Speaker 1: And we are your hosts of street politicians, the places
Speaker 1: in the streets and politics me. So it is it
Speaker 1: is like always something happening. First of all, the government,
Speaker 1: it's gone wild. That's all I had in today's show.
Speaker 1: We're still sticking with the six episodes um the series
Speaker 1: that we're doing on gun violence. So I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: take up a lot of time talking about all the
Speaker 1: other things that's happening. But people need to know that
Speaker 1: our government is in crisis. We've been in crisis for
Speaker 1: some time. You will will be in crisis, but we
Speaker 1: certainly are in crisis now. We now have seen that
Speaker 1: over the last weekend. Uh, there has been um a
Speaker 1: lift if you will, on the band um or what
Speaker 1: is it? I guess it's the moratorium is the right word,
Speaker 1: the moratorium on evictions and people are out here like
Speaker 1: you know, hell, folks had p p P and they
Speaker 1: had this, and they had money and they should have paid. Okay,
Speaker 1: you can say that, but at the same time, we
Speaker 1: want the violence and the crime out of our communities.
Speaker 1: You can't have people out homeless who you expect to
Speaker 1: live a certain way to live righteously, because folks are
Speaker 1: gonna find a way to eat. Okay, they're gonna find
Speaker 1: survival mechanisms. And so in the midst of a pandemic,
Speaker 1: where we're they're saying that there is a surge in
Speaker 1: uh COVID cases, that people are getting sick. The pandemic
Speaker 1: is not over. We should not be in any way
Speaker 1: removing people from their homes at this time. So I
Speaker 1: believe in personal responsibility. Hell yeah, we believe in personal
Speaker 1: responsibility because I paid my bills the whole pandemic, no
Speaker 1: matter what I had to do. But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, there's a lot of people out there
Speaker 1: that can't make that happen. And what you always say,
Speaker 1: my is the there the exception, but not the room.
Speaker 1: And we understand what we're dealing with. The government knows
Speaker 1: what's happening. You know, a lot of people in the
Speaker 1: home from for months, you know, most a lot of
Speaker 1: businesses have didn't return. You know, businesses didn't return. A
Speaker 1: lot of people still haven't going back to work. A
Speaker 1: lot of people are just traumatizing skinned to go to work.
Speaker 1: So we we have to you it take time to
Speaker 1: undo a pandemic, to undo the just the the long
Speaker 1: term effects of it. You know, the trauma that people
Speaker 1: are then, so now on top of that, you're gonna
Speaker 1: add rent back, you know, and talking about they need
Speaker 1: to pay these bills, you know, after you suspended it,
Speaker 1: like it's just like, this ain't the time to do it,
Speaker 1: especially when, like you said, we were there's a resurgence
Speaker 1: of COVID and a eighteen different strains and people just
Speaker 1: didn't People are just starting to get back to normal,
Speaker 1: you know. So you've got to give people some grades,
Speaker 1: gotta give them some opportunities, you know, you got to
Speaker 1: give them a little bit of time to get back
Speaker 1: and to the blow before you start threatening them, tell
Speaker 1: them they need to get out and being stret they
Speaker 1: went on vacations, I'm like, yeah, and so the landlords, right,
Speaker 1: So did some of the landlords. They took some of
Speaker 1: the money that they received and didn't do with it
Speaker 1: what they were supposed to do. Everybody is at fault.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, we all in
Speaker 1: I thought, they said, we were all in this together.
Speaker 1: A little bit of vacation that somebody got that they
Speaker 1: ain't been on vacation their whole life. They probably never
Speaker 1: went to Toulon, in this place, in that place, and
Speaker 1: can coom or whatever. They got a little check for
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars and spent a little bit on a vacation.
Speaker 1: The sneakers that their child has been asking them for
Speaker 1: a little bit of summertime in the city, and we
Speaker 1: seemed to be criminalizing and demon demonizing those individuals. Now,
Speaker 1: the system might criminalize some folks that got them p
Speaker 1: P P P p p P loans. They might be criminalized,
Speaker 1: But we know that evicting people from their home is
Speaker 1: a real serious and we don't want to see people homeless.
Speaker 1: If nothing else, you don't want to see people homeless.
Speaker 1: But it brings me to my thought of the day.
Speaker 1: My thought of the day is why are grocries so
Speaker 1: damn expensive? Like? What is is it not possible to
Speaker 1: find some type of way not to have groceries, especially
Speaker 1: healthy food. Now, some people say, well, it's not that
Speaker 1: much more to eat health It is the milk that
Speaker 1: I drink zero percent milk, right, which I probably shouldn't
Speaker 1: be drinking it at all, And and you know, other
Speaker 1: others who are extremely healthy tell me that I should
Speaker 1: be doing a whole bunch of other things instead of
Speaker 1: drinking milk. But nonetheless, the zero percent milk that I drink,
Speaker 1: the fat free milk, right, my milk is almost nine
Speaker 1: dollars for a half a gallon. Nine dollars. So what
Speaker 1: I'm trying to understand is like we didn't want people
Speaker 1: to be healthy. We're saying that America is obests. We're
Speaker 1: saying that Americans rather are obese. We're saying that the
Speaker 1: health crisis is this matic preexisting conditions and all this
Speaker 1: and that. And still when you go to the grocery
Speaker 1: store a little bag of groceries, one bag could be
Speaker 1: a hundred dollars and you hardly have anything in it.
Speaker 1: How are people surviving? Because I know, for me, I
Speaker 1: have the resources to do it, and I still feel
Speaker 1: uncomfortable spending the type of money that I'm spending in
Speaker 1: the grocery store. You're experiencing this because I'm I'm I'm
Speaker 1: struggling now. Groceries are very high. Like for real, every
Speaker 1: time every time I go to the store, I can't
Speaker 1: believe the amount of money I's been for the few
Speaker 1: things that's in the bag. Like you said, it just
Speaker 1: really doesn't make sense. Thirty dollars and you'll be having
Speaker 1: like four things in the bag and those things ain't
Speaker 1: gonna last through through the night, you know. So it's
Speaker 1: it's really crazy. Like when you look at air flights,
Speaker 1: everybody's trying to make up for what they lost. Everybody
Speaker 1: has played double. It's like it's a drought. Like you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, Like when we was in the
Speaker 1: street that you were hustling and you were selling weed,
Speaker 1: and when it was a drought, you double. You made
Speaker 1: the weed a double two times where the normally was
Speaker 1: because people knew they couldn't get it or people knew
Speaker 1: they really needed it. The same thing they was doing
Speaker 1: with the lights of whites. Remember there was charging people
Speaker 1: all types of money for things like that. So you know,
Speaker 1: we're we're in those times where you know, the economy
Speaker 1: has suffered and people who have things that they know
Speaker 1: are you know, commodities and things that people want, and
Speaker 1: they feel like, you know a lot of people got
Speaker 1: those little p P P loans and they're gonna they're
Speaker 1: gonna spend it fast. So they're trying to get their
Speaker 1: money back while they feel like it's a couple of
Speaker 1: hours out there. But all of that is drying up
Speaker 1: right now. Man, It's all drying up. It's drying up,
Speaker 1: for sure, but it's kind of like, what do you
Speaker 1: do if you are somebody who's really struggling but you're
Speaker 1: trying to take care of yourself and your family. It
Speaker 1: scares me to think that a single mother who doesn't
Speaker 1: qualify for food stamps, because they demonize people who get
Speaker 1: any type of subsidies. So if you work on a job,
Speaker 1: let's just say you are um an assistant maybe at
Speaker 1: a college or you know, you're you know, a pretty
Speaker 1: decent job where you dressed nice every day and you're
Speaker 1: going into an office and you're making maybe seventeen eighteen
Speaker 1: dollars an hour, maybe even twenty an hour. That sounds good, right,
Speaker 1: That's that's nice. But if you go to the grocery
Speaker 1: store and most of your money is being spent on that,
Speaker 1: and also transportation because now that people are going back
Speaker 1: to work, it is expensive to get on the train.
Speaker 1: I think the training thing is like two dollars and
Speaker 1: seventy or something like that per ride per day. You
Speaker 1: have kids that want to have, you know, snacks and
Speaker 1: different things. Maybe you want to get your hand your
Speaker 1: nail sounn because you need to keep yourself up to
Speaker 1: be able to go to work, your children need a haircut.
Speaker 1: How I don't understand how we could even be having
Speaker 1: a conversation about just now getting to the point where
Speaker 1: there is a debate that has not in any way
Speaker 1: been passed on fifteen hour. So it's people that ain't
Speaker 1: even making that, and they they hustling every day trying
Speaker 1: to make ends meet. But then you have folks who
Speaker 1: are making above that, who are still living very far
Speaker 1: below the poverty line. And if you will go to
Speaker 1: the grocery store and you have to spend three and
Speaker 1: four hundred dollars for your family of four, even your
Speaker 1: family or three, even the family or two, just to
Speaker 1: get the things that you need to be able to
Speaker 1: have lunch every day, have dinner every day, have juice,
Speaker 1: and things in the refrigerator, and don't start with washing
Speaker 1: clothes and buying like detergent it maybe you know the laundry,
Speaker 1: the cleaners for you like this. This is a very
Speaker 1: expensive life that people are living. And you can see
Speaker 1: why people are frustrated because we fix it up nice.
