SEEKING ANSWERS

Gun violence prompts
‘call to consciousness’ forum

By St. Clair Murraine
Outlook Staff Writer

Adding their voices to a nation-wide outcry over recent mass shootings, municipal government leaders joined with members of the local clergy and others in the community for a “call to consciousness” forum on gun violence.

Throughout the nearly three-hour long conversation, they talked about ways to find answers based on what statistics from the FBI and other agencies say. Rev. RB Holmes, who organized the event, said the discussion will be dissected to come up with solutions. 

“We have come to make it clear that we can grieve and act at the same time,” said Holmes, pastor at Bethel Missionary Baptist Church. “We can cry for the victims of gun violence and cry out for serious gun reform and safety at the same time. Now is the time to pass  true, sound and ethical gun safety laws and restrictions. 

“We have too many guns on the streets of America in the hands of irrational and irresponsible people.”

The forum, which took place at Bethel’s Family Lift Center,  came after a mass shooting in Buffalo, N. Y. that was followed 10 days later by an attack on Robb Elementary School by an 18-year-old gunman in Uvalde, Tex. Last Sunday fatal shootings occurred in Philadelphia, Chattanooga, Tenn., and Socorro, Tex. 

More than once during the meeting, speakers mentioned 60 gun-related incidents that have also taken place in Tallahassee. Many reiterated the same sentiments about the causes of shootings.

Experts throughout the country are now saying that shootings have become a public epidemic. That was backed up by statistics presented by Patricia Warren, a professor in FSU College of Criminology and Criminal Justice.

She pointed to 2000 when there were 29 incidents involving guns, a number that escalated to 249 by 2021. Since those numbers were released, 27 school shootings have taken place so far this year.

 “Our schools have become unsafe places,” Warren said, lamenting how it’s become routine for kids to prepare for active shooters on their campuses.

Warren’s presentation was a prelude to four segments that the group focused on, including ways to find a cure and cause of gun violence, reasons and resolution for Black on Black crime, the role and responsibilities of the business and political leadership in reducing gun violence, and the role of the religious community and community leaders.

On the latter topic, Greg James, pastor at Pastor Life Church International Center, said churches are losing young people to rappers who have become influencers. For instance, James said rapper Young Thug has lyrics in his songs that make a life of crime seems cool.

He pleaded with ministers in the audience to help change the minds of young people.

“The church’s responsibility is to ensure and educate them that the messages that they are hearing from this type of music has a lot of fantasy with it,” said James, who is a candidate for district eight state representative. “It’s not real, what the rappers are singing. The leadership of our churches must take an active role.”

Assistant Tallahassee Police Chief Maurice Holmes pointed to the urgency for change when he said 195 guns were stolen from vehicles last year with 181 of them being from unlocked vehicles.

Many of the guns are stolen by young people who take them to school campuses, Holmes said.

Young people with guns make “bad decisions,” he said. “They are grabbing these guns and are pointing at people, pulling the trigger. When they pull the trigger, you don’t get that back. Once that bullet leaves that firearm you can’t bring it back.”

City Commissioner Dianne Williams Cox called out parents who have given control of their homes to their children. Parents need to return to old-school discipline, she said.

“We’ve got to heave people and leaders who are not afraid to speak power to truth,” Williams Cox said. “It’s time to stop playing with it because they don’t care anything about the church. They come to the church and shoot up in there. We used to be scared to even chew gum in church.”

But the problem runs much deeper than just children being undisciplined, said Cecka Rose Green, executive director of Leon County Children’s Services Council. Hunger, poverty and trauma are all part of what could lead young people to guns, said Green, mother of three children between the ages of 21 and 15.

“We’ve got to get our kids ready to start school,” she said. “Get them in early learning, get involved in their education and thereby deter them from getting involved in juvenile crimes.”

Some other astonishing facts were presented by Rev. James Wright, an assistant professor at Askew School of Public administration and the college of social science and Public Policy at FSU. Speaking on the topic of Black on Black crime, Wright said a FBI study has found that 89 percent of crimes committed by Black is toward another Black. By comparison, 83 percent of crimes committed against a White person is by another White individual. 

Another interesting study mentioned by Wright is one that showed neighborhoods that are predominantly Blacks and Latinos weren’t ranked as preferred places to live or invest. Usually those communities are plagued with substandard housing, substandard education, high poverty, and high unemployment, he said.

 “The conditions in the Black communities historically have created an opportunity where we’ve seen there are high instances of Black crimes against other Blacks,” Wright said. “These are structural issues that we need to address.”

Joe Parramore, executive director of New Journey Ministries, was