June represents Gun Violence Awareness Month in the United States.
With the recent increase in mass shootings, this month is more important than ever. In the past few years, we’ve experienced mass shootings in night clubs, concert venues, schools, and churches. We’ve experienced shootings in nearly every place that should be safe.
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No child should be terrified to go to school, on the grounds of the fear of dying by gunfire. No person should be scared to go to places that are meant for joy and and happiness because of the fear of being the next to go in a shooting.
We need to talk about this now. I can’t even say we need to be better. I can only say we have to be better. It is far too late to assume things can be fixed at a later date.
The number of shootings in this country have become far too large to be ignored. The shootings will only continue to increase with more victims everyday if we don’t do anything.
Gun violence is beyond multi-faceted. It is correlated to gender, race, age, and beyond. But I want to speak about race.
Gun violence is racial. It is not just a matter of school shooters being predominately white males. It is a matter of Americans refusing to acknowledge that we prioritize gun violence cases with predominately upper class white victims.
Now don’t get me wrong, I believe we should prioritize every case of gun violence. But we have to talk about the elephant in the room.
The media doesn’t speak about the rates of gun violence for inner city kids. The media doesn’t speak about the Black students struck by the Parkland shooting. This must change.
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We must demand accountability from mass media. The movement to raise awareness of school gun violence didn’t start with the Parkland survivors. This movement started years before with inner city kids demanding action for schools that are unbelievably dangerous to learn in and homes that are often left behind.
The truth is I can’t speak on their experiences at the level I’d like to. I’ve had the privilege of learning in environments where I don’t have to worry over guns. I’ve had the privilege of going to a home safe from guns and poverty, and beyond. I’ve had the privilege of being lighter skinned and more prioritized in a society that prizes whiteness.
But I still want to do everything I can to help people recognize this issue. People like me, we have to use our privilege to help at every step.
Inner city youth and Black Americans and Latino Americans are impacted at a deeper level by gun violence than their higher income whiter counterparts. This is significant and this is a race thing. Why is it a race thing and not a mere coincidence?
Because to an extent, this is nearly an everyday reality for these youth. It has been a reality for the longest time but not once did the media take their concerns seriously. Not once did the laws even have room for change. Well not at least until, shootings increasingly had white victims.
You can disagree with me, I won’t stop you. But I can allow you the opportunity to see the evidence I set across to prove my point. You can tell me “oh since it’s just an inner-city, black thing, why should I take it seriously?” You should take it seriously because this is everyone’s problem. We are literally putting our youth, all of our youth, at risk by being picky about who gets coverage.
For inner city youth, gun violence isn’t just something that happens in schools. It is literally the world outside of school too. This is a problem. It is a problem when we experience gun violence inside and outside of schools, especially as youth. The amount of trauma that this sets across can be detrimental to their current quality of life and their futures.
CDC data also show that within our nation’s cities, Black Americans are, on average, eight times more likely to be killed by firearms than those who are white.
This is not just a “minority on minority crime” type situation. This is a matter of disadvantage that is frequently state mandated. The level of poverty among Black and Latino Americans is higher than White Americans. This isn’t because of outdated racist stereotypes. This is because opportunity has traditionally been more welcome to White Americans in the “land of the free.” Mass Incarceration impacts people of color the most. A majority of our incarcerated population are Black and Latino.
But also out of poverty stems crime and gang activity. Guns become a matter of need for self defense in lower income neighborhoods. We need to recognize this. But mistakes happen, innocent people get caught in the crossfire.
Shootings like the 2013 killing of 15 year old Hadiya Pendleton continue increasingly in urban areas like Chicago. Inner city gun violence needs to be just as much a priority when we speak about gun violence.
So I want to zoom forward a few years. In the recent year, Parkland has become a terrible mark on America’s bloody history with guns. But when we saw Parkland and related coverage, we almost constantly only see white students being spoken about. In no way am I interested in slandering this students, they are not the problem. Parkland survivors like David Hogg have spoken on the disproportionate coverage of gun violence. But that isn’t enough.
We need to recognize the Black survivors of Parkland like Aalayah Eastmond. We 100 percent need to recognize the impact on their lives and the work that needs to be done to make all students and all Americans feel safer from gun violence.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9Dq4Fu_Zp0
So I ask of all of you, all Americans, to wake up. To recognize that gun violence is a problem. But to recognize that we need to acknowledge how multifaceted gun violence is. It is a race thing, it is a gender thing, it is a class thing, and it is most definitely a matter of bigotry. But in the end, Gun violence is a matter of life and death. We all deserve to live free of the fear of death at the hands of a shooter.
It is time we take control of this situation and recognize all narratives. Actually correction, it is beyond time we take control of this situation. We cannot allow this to continue. As a nation, we have a moral responsibility to do something. It is beyond late to fix the past. But it is not too late for us to make the world safer for our future generations.