Speaker 1: We fix it up you. You fix it up with
Speaker 1: a good crispy white T shirt on a nice hat.
Speaker 1: We always keep our feet fresh. You know, we I
Speaker 1: like to wear nice clothes. People look at us and
Speaker 1: there's and there's a level of resentment that builds up
Speaker 1: because you look like you're doing so well while your
Speaker 1: community and the people that come from where you come
Speaker 1: from are struggling. And I get white folks are so
Speaker 1: damn frustrated because it's really expensive to survive, especially if
Speaker 1: you live in the re ord. And by the way,
Speaker 1: I just came back from Cleveland, and it's no better
Speaker 1: day when you go to the school. Right, it is
Speaker 1: really hard out here, and it makes those who are
Speaker 1: have a little bit look like you start looking like food.
Speaker 1: People get mad at you that you become target. Like
Speaker 1: I'm telling you, like, robbery is a big thing, right,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a big thing. People are robbing people
Speaker 1: because some people have looked like, you know, they progressed
Speaker 1: during the pandemic, they kept up, they looked like they
Speaker 1: have more. And there's a lot of people like in
Speaker 1: the dictment area. You know, my little brother hangs out there,
Speaker 1: goes to a lot of these clubs, and he's telling
Speaker 1: me how, like every other night you're going to the
Speaker 1: club and people are getting robbed. Women a woman got
Speaker 1: snatched at the car, literally snatched at the car and
Speaker 1: they're taking jury. So that's it's at an old time post.
Speaker 1: So you know, it's it's very dangerous out here for
Speaker 1: people who who look like they got a little more
Speaker 1: than left me. And then it's very hard out here
Speaker 1: for people who just don't have it. So, you know,
Speaker 1: we just said some these are some difficult times. Man,
Speaker 1: We're in real difficult times. And hopefully this administration and
Speaker 1: the government tried to get together. I don't really have
Speaker 1: much faith in ane of that, but we're gonna keep fighting.
Speaker 1: So in keeping about that and itself and need sort
Speaker 1: of write into the conversation around the gun violence that's
Speaker 1: happening in our community. And today I'm really really happy,
Speaker 1: um and and really honored you will to have two
Speaker 1: giants with us. And so my son, let me keep
Speaker 1: it to you, and let's introduce our guests before we
Speaker 1: go to the next segment and have our special guests joint.
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a quick break for our sponsors. But
Speaker 1: as we've been promoting, this is our fifth episode on
Speaker 1: gun violence and what it's gonna take in order for
Speaker 1: us to combat it. We've been interviewing and you don't
Speaker 1: have the conversations with a lot of grassroots organizers. We've
Speaker 1: had different organizers, we've had people from law enforcement, we've
Speaker 1: had government officials, and now today we want to have
Speaker 1: a penel like discussion. And today joining us are two
Speaker 1: grassroots organizers who are really doing the work. People always ask, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, why ain't nobody doing the work about gun
Speaker 1: violence that happens in our communities. People always want to
Speaker 1: tell about the gun violence that the police is doing,
Speaker 1: and and it's really what's going on our community is
Speaker 1: more important, and we do do that. We talk about
Speaker 1: that as well. And these are two people who are
Speaker 1: living testaments to that who's worked proceed them, who have
Speaker 1: been victims, who have been family members, who have been victims,
Speaker 1: who have been surrounded by utilize their pain and turned
Speaker 1: it into purpose. One of them have already been on
Speaker 1: our show. We have my brother, Mr. San Duke mcfader,
Speaker 1: who is the founder and CEO of g MAC Gangsters
Speaker 1: making astronomical community changes, which the organization that he founded,
Speaker 1: you know, coming from prison and he understood the need
Speaker 1: to transform his life and also utilize his experiences to
Speaker 1: be one of the people who used to be the
Speaker 1: ones who started the violence of the community. Now he's
Speaker 1: once to interrupt with so we want to say thank
Speaker 1: you and and I'm welcome to the your again. To
Speaker 1: our brother Shan Duke, thank you for having me. I
Speaker 1: appreciate y'all. Yes, sir, as usual, this is our friend.
Speaker 1: Like you know, we always have friends with the show.
Speaker 1: So let me get this way because I don't want
Speaker 1: to not say her name properly. But this young lady,
Speaker 1: I've read her rio and she is amazing as well.
Speaker 1: Joining us today is Ms Tabell from the Tribute Project.
Speaker 1: She's also a grassroots organizer and who focuses on gun violence.
Speaker 1: She's been impacted family members, friends, and she utilized her
Speaker 1: pain and she also turned into purpose. So thank you
Speaker 1: Tibell for joining us today for this in depth discussion
Speaker 1: that we're gonna have on gun violence in our committee.
Speaker 1: Thank you Tia and Shand for being with us. Um
Speaker 1: you know, Shand we asked you to come back today
Speaker 1: because I think you have a very very unique position
Speaker 1: that you sit in. Being an organizer is clearly one
Speaker 1: part of it. But I'll so watch being around you often.
Speaker 1: How many men work at work with you who are
Speaker 1: recently returning or you're trying to help them stay out
Speaker 1: of the truth. And right now, what we're seeing happen
Speaker 1: UH is a resurgence in violence in our community in
Speaker 1: a way that we can't ignore it. We can't act
Speaker 1: like it's not happening. We can't turn a blind eye.
Speaker 1: It's a real serious situation. And it's cool to talk
Speaker 1: to all the folks who think they know, but there's
Speaker 1: some people who actually do know. And I think that's
Speaker 1: why we want to focus on this, this conversation with
Speaker 1: the two of you today, UH, tr you and I
Speaker 1: recently became acquainted. Um, you've now become my sister. I've
Speaker 1: learned how much you know, how much you've been doing UH.
Speaker 1: And you know, oftentimes, unfortunately we as women in this
Speaker 1: work are overlooked because we know that violence definitely is
Speaker 1: a larger issue for our men, but we also know
Speaker 1: that women are star and to become the fastest growing
Speaker 1: population going into prison and also having violent issues, whether
Speaker 1: it be domestic issues and or street violence issues, and
Speaker 1: so UM, we can't ignore that. And the first show
Speaker 1: that we did five shows ago, we talked about and
Speaker 1: had Maggie carry on Shan Duke and others where we
Speaker 1: talked about women and how they are impacted by this
Speaker 1: epidemic that we are in. And so this we're speaking
Speaker 1: on the backdrop of a shooting, multiple shootings or one
Speaker 1: incident um that happened in the last weekend in New
Speaker 1: York City where ten people were shot. And I think,
Speaker 1: Shandon Do, you were bringing us up to speed that
Speaker 1: there were three people who were the alleged intended target,
Speaker 1: but at least seven people who were hit surrounding this
Speaker 1: incident um, and clearly that's it's serious, you know. And
Speaker 1: I think for me and what I appreciate about duty
Speaker 1: A and you Shan Do is that you guys get
Speaker 1: the intersection between police accountability and what we are fighting
Speaker 1: for there and what we're doing to raise awareness and
Speaker 1: to really curb the violence in our community. So it's
Speaker 1: so important that we talked because if we don't, the
Speaker 1: solution from government officials will be to put more police
Speaker 1: in our communities, and we know that that will not work.
Speaker 1: So talk to us and do let's get started with
Speaker 1: you just talk about what's happening, what you know that
Speaker 1: happened in New York um, and then what's what is
Speaker 1: the organizing UH idea concepts that are happening among the
Speaker 1: crisis management system and others who are working in New
Speaker 1: York to try to address the surgeon violence. All right,
Speaker 1: thank you. So when we look at the surge, we
Speaker 1: have to frost be aware of the fact that we
Speaker 1: are still recovering from a pandemic. A lot of things
Speaker 1: that happened through at that time went unaddressed. And one
Speaker 1: of those things we know priorly that we had Beall
Speaker 1: reform and then Ball reform. There was an attack on
Speaker 1: Bell Reform from UH prosecution where they just felt to
Speaker 1: release anybody and everybody, not really assessing the cases, but
Speaker 1: just releasing people just as a this is what we're
Speaker 1: gonna do since you want Ball reform. So there were
Speaker 1: a lot of people who didn't deserve to be in
Speaker 1: our communities, out in our community because they didn't receive
Speaker 1: any type of mental rehabilitation, and we have to be
Speaker 1: acceptance of that. So there were also people who released
Speaker 1: from state prisons who received no type of services. Everything
Speaker 1: was shut down, right, So imagine someone doing a year
Speaker 1: or more and coming right back into our community and
Speaker 1: only option that they have is those in the community
Speaker 1: who are on the violent or criminal mindset offer them
Speaker 1: of those criminal activities. So we have to really look
Speaker 1: at that as part of the problem, and a lot
Speaker 1: of trauma not being addressed, including the fact that we
Speaker 1: have a whole bunch of police brutality still in our
Speaker 1: community that we don't see no justice for. Recently in
Speaker 1: New York City and Corona Queens. Yes, there was alleged
Speaker 1: tend people's shot seven bystanders with them Leslie identifying and
Speaker 1: I always said, Leslie, because I'm good, I'm in Chicago,
Speaker 1: and I'll getting information based off of what has been reported.
