My Belly becomes a roadmap for our past and a strategy for our future.