Speaker 1: So in our work we like to go into the
Speaker 1: field and understand and get our facts to be sure
Speaker 1: who was causing the violence. So in this instance it
Speaker 1: has been said that it's the Trinity Daddios. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go with Potios because if you know, stay prisons there
Speaker 1: and I stay prisons and we call them Potio And
Speaker 1: there's there's a history allegedly where they also were part
Speaker 1: of the killing of Junior years ago in the Bronx.
Speaker 1: So if you look at issues, you have to understand
Speaker 1: what is causing these issues. So if there's a problem
Speaker 1: with the Potias, and I will work. That's who we
Speaker 1: look to engage, right and if we're not engaging them
Speaker 1: in those areas, there's no way we'll be able to
Speaker 1: mediate the conflicts that they're having. Was according to this
Speaker 1: last incident, they were allegedly shooting at three people who
Speaker 1: were shot who are supposed to be rivals. We have
Speaker 1: to determine what those who those rivals are and determine
Speaker 1: what we can do to mediate any retaliation in our community,
Speaker 1: as the christ Management says, And we also have to
Speaker 1: look at those seven innocent people and their families and
Speaker 1: how someone may not be affiliated, may not be living
Speaker 1: no life of crime, but may feel a certain way
Speaker 1: now because they had an innocent family member shot. Right,
Speaker 1: So this is what our world looks like. Putting a
Speaker 1: bandage on that those issues right now, why we continue
Speaker 1: to work on a bigger issue of why that group
Speaker 1: feels that they have to respond in broad daylight to
Speaker 1: a group of individuals with depraved and difference for the
Speaker 1: other lives around those individuals that they want to attack.
Speaker 1: So it's a lot of work that we have to
Speaker 1: work on preventing, not just folks on the issue after
Speaker 1: that happens, you know, That's why I like and I
Speaker 1: understand because we come from the same you know, pretty
Speaker 1: much the same background and understanding how intricate the work is, right,
Speaker 1: understanding that you have when you when you come from
Speaker 1: a game culture, you know you are, you are personal,
Speaker 1: accept and acknowledge that he's a blood and you bring
Speaker 1: your bloodness, your blood um title into this work and
Speaker 1: utilize it to transform right because you identified with the
Speaker 1: culture of the game culture, you identified with the the
Speaker 1: actual rules and laws, and you play the real rules
Speaker 1: and laws, and what it was actually founded for was
Speaker 1: protection of our communities in our neighborhoods, and you're transform
Speaker 1: his minds. So having those understanding that and being able
Speaker 1: to connect with the game culture and understanding how these
Speaker 1: things happen, how who you need to talk to, how
Speaker 1: do you intercept understanding why we're saying that it's not
Speaker 1: about police be in our community because they don't stop.
Speaker 1: They are unable to have that intel, they're unable to
Speaker 1: have respecting those connections in our communities that could actually
Speaker 1: further stop further violence. So I just want to commit
Speaker 1: you and that and say that's why I always say
Speaker 1: that it's definitely needed. But Te, I just want you
Speaker 1: to give us your perspective about the violence that's going
Speaker 1: on in the communities and all over. What what what
Speaker 1: is your perspective coming from your background and the work
Speaker 1: that you do. What do you see? What do you think? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I want to again just say I'm grateful to to
Speaker 1: be on this platform and share my unique perspective. UM,
Speaker 1: I'd like to believe that God designed my life to
Speaker 1: join this fight and really ending gun violence. And and Shan,
Speaker 1: do you said something so powerful? I don't. I don't
Speaker 1: even think I breathe. I took a breath while you
Speaker 1: were talking, Um, But it just it. It's reaffirming, unfortunately
Speaker 1: that our deep wounds require deep, deep, deep killing. And
Speaker 1: until we get the voice of who Shan Duke is
Speaker 1: advocating for and GMAC and who Trigger is advocating for,
Speaker 1: really at the table, we're gonna continue to see this
Speaker 1: manifestation of despair and using the gun as a solution. Um.
Speaker 1: The Trigger project stands for true reasons. I grabbed the gun,
Speaker 1: evolved from risk and as a survivor. I almost lost
Speaker 1: my mom when I was ten. She was shot twice
Speaker 1: in broad daylight. It wasn't a shock, you know, UM,
Speaker 1: I knew who had did it um, and there wasn't
Speaker 1: a shanduke to come to me and say, hey, let
Speaker 1: me get a full understanding of what you know that happened.
Speaker 1: Let me get you on the basketball or so you
Speaker 1: can release your feelings, let me um support you, mentor
Speaker 1: you so you can figure out what you want to eat,
Speaker 1: so you don't think you're burdening your mom who's healing.
Speaker 1: You know, I didn't have that. So just with the
Speaker 1: combination of losing friends after I'm almost losing my mom,
Speaker 1: losing my stepdad, now losing young people, I realized that
Speaker 1: the voice of the shooter is missing. So when you
Speaker 1: say trigger project you you you you embody the voice
Speaker 1: of the shooter because we all have a trigger finger,
Speaker 1: But no one's asking the question black or white? You know,
Speaker 1: wife just the best guys? Was just or stick? Says
Speaker 1: My baby's like to say, was land in the middle
Speaker 1: of the street. Why would some people be able to
Speaker 1: just walk past them like they're nothing? And why would
Speaker 1: some people see it as a commodity, see it as
Speaker 1: a resource, see it as a language. You know, we're
Speaker 1: criminalizing our culture and our music versus really getting to
Speaker 1: the source of our pain and and that's what the
Speaker 1: Trigger Project is about. Tell me when you say you
Speaker 1: know that it's a language that for me, that's powerful,
Speaker 1: because I know that's loaded. And I think both of
Speaker 1: y'all can talk about the language. I mean, you've already
Speaker 1: been speaking to it. But there is a language chan
Speaker 1: do and and Tia that is coming out of this pandemic,
Speaker 1: and we hear it loud and clear. In fact, I've
Speaker 1: been saying that the violence that we see you taking
Speaker 1: place in our communities, it's not really While I understand
Speaker 1: that that those engaging in it do have to have
Speaker 1: some responsibility, I think it's a mirror to all of
Speaker 1: our faces. Is about where we have failed um as
Speaker 1: a society. I think that our young people and whatever
Speaker 1: they're going through is an indication of how well we
Speaker 1: have done to give them the resources and the things
Speaker 1: that they need. So when you say it's some language
Speaker 1: and you want both of you to talk about this,
Speaker 1: tell me what that means when when we look at language.
Speaker 1: For me, right, we have to understand that mentality, that lifestyle. Right,
Speaker 1: and when you have a lifestyle that you don't see
Speaker 1: as criminal, nothing you do is is looked at is wrong. Right.
Speaker 1: There's no more rules and remorse for your acsents because
Speaker 1: you're living a lifestyle that you believe everything you're doing
Speaker 1: is right and language. For me when I was in
Speaker 1: the streets was when I got up in the morning
Speaker 1: as triche gangster, I put two guns on my waist
Speaker 1: in Brooklyn, New York, even though there was no right
Speaker 1: to carry, And I didn't do that with the intent
Speaker 1: to go out there to shoot or murder anyone. I
Speaker 1: did that to make sure that no one would be
Speaker 1: able to shoot and murder me. So when you hit trigger,
Speaker 1: talk about the response and the reasons and why we
Speaker 1: carry guns. We have to understand that language. So if
Speaker 1: someone is growing up in Brooklyn or New York City
Speaker 1: and we know that they never had the right to carry,
Speaker 1: but all they're seeing is people die at the hands
Speaker 1: of gunfire, we have to understand that the language tells
Speaker 1: them that the best way to protect themselves is to
Speaker 1: carry that gun as well. Absolutely, I asked my young people, um,
Speaker 1: because young people aren't the problem, they are a resource
Speaker 1: at the trigger projects. So my masters is in youth development. UM.
Speaker 1: Gun valance tried to impede my life, but I went
Speaker 1: to NC State I was first in my family to
Speaker 1: finish high school go to college, and then I told
Speaker 1: my knee up. So you guys know what that meant
Speaker 1: to my hoop dream in my hood. Um, but I
Speaker 1: landed in my master's of youth development. So I learned
Speaker 1: very quickly that Um, America has this language for black people.
Speaker 1: We got single parent, household, black on black crime. You know,
Speaker 1: they got the language that just keeps us oppressed. And
Speaker 1: there's also a language that the CDC research that says
Speaker 1: gun violence is a disease and all these things that
Speaker 1: sort of make us black make us prone to gun violence.
Speaker 1: So when I learned this, I got mad as hell. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm a cancer, are very emotional. I'm also a young
Speaker 1: lady who was very dark and had a lot of
Speaker 1: responsibility on me because of trauma. So I refused to
Speaker 1: be angry again. Um, and I want to be graceful,
Speaker 1: but I just seill that to say we only a
Speaker 1: gun is a tool. A gun is like a cell phone.
Speaker 1: My young people are not the problem. Again, they are
Speaker 1: resource and when I asked them to use their voice
Speaker 1: and advocate for what they're going through or what their
Speaker 1: families going through, because the exposure to violence can lead
Speaker 1: to vinance, to just exposure. So that's in movies, that's
Speaker 1: in real life, that's in police brutality. We all saw
Speaker 1: the public lynchings. Like, just exposure can lead to this
Speaker 1: disease too. So um, when we say language, we we
Speaker 1: we definitely just like any languages. Things you're accustomed to
Speaker 1: is go is things you say, is things you know
Speaker 1: you can do, is the way you think. Um, And
Speaker 1: no one in America is really understanding there's still public
Speaker 1: safety and our way through you know, the same day
Speaker 1: are our city made announcements that certain organizations would get
Speaker 1: money to prevent gun violence was the same day she
Speaker 1: put a left. Our leadership put eleven million dollars into
Speaker 1: over time for police. So, um, we we have to
Speaker 1: get to a common language so that we can really
Speaker 1: disrupt this this this because it's spreading um viciously, and
Speaker 1: and now it's becoming the narrative, it's becoming that it's
Speaker 1: a young people problem. You know, But like Tamka said, uh,
Speaker 1: what's the African problem? The young people in order to
Speaker 1: feel the village warmth for young people will burn it down,
Speaker 1: you know, So I can't it go something like but
Speaker 1: that's that's what we're going through. And that's why I
Speaker 1: try to put young people on the front so that
Speaker 1: by they're they're exposed to the risk factors and protect
Speaker 1: the factors that lead to being a perpetrator a shooter
Speaker 1: or being a victim. You know, this disease those both
Speaker 1: ways in our community, and it's in a person when
Speaker 1: we understand that, like it's such a thin line, and
Speaker 1: they just put us in cages. So ideally, I would
Speaker 1: love if we could go to like a health clinic
Speaker 1: and really cleanse this disease out of us, because um,
Speaker 1: it's we were moving slightly in the right direction and
Speaker 1: funding it's slightly coming in our direction, but it's still
Speaker 1: not tailor for the people closest to do. We think
Speaker 1: that we can just pour money on the problem and
Speaker 1: it will go away. I don't. I don't believe it
Speaker 1: is pouring money on the problem. I believe it's given
Speaker 1: the justice, the funding justice that we need to the
Speaker 1: to the issue right. And I talk about New York City.
Speaker 1: While we've been fighting and everyone's been behind defunding police,
Speaker 1: we still saw a city council that added two hundred
Speaker 1: millions to n y pples budget and the number they
Speaker 1: added funding to on prevention organizations but in nowhere matched
Speaker 1: a number of two hundred million dollars, right, And we
Speaker 1: are not getting what we're asking for, right. So they're
Speaker 1: continuing to add a divide right between the community of
Speaker 1: police by not fully funding the services that's needed for
Speaker 1: our community. And and when we talk about that, we're
Speaker 1: talking about on a different level because we don't have
Speaker 1: enough funding to not just employ people, but to add
Speaker 1: to the shifting of the messaging. Right. An example of
Speaker 1: that is my song right when when I talk about
Speaker 1: the Brother all the time, I get people understand his
Speaker 1: shift in his music, right, And his shift in his
Speaker 1: music was a determination that he made to not continue
Speaker 1: to push that music to our community. And that's where
Speaker 1: we talk about part of the problem, because we're fighting
Speaker 1: against a system that's continue to fight against what we're doing.
Speaker 1: And our young people just like me, the mice, and
Speaker 1: the young people coming up and up, the ones who
Speaker 1: came up for us, who went through the system, who
Speaker 1: were inconcentrated reports, who who are part of the violence.
Speaker 1: It wasn't by happening. It happened because they pushed it
Speaker 1: into our minds at a young age example, I like
Speaker 1: to use his music and that's why I burned myce
Speaker 1: LP in the conversation. I believe that music it's more
Speaker 1: potent than drugs. That's something I always say. I used
Speaker 1: to unfortunately have to sell drugs. That's what I believe
Speaker 1: back and have to sell drugs. And when I sold drugs,
Speaker 1: I so drugs to people that you would never know
Speaker 1: we're doing hard crack cocaine because they just went home,
Speaker 1: went to work, came and got the crack and went
Speaker 1: upstairs because their tolerance level was totally different. But then
Speaker 1: you have the young person who is coming up in
Speaker 1: a deprived home. I had no farther, went to force
Speaker 1: to care, grew up in the projects. And the music
Speaker 1: it's telling my prefrontal cortex that this is how I'm
Speaker 1: supposed to live. So music is more potent than druggs
Speaker 1: because it shoots straight to your soul no matter what
Speaker 1: you're going through. If it's a all and B song
Speaker 1: and I started talking about I heard it all before,
Speaker 1: a woman is gonna relate to that if she's going
Speaker 1: through something she believed that man is lying. So it's
Speaker 1: the same difference if a young person today it's throwing
Speaker 1: on the drills. Nobody wanna talk about it, but throwing
Speaker 1: on the drill music in New York City after popping
Speaker 1: that prop, there's no remorse in what they're doing because
Speaker 1: they're not even in the same mind. So working on
Speaker 1: and ot of like we're having to the trap nis
Speaker 1: that you're talking about that's promoting these these drugs in
Speaker 1: our kids. Mind has to shift. So we need the
Speaker 1: resources to be able to change the messaging. You can't
Speaker 1: drive down Manhattan or anywhere broken in anywhere New York
Speaker 1: City and really see prevention shift mind shifting resources for
Speaker 1: our kids in our community to be devoted to you
Speaker 1: see everything else, no disrespect. I'm gonna going through an
Speaker 1: airport and all I saw is nothing but fifty and
Speaker 1: power of being promoted. I was like, you don't need
Speaker 1: that much promotion. How much money were spent on that
Speaker 1: versus helping us have somebody go through a go coming
Speaker 1: into New York and to live I mean Jeff k
Speaker 1: or La Guardia and seeing nothing but violence prevention organizations
Speaker 1: that are in that community when you come and know
Speaker 1: that you have a resource when you come to that community.
Speaker 1: So we have to look at being able to fund
Speaker 1: the resources and a whole different level. People will say, right, well,
Speaker 1: white folks have poor communities. Also, it's not like we're
Speaker 1: the only ones that have projects, poverty and this and that.
Speaker 1: But when they watch TV and listen to their music,
Speaker 1: they have bounced. They're able to listen to a little
Speaker 1: heavy metal, They're able to listen to a little bit
Speaker 1: of our hip hop and other music. But they also
Speaker 1: get to listen to things that speaks to their intelligence
Speaker 1: and helps to build them up and make them feel
Speaker 1: like they're you know, helped build their character. I even
Speaker 1: think about when I was a young girl, clearly walking
Speaker 1: into a room in a Catholic school where all of
Speaker 1: the presidents and different important elected officials and leaders were
Speaker 1: all over the walls, and they were all white. They
Speaker 1: were all white. I think they had because I lived
Speaker 1: in Harlem and I went to school in Harlem. I
Speaker 1: think Charlie Rangel was probably the only black man Congressman
Speaker 1: Charlie Rangel, who I love very much, but he's also
Speaker 1: a very fair skinned man. So they're basically looked like
Speaker 1: all white people. And let's not even talk about all
Speaker 1: men for the most part, who were being displayed before us.
Speaker 1: It's not until recently that you get Barack Obama. But
Speaker 1: that's one. So there's a balance that while they're in
Speaker 1: school they may be listening or whatever. When they're at home,
Speaker 1: they may have drugs, they may have violence. And when
Speaker 1: they go to school, the schoolbooks, the the the images,
Speaker 1: everything is an affirmation versus what we received, which is
Speaker 1: a denigration, if you will, of our communities and and
Speaker 1: and and of our of our of our humanity. That's right,
Speaker 1: And you spoke on You spoke on it, right, Tondu.
Speaker 1: And I say that all the time. These are conversations
Speaker 1: that I have with these UM radio execs, you know,
Speaker 1: and I say the fact that you you salute our
Speaker 1: work and you tell us that we do this work,
Speaker 1: but you don't give us the same platforms right to
Speaker 1: promote the work and promote the message that we promote.
Speaker 1: Artists who are talking about positivity and and still being
Speaker 1: have relevance to understand what's going on the street. Were
Speaker 1: giving them a different perspective to move away from that.
Speaker 1: You don't give us the same platforms and the same
Speaker 1: notoriety as you give the people. That's poison in us, right.
Speaker 1: So the poison is incentivized. They have an incentive, right
Speaker 1: because they understand if you wrap about killing and robbing,
Speaker 1: right if you if you literally robbed somebody and shoot
Speaker 1: somebody and you rap about the song and do a
Speaker 1: video about it, you're signed. If you look about if
Speaker 1: you look at the last probably six or seven artists
Speaker 1: that they signed from Chicago, the streets know that these
Speaker 1: are really the songs that they're putting out about real
Speaker 1: beef that happened, like literally, and they're saying, why these
Speaker 1: kids getting killed and all that because they're talking about
Speaker 1: the people who they killed on the record, or they
Speaker 1: shot or they robbed or they did this, and the
Speaker 1: family has to see this on the internet. The Internet
Speaker 1: is pretty much exacerbating this vibe. They're promoting it. You
Speaker 1: got you got um blogs like DJ academics and them
Speaker 1: who literally gas light violence. They literally go on their
Speaker 1: their blogs such and talk about, Yo, this he's running
Speaker 1: around here after he shot this person. YEA better slide
Speaker 1: on him. He too comfortable outside? Like this is what
Speaker 1: you got. These people have never been in the streets,
Speaker 1: They have no credibility, have no understanding, but yet and
Speaker 1: still they're able to agitate and instigate real violence in
Speaker 1: our communities and these record companies are only signing you.
Speaker 1: If that so what we have to do, and then
Speaker 1: that's why I started. I ran out and get this
Speaker 1: is that we have to start really like guerrilla marketing again,
Speaker 1: Shan Duke like, we have the memories to put posters
Speaker 1: on the walls and stickers like they it means something
Speaker 1: every neighborhood. Um, this is where I'm starting this week,
Speaker 1: every neighborhood. We're running through the communities and we're putting
Speaker 1: these posts in the stores. We put them everywhere possible
Speaker 1: because we gotta retrain the mondstate. We need a boy
Speaker 1: hard black murder. I can't kill my brother. They gotta
Speaker 1: constantly see it the same way they look at these
Speaker 1: commercials and they go on the internet and they constantly
Speaker 1: see visions of did somebody shooting each other? And they
Speaker 1: constantly hear music about kill kill, I blast you all,
Speaker 1: rob you. We have to give account of narrative. We
Speaker 1: gotta be able to to try to shift and try
Speaker 1: to get you know, get them back on a different trail,
Speaker 1: or else we're gonna lose because violence is promoted. It's
Speaker 1: promoted everywhere we go, and they get paid to do it.
Speaker 1: It was just so loaded. We want you to kick
Speaker 1: the young black youth for the young black people. Young
Speaker 1: black people understand that there are moving parts around you
Speaker 1: and and their relationships that um their connection and they're
Speaker 1: moving parts around you. I eat your schools, you go
Speaker 1: to health clinics, hospitals, you attend churches, the media, you
Speaker 1: watch policy plitics. There's all these things moving around you
Speaker 1: that develop who you are. And as to me can
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, not only have we failed you, but we
Speaker 1: haven't worked intentionally. Like Sandu said, we're throwing money, but
Speaker 1: it's so deep rooted, like we need them to part seize.
Speaker 1: You cannot release a young man who's traumatized in jail
Speaker 1: for for being convicted of doing the crime that in
Speaker 1: In the ideology of America, crime is is synonymous with choice,
Speaker 1: and we don't develop that frontal cortex until win Shandu
Speaker 1: until we twenty six. But how many of us are
Speaker 1: locked up for the idea that we made a choice
Speaker 1: and our brain isn't It isn't even fully developed. It
Speaker 1: makes me sick. So the media is a huge part
Speaker 1: of it. Um. What you're talking about, Misha's is being
Speaker 1: the protection So they risk factors that lead to it,
Speaker 1: but they're also protect the factors. That is the reason
Speaker 1: why I'm standing the day I had connect connecting this
Speaker 1: to adults outside my family to help me build my resilience.
Speaker 1: But I'm six before, so people believe in me because
Speaker 1: they could see the potential, you know. But every young
Speaker 1: person needs that primary prevention and protection. You wouldn't go
Speaker 1: tell a young person that has sex without giving them
Speaker 1: a talking connors, you know. So we can't go out
Speaker 1: here and let them let the accessibility to guns be
Speaker 1: the way it is. Let the government not take accountability
Speaker 1: for the infiltration of what they've given to us. If
Speaker 1: they gave us produce, we would have been throwing a
Speaker 1: lot of fruit, you know, it would have been a
Speaker 1: lot of fruitfulness in this community. But they didn't. They
Speaker 1: gave us drugs and guns. So we understand that it
Speaker 1: is a disease um. But at the same time, I
Speaker 1: want to address my black brothers and sisters who do
Speaker 1: feel alone, entire frustrated because you just see us taking
Speaker 1: each other's life. It's no way we're supposed to be
Speaker 1: less than twelve percent in this country, um, but it
Speaker 1: is by design, and you have to understand that it's
Speaker 1: very basic needs that were met in your life, from
Speaker 1: sleep to rest, to food, to belonging to the safety,
Speaker 1: to shelter. You had things that were aligning your life
Speaker 1: that allow you to make decisions and beat your best self,
Speaker 1: like telling them, telling the police what you saw happen.
Speaker 1: You gotta be your best self. We can't expect our
Speaker 1: community to be accountable and when it's not a lot
Speaker 1: of self actualization taking place. So I just think we
Speaker 1: gotta give ourselves grace. We gotta know that what's happening
Speaker 1: now isn't a result of our movement, because the movement
Speaker 1: has been steadied, but now it's starting to take high reach,
Speaker 1: no limits, So we gotta I think I see a
Speaker 1: lot more homeless young people, but maybe maybe not, But
Speaker 1: I'm thinking. And I and I was in DC recently,
Speaker 1: and I you know, I go to when I go
Speaker 1: to d C, I don't just of course, we go protests.
Speaker 1: She and who comes with us and and it and
Speaker 1: holds us down every single time that we have super
Speaker 1: disobedience there in DC. I don't just go to that area.
Speaker 1: We always go to. In fact, uh, one of our mentors,
Speaker 1: Core Masters Berry, the wife of the late grade Mary
Speaker 1: and Ferry mayor. Mary Ferry owns the on our own,
Speaker 1: but run Z owns whatever. I don't even know with
Speaker 1: the right terming altitude. But she runs the Southeast Learning
Speaker 1: Tennis Center in Southeast d C. And she actually lives
Speaker 1: in that part of DC as well, And so when
Speaker 1: I visit with her, I happen to go past there's
Speaker 1: a liquor store at a chicken spot and some other things.
Speaker 1: That's the same in every schoolhood, and it's it's it's
Speaker 1: really to me, it's painful. I won't say it's scary
Speaker 1: because I'm not scared of black people. I'm it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter what community we go to, we find our people
Speaker 1: and we're not afraid of them at all. And generally
Speaker 1: what I've learned, you know, I have people in my
Speaker 1: family who say you can't go there, and you can't
Speaker 1: do this, you can't do that. Generally, I don't care
Speaker 1: how tough a dude is. When I say hello, how
Speaker 1: are you doing, and looking in his eyes, he always
Speaker 1: always gives me the respect and says, okay, you know
Speaker 1: you you about something. He might try after that to
Speaker 1: get my phone number, and that go on, you know,
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. But but generally he's like, yeah, okay, cool,
Speaker 1: we have a connection. But I'm seeing people who are
Speaker 1: looking dingy, broken hi, And they're young cats, real young
Speaker 1: and young girls who look like they are already prostituting
Speaker 1: themselves at these young ages. And we know sex trafficking
Speaker 1: is an issue, so all of this can't You can't
Speaker 1: ignore these things and say we're just gonna lock everybody up.
Speaker 1: There's no way that that is the solution for dealing
Speaker 1: with homelessness, first of all, in this pandemic, and my
Speaker 1: son and I talked about it all the time, right,
Speaker 1: the pandemic either made or broke you in terms of
Speaker 1: you being in the household with your family, where everybody
Speaker 1: in the house was on the schedule of being outside
Speaker 1: most of the time and they only had to be
Speaker 1: in the same house for a few hours. Maybe Dad,
Speaker 1: if he was in the home um permanently, he might
Speaker 1: be out working overnight. He might be hustling overnight. Who knows.
Speaker 1: Mom has to go to work, somebody might go to school.
Speaker 1: The pandemic caused everybody to have to come inside of
Speaker 1: the house and deal with people that they don't even
Speaker 1: really know. They may not even trust, they may not
Speaker 1: be safe around from sex, it will assault, to drug
Speaker 1: abuse to just depression to not having the proper resources.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to understand why folks don't get this. I
Speaker 1: really am so do you are y'all seeing this's with
Speaker 1: the young people that you're working with? Or am I
Speaker 1: just you know? Maybe I'm not. My finger is not
Speaker 1: on the post. Your finger is directly on the post.
Speaker 1: They're they're not paying attention to the fingers that they're
Speaker 1: supposed to paying attention to. Right, And what we see
Speaker 1: is exactly what you're talking about. And that's what we're
Speaker 1: talking about when we are discussing risk reduction in our organization. Right,
Speaker 1: it's not just about identifying a shooter. It's about identifying
Speaker 1: a shooter and then working to reduce that risk of
Speaker 1: that person. And that person risk may be different or
Speaker 1: definitely would be different from a lot of people, right,
Speaker 1: and it could be those issues that you're talking about,
Speaker 1: and we have to now work to pull them of that, right,
Speaker 1: And that's what we do every day. So once we
Speaker 1: locked eyes on you build a relationship, build the rapport.
Speaker 1: It's it's not an overnight success. Right, we had we
Speaker 1: we've had a recent this wasn't spoken about recently. One
Speaker 1: of my guys got a call from a participant that
Speaker 1: we've been working for a while and he's supposed to
Speaker 1: be a young and created kid, and he called because
Speaker 1: he was in his house and somebody he was arguing
Speaker 1: with his mother and him his mother is always going
Speaker 1: at it, but we a stabigation with him and his mother.
Speaker 1: So what one day they come to the house because
Speaker 1: somebody alleged called the police on him, and it wasn't
Speaker 1: his mother, it was a neighbor. So he's thinking his
Speaker 1: mother called the police on him while he is alleged
Speaker 1: that have a gun in the house. According to the
Speaker 1: call sixty seven precinct, it's outside his house looking out
Speaker 1: the window, ready to rush the building. But he's on
Speaker 1: the phone with one of my outwas workers and the
Speaker 1: outwas worker gets to the scene and and because we've
Speaker 1: built a relationship of a special working late ship with
Speaker 1: n y p D, he informed them, Hey, I have
Speaker 1: him on the phone, give me a moment. I'm going
Speaker 1: to get him out of the house, and and we
Speaker 1: were able to do that without anything happened. This wasn't
Speaker 1: highly reported, but contact system in pieces and they'll tell
Speaker 1: you this happened, and the commanding officer respected that we
Speaker 1: were able to do that right, and we after that,
Speaker 1: we had to assure that young brother, don't go at
Speaker 1: your mother right because it wasn't your mother that call,
Speaker 1: even though you are arguing with her. So now we
Speaker 1: still have to work with ovations. So this is an
Speaker 1: example we're talking about, and this is a kid that
Speaker 1: is continue to have issues, but we put him in
Speaker 1: programs and we have in programs were able to work
Speaker 1: with him right. So we have to look at that
Speaker 1: because he's also been outside of the home where we
Speaker 1: had to get him into a shelter at times. So
Speaker 1: we understand the issues we need to society understand that.
Speaker 1: This is how we work on bringing down the conference
Speaker 1: that's having our community. But when we're talking about our
Speaker 1: young people, we have to remember, like you said, we
Speaker 1: left them, there's a piece mission there, so we have
Speaker 1: to grab them. We have to understand what pieces mission
Speaker 1: in their life and see what we can do to
Speaker 1: supplement those mission pieces. Yes, I do a lot of
Speaker 1: fundraising and and asking and and presenting and proposing because
Speaker 1: my young people need beds, they need legos for their
Speaker 1: brothers and sisters, so they don't go rob somebody to
Speaker 1: get the money to do it. I'm competing with the streets.
Speaker 1: And so earlier you asked, is money a solution? Um,
Speaker 1: It absolutely is, because first, I think doing things that
Speaker 1: we do should receive uh compensation. You know, I worked
Speaker 1: as a full time high school counselor. I'm often the summertimes.
Speaker 1: I go hard in the summer because I'm paid for
Speaker 1: my nine the five and and I got free time,
Speaker 1: you know, but I'm also the mother of a three
Speaker 1: year old, and this work is non stomped. You know.
Speaker 1: Young people don't have boundaries. They're not supposed to, you know,
Speaker 1: they're asked the in requests are are substantial, and it
Speaker 1: may be from fixing a broken nail to during a
Speaker 1: college application. But my time, my opportunity, and and and
Speaker 1: my counseling, my supervision, my team who also pours into
Speaker 1: these young people. That's the solution, um. And we need
Speaker 1: the government, we need city officials, we need philanthropists to
Speaker 1: really get on the side of thinking outside the box. Um,
Speaker 1: because it may look like intervening and stopping the police,
Speaker 1: but it also may look like just giving a young
Speaker 1: person a hundred dollars because they just misplaced the ZIP
Speaker 1: and they gonna do something to get it back. And
Speaker 1: so I need Um, I needed this platform and I
Speaker 1: needed this opportunity because I do believe public health in
Speaker 1: our way through this is this oution. And UM, I
Speaker 1: do believe that I am in addition to violence interruption
Speaker 1: into just this progressive transformation that all Black cities have made.
Speaker 1: Returning citizens are running the city. And UM, I do
Speaker 1: believe that I am in addition to violence interruption into
Speaker 1: just this progressive transformation that all Black cities have made.
Speaker 1: Returning citizens are running the city. You know, um, And
Speaker 1: it's a beautiful thing and it shows that transformation is real.
Speaker 1: Tell us how people can support the Trigger project. Same
Speaker 1: thing for GMAC. How can people give um, you know, cash, afts,
Speaker 1: whatever you have. We're also going to make sure that
Speaker 1: we put it on the screen. UM. I want to
Speaker 1: make sure that folks know that. As we are in
Speaker 1: this conversation right now with Shan Do, he has pulled
Speaker 1: away from a conference that is happening in Chicago. Again.
Speaker 1: People seem to think there's no work being done, nobody's
Speaker 1: getting together, They don't care about gun violence. What about
Speaker 1: the violence in our community. Well, there are individuals that
Speaker 1: are at a conference right now working together on on strategies.
Speaker 1: And then we have our sister Tia in um Tia
Speaker 1: bell In in d C. And guess what, it's not free.
Speaker 1: It's not free. It costs money to get there. I'll
Speaker 1: see you in a nice little clean hotel shining through.
Speaker 1: You supposed to be in that. We're not. We're not
Speaker 1: staying at the Motel six. We're not doing that. But
Speaker 1: let me tell you, let me tell you something about that. Right.
Speaker 1: I had to. I had to work on of the
Speaker 1: sources of funding to make this happen for fifteen of
Speaker 1: my team, right, and we submitted to the Mayor's office
Speaker 1: to prevent gun violence, that we're going to the conference,
Speaker 1: and they said they didn't deem it necessary. We're gonna
Speaker 1: send two people, and they didn't understand the need for
Speaker 1: me to take my team to the national game crime.
Speaker 1: We sent to national conference and we're Gangster is making
Speaker 1: astronomical community changes dealing with issues of gang violence. There's
Speaker 1: always something there to try to prevent us from moving forward.
Speaker 1: But we had to continue to fight for solutions, right,
Speaker 1: So in that we had to make it work, and
Speaker 1: that's what this work is about. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: not just on that level, if we're talking about working
Speaker 1: on with individuals in our community. If to like look
Speaker 1: at the incident with the TEND people's shot, if we
Speaker 1: had a post on that neighborhood and we knew that
Speaker 1: conflictence bruining, it takes resources to take those two groups
Speaker 1: who have no space to to mediate. And when you
Speaker 1: think about the conference, nobody wants to sit on the
Speaker 1: corner with TEND people on this side Tipically that's side
Speaker 1: of anybody got guns and trying to mediate the conference.
Speaker 1: It's not gonna work. There's no mediator there. Somebody's obsessing.
Speaker 1: So we have to create mediation spaces for then wherever
Speaker 1: there's conference of gangs or whatever clicks in our city.
Speaker 1: And in that there's times where we had to take
Speaker 1: a group of individuals and sit down and pay for
Speaker 1: dinner or lunch to have that conversation. Then go get
Speaker 1: the other group and have dinner on lunch with them
Speaker 1: and they don't want no pizza because they in the
Speaker 1: speech husband they want a pizza, And then work to
Speaker 1: bring that group together right and that these are different
Speaker 1: types of resources and just like the systems said, you know,
Speaker 1: how how can I not have to count the city
Speaker 1: if I see a person who was upset about a
Speaker 1: hundred fiftiesip that somebody got him for and if I
Speaker 1: know I could save a life by being able to say,
Speaker 1: here's a gift car for two hundred hours. Bro, It's
Speaker 1: not even that serious, right, We got that, yo, Bro,
Speaker 1: don't do that again. You see what I'm saying. He
Speaker 1: still want to do what he wanted to do regards,
Speaker 1: but we want you to know that our world has
Speaker 1: been been that you made a bad mistake, and let's
Speaker 1: work with you to make sure that you don't make
Speaker 1: mistakes like that because that's gonna lead to somebody dying.
Speaker 1: So we had to look at all these things and
Speaker 1: understand that the resources are extremely important. And on top
Speaker 1: of that, because I've been attracted about my salary before
Speaker 1: and they don't know the level of work that I do. Right,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm the CEO, and I'm in the train in
Speaker 1: two with my team. Right, it doesn't stop, but it's
Speaker 1: it's about also understanding that this is what I do
Speaker 1: twenty four steps it there's no stop point for me.
Speaker 1: And in that work I have to provide for a family,
Speaker 1: and I cannot be looking like I'm starving in the street,
Speaker 1: hurting and telling somebody that the positive life is the
Speaker 1: way to grow. And man, that's I'm not trying to hurt,
Speaker 1: like yeah, yea, look at but I'm not with that right.
Speaker 1: That doesn't make sense to the people. So it's about
Speaker 1: understanding that there's value in the work of of of
Speaker 1: of who we are and what we do, and that
Speaker 1: it takes resources to keep us working right, because I
Speaker 1: can't I got a bunch of I got kids, So
Speaker 1: how do I provide for my kids? I chose this
Speaker 1: work right, and I chold to build up the ability
Speaker 1: to be able to finance myself and anybody else in
Speaker 1: the community that I can finance to do this work.
Speaker 1: And that's where we have to grow. We grow more
Speaker 1: provincionists and we're able to fund more provincionists on different levels.
Speaker 1: It's not just about the street work we're doing, but
Speaker 1: on different levels the mental health perspective, right, that's not
Speaker 1: getting the resources that it needs. So when we get
Speaker 1: people understand we need so many different levels of resources
Speaker 1: to deal with these issues, then we'll really start to
Speaker 1: see the changes that we're looking for and we're working towards.
Speaker 1: I said it all the time. I said, those directly
Speaker 1: impacted pollution man. And like you said, if these young
Speaker 1: most of these young kids are committing acts of violence
Speaker 1: out of poverty, poverty is violenced, you know, and you
Speaker 1: and these communities a lot. They on the corner, hustle
Speaker 1: in the skin and making a couple of hundred dollars.
Speaker 1: And we have organizations and I say all the times,
Speaker 1: like you said, gangster is making astronomical changeing. Gangster's stopping violence.
Speaker 1: Right when you gangster, you can tell somebody, yo, we're
Speaker 1: not beefing. Ain't nobody shooting on this block. We're gonna
Speaker 1: hold this block down. The ladies gonna feel safe, the
Speaker 1: kids donna feel safe, and the fun. And when we're
Speaker 1: able to fund that mentality, when we're able to give
Speaker 1: these young kids, that the the ones who have the
Speaker 1: reputations in the hood, the up and coming ones who
Speaker 1: would normally have been the shooters, and say, look, we
Speaker 1: want to fund you to make sure that this block
Speaker 1: is safe. This is your block, you think it's your block,
Speaker 1: making sure you don't. We don't need nobody shooting out here.
Speaker 1: We make sure these kids got opportunities, they got on resources,
Speaker 1: they got after school, they got basketball, they got traveling teams,
Speaker 1: all the things that keep you out of them the streets.
Speaker 1: Like if we can, if we can fund our communities
Speaker 1: to do those things, then we can change the narrative.
Speaker 1: Then we then we we we create with cool is
Speaker 1: right now? Cool is you shoot you the shooting you
Speaker 1: and you man down somebody you call the stain as
Speaker 1: they said, that's being cool. So when we when we
Speaker 1: start saying, yo, the cool dude right here ain't going
Speaker 1: to jail. You know what I'm saying, He ain't going
Speaker 1: to jail. He got more money than you, and he cool.
Speaker 1: He got the same girl you're trying to get, and
Speaker 1: he ain't doing nothing negative. Then we can compete. I
Speaker 1: told you my my message is to take the positivity
Speaker 1: out of negativity and put the positivity and positive right
Speaker 1: exactly what you said. We have to now show him.
Speaker 1: Yeah you see me, I'm looking good. I might gotta
Speaker 1: pare this and that. Yeah, I'm doing positive right. I
Speaker 1: got people who see me that year a rapper. It
Speaker 1: happens all the time, you know. I got the chain
Speaker 1: on that looks like a wrapping something, right, and I
Speaker 1: say no, guess what I do. I prevent violence and
Speaker 1: they all struck like you're serious? Yes, right, the perception right,
Speaker 1: So this is what we have to get in going
Speaker 1: back to what you said, Mike, think about and that's
Speaker 1: what we gotta get a society think about. Think about
Speaker 1: going to all these neighborhoods with the resources to say
Speaker 1: all you, you, and you and you. I know you
Speaker 1: got a reputation out here. I know they respect you
Speaker 1: out here. I'm going to make sure that you have
Speaker 1: a yearly salary to make sure these these shootings do
Speaker 1: not happen. So when you were gonna do the neighborhood, listen,
Speaker 1: don't mess up my money with no shootings, right, that's
Speaker 1: the mindset you gotta have. Right, you're a gangster, right,
Speaker 1: you're saying you're a gangster. All right, As a gangster,
Speaker 1: you should baby tell So don't shoot out here. We're
Speaker 1: not doing that, right, don't mess up my money. Look
Speaker 1: at how you want to especially women and children are outside,
Speaker 1: especially the window especially, And that's that's the messaging right
Speaker 1: once up at the time, as we get the to
Speaker 1: understand one, don't shoot two if you have a problem
Speaker 1: and you feel that you have to respond, we want
Speaker 1: to find an outlet for you. But if you feel
Speaker 1: like that's the demonster says, we gotta check our women
Speaker 1: and children. So that is our main messaging, right, If
Speaker 1: somebody is not of that life, then you should wait
Speaker 1: for any type of action. I don't give as a fight.
Speaker 1: You don't go up into a public restaurant and engage
Speaker 1: in a fight because you're now gonna engage people who
Speaker 1: have nothing to do with that, and an innocent person
Speaker 1: will get hurt. So the messaging has to change overall. Right,
Speaker 1: the people who are pushing this energy we have to
Speaker 1: reach out to, including our state prisons. I want us
Speaker 1: to remember that there are people are sitting in jail
Speaker 1: with life oppressed, with no money, and they're using their
Speaker 1: reputation there. There's their status that all of that to
Speaker 1: push those young brothers in the street to keep moving
Speaker 1: like that because that's all they got, right, So we
Speaker 1: gotta get on top of them as well. Information how
Speaker 1: people donate and if you take us out, Yeah, you
Speaker 1: can find g MAC at www dot Gangster g A
Speaker 1: n G S T A macin m A c K
Speaker 1: I and dot com UH and Our donation button is
Speaker 1: right on our page PayPal. You can find us on there.
Speaker 1: Look up shandonly Fatther to see the work that we're
Speaker 1: doing in New York City and what I'm going to
Speaker 1: do for Brooklyn as a whole. Bless you brother again.
Speaker 1: In the perfect world we would be able to operate
Speaker 1: in a way that is and that's that to who
Speaker 1: we're serving, not the grant tour you know, um, But
Speaker 1: I'm Tia Bell, founder to Trigger Project. Check to true
Speaker 1: reasons I grabbed the gun eball from risk were the
Speaker 1: voice of the young inns and the shooter. And our
Speaker 1: website is www dot the Trigger Project dot org. We're
Speaker 1: on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter at the Trigger Project DC.
Speaker 1: And we do have a cash shop because we're not
Speaker 1: that big. So it's dollar sign Trigger Project. And you
Speaker 1: are donating to and supporting again the nourishment, the enrichment, UM,
Speaker 1: just the betterment of the young people that I served.
Speaker 1: We make. It's just that and work together. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: gotta connect man. We want to thank you all for
Speaker 1: being a part of this conversation. Um. Continue to do
Speaker 1: the work you do. We do the work so we
Speaker 1: understand what it takes. We understand how unfunded, undefunded this
Speaker 1: work is, how unglamorous it is, how it's criticized. You know,
Speaker 1: I understand definitely what Shand goes through, being somebody from
Speaker 1: that life, coming from the streets and really wanted to
Speaker 1: do something better. And people don't want to see you
Speaker 1: do better. They don't want to see you evolved. They
Speaker 1: don't want to believe that you can evolved because you're
Speaker 1: able to utilize you know, soliloquy, I mean colloquialism and
Speaker 1: and and understand the language and understanding where the uniform
Speaker 1: of the culture and be effective and really change. I
Speaker 1: want you to know that when they're attacking you and
Speaker 1: it's and it's and they don't believe and you being
Speaker 1: able to do what you do, one of the main
Speaker 1: reasons is they don't believe in themselves and they can't
Speaker 1: do nothing but ridicule someone else. Family, We want to
Speaker 1: thank you all so much. It took a lot of
Speaker 1: your time today. Um, this is gonna be a really
Speaker 1: powerful episode that I think a lot of people will
Speaker 1: gain information. And you know, generally we do ten minutes,
Speaker 1: fifteen minutes. It's kind of moving along quickly because we
Speaker 1: do live in a society and in a time where
Speaker 1: everything in media is fast fast, but today we want
Speaker 1: to slow it all the way down and really be
Speaker 1: able to give folks the opportunity to YouTube, the opportunity
Speaker 1: to express the real nitty gritty of what's happening. Anybody
Speaker 1: who wants to get this thing right. If you are
Speaker 1: somebody who's out there and you say, listen, I have power. UM.
Speaker 1: I am a corporate leader, I a philanthropist, I'm an
Speaker 1: elected official, I'm whoever, and I have the ability to
Speaker 1: make a change. These folks know what they're talking about.
Speaker 1: And these are just two of thousands of people across
Speaker 1: this nation who do the work every single day and
Speaker 1: they know not just the communities that they know the blocks,
Speaker 1: they know the buildings, they know the apartments, they know
Speaker 1: the people, they know the hospital, they know the intricate details,
Speaker 1: and they need our support. So until freedom, our organization
Speaker 1: UM is you know, working very uh diligently. My son
Speaker 1: is leading the campaign to black boycott, black murder, but
Speaker 1: also street politicians as a platform these six episodes. I'm
Speaker 1: proud of them, my son, because you know, we really
Speaker 1: have focused in and honed in on what we know. UM.
Speaker 1: But street. Politicians will not stop here in terms of
Speaker 1: getting out being using our platform to share a message
Speaker 1: about the work. We have to do it for ourselves.
Speaker 1: We can't wait for any else to tell our stories.
Speaker 1: Very very powerful individuals. That was dope. That was dope.
Speaker 1: They had a little synergy there, you know what, they
Speaker 1: had good energy, man, they both respected each other. It's
Speaker 1: this work is you know, it's not glamorized. You know,
Speaker 1: it's not even understood the time. But when you see
Speaker 1: people like them who really are passionate about the work,
Speaker 1: who come from the community, who who understand, Like when
Speaker 1: you listen to them, you know that they understand what's
Speaker 1: needed to stop violencing the community. Have the right level
Speaker 1: of passion, skill and love that is needed. Man. That
Speaker 1: when I'm listening to t I can tell these young
Speaker 1: boys and girls sit around her and she treats them
Speaker 1: with love and tenderness and she and she pours into
Speaker 1: them and she wants those resources to be able to
Speaker 1: give to them. Listening to Shan, do I know that
Speaker 1: he really wants to change? I know, you know he
Speaker 1: identifies with his own mistake and you know, being led
Speaker 1: astray and and the mind state that it took when
Speaker 1: he was involved in that street life, and he really
Speaker 1: wants to be able to give back and redirect a
Speaker 1: lot of our youngsters in our communities right now. So
Speaker 1: it's really dope to have conversations like that with people
Speaker 1: like that. Yeah, I feel like I felt like there was,
Speaker 1: as you said, synergy between Tia and Shan Duke. That's
Speaker 1: really important. Right. It's like this is the first time
Speaker 1: that they met, but they talked about that language and
Speaker 1: they both speaking and you would think, well, if you
Speaker 1: didn't know that, they just today UM on our platform
Speaker 1: had their first conversation. If you didn't know that, you
Speaker 1: would think they've been working together for years. Because the model,
Speaker 1: the model and the depth of knowledge is the same.
Speaker 1: Yet different places and spaces mean that you have to
Speaker 1: be creative and how you approach things, and we can
Speaker 1: learn from one another. I think that there is something
Speaker 1: to be said about the to me they UM they
Speaker 1: to me, I felt like they were in a beautiful dance. Uh.
Speaker 1: In conversation. It flowed so well that at times I
Speaker 1: lost myself in trying to understand and digging deep with
Speaker 1: what they were saying, because there was nothing fake about it.
Speaker 1: It's extremely authentic and it's coming from a place of
Speaker 1: real understanding. And you can only get that understanding when
Speaker 1: you're out there knocking doors, talking to people, saving lives
Speaker 1: and really working with our people. And guess what, none
Speaker 1: of us are perfect, right. I'm sure that within their organizations,
Speaker 1: within their lives, they struggled with all types of things.
Speaker 1: I think we're all constantly in a battle with ourselves before,
Speaker 1: you know, how can we do better? How can we
Speaker 1: be stronger? How can we support more? How can we
Speaker 1: be supported more? Um? But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I know for sure that these two individuals are doing
Speaker 1: some real powerful work. And the other thing I was
Speaker 1: gonna say is that there are other folks that I've
Speaker 1: reached out to when you've reached out to and not
Speaker 1: long after we talked to them, there's some drunk Oh,
Speaker 1: you know, why did y'all come to my town and
Speaker 1: you didn't call me? Or why did you do this?
Speaker 1: Or you know whatever, which you try to respect people
Speaker 1: all the time and when they say why did you
Speaker 1: come downtown? And we make sure that we work hard
Speaker 1: to to to mend those relationships when we feel it's necessary,
Speaker 1: and when those individuals have a certain left of respect.
Speaker 1: But the thing about Tia and and why I know
Speaker 1: we're not crazy is because as soon as I've reached
Speaker 1: out to her, she was like, we have the late.
Speaker 1: All of these connections have to be made. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: introduce you to my people who introduced me to yours,
Speaker 1: because she never ever started with the old Well, you know,
Speaker 1: y'all came the d C one time and stepped on
Speaker 1: my toe and hurt my mom is back and did this.
Speaker 1: It was straight from the beginning, y'all what y'all trying
Speaker 1: to do? You know, tell me more about who you are,
Speaker 1: and we beginin. We jumped right in and you could
Speaker 1: see that energy from her in this conversation, which tells
Speaker 1: me that it's a lot of other people out here
Speaker 1: that really don't have our community's best interests at hard.
Speaker 1: And and that brings you to what I don't get.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't get why people see the need
Speaker 1: to try to hate what tis somebody down that's doing
Speaker 1: work that they don't do. You know that they that
Speaker 1: they're not even willing to do. Like if you look
Speaker 1: at most of the people who criticize, you know, brothers
Speaker 1: like Shan do or brothers like myself or sisters like you,
Speaker 1: you know, who literally on the front line doing this work.
Speaker 1: They are doing nothing, you know. And I don't understand
Speaker 1: how people think that they even have do they have
Speaker 1: the authority, they have any level of credence who have
Speaker 1: to critique people who are actually doing work, like this
Speaker 1: work is a day and night job. Man, You know
Speaker 1: what Shan Duke was breaking it down, how this is
Speaker 1: his lifetime's work. You know, this is his lifetime's work.
Speaker 1: I've seen the article in the paper about Sean King
Speaker 1: and his house and him having a house, and people
Speaker 1: want to criticize, and it's for me like, well, why
Speaker 1: should a man who gets death threats, who puts his
Speaker 1: life on the line, who we've seen do work to
Speaker 1: to get people of death roads to who we've seen
Speaker 1: raised money for people who's been in jail to come
Speaker 1: home and buy them houses, who we've seen raised money
Speaker 1: for different situations and people we've seen him fight, you know,
Speaker 1: and get police officers who have done things, identified them,
Speaker 1: found that the new the number of them, found people
Speaker 1: who are who are wronged and and and somehow got
Speaker 1: the address and got them to charge. Like when people
Speaker 1: are literally doing work to that that significant in that
Speaker 1: real and that threatening to your own life. Why should
Speaker 1: they be starving? Why should we not want to see
Speaker 1: them happen? You know? And it's and it's and and
Speaker 1: why do people what do? What does it get? What
Speaker 1: does it give you to to to tear people down
Speaker 1: and hate on people that are doing work? Literally, even
Speaker 1: if you don't agree with everything, like it's people, I
Speaker 1: don't agree with everything. When I see somebody is doing something,
Speaker 1: especially something that I'm not willing to do or able
Speaker 1: to do, you know, or don't know how to do.
Speaker 1: You know, I could could, I could partigue it or preticithering. Ah, well,
Speaker 1: I think this is never at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to tear you down because I know
Speaker 1: whatever it is that you do, if I'm not able
Speaker 1: to do it or doing it and it's actually helping
Speaker 1: or done something to somebody attests to the fact that
Speaker 1: you're really doing work. I don't have anything there going
Speaker 1: to say about that, you know, as long as about
Speaker 1: evolution is about saving our communities are gonna build and
Speaker 1: it's about community and I'm all for man and I
Speaker 1: think more people should have that monstery. You want to
Speaker 1: know what I think what I don't get it. You
Speaker 1: don't get it because it ain't to be That's it,
Speaker 1: because if we don't get it, we're supposed to get
Speaker 1: it because it ain't to be got. So once again
Speaker 1: we had another make shoot that you follow, Shan Duke,
Speaker 1: Mike Fatter, g Matt and Tia Bell the Trigger Project
Speaker 1: doing real phenomenal work. You hear you hear it. You
Speaker 1: see who they are, dope individuals and I'm your host,
Speaker 1: my song this is Tamika Mallory. She's not gonna always
Speaker 1: be wrong and I'm not gonna always be right, but
Speaker 1: we will guarantee you of the time will always be authentic.
Speaker 1: Number one show. That's how we owed it. That's how
Speaker 1: we owed it. That's how we owed it. That's how
Speaker 1: we owed it. That's how we owed it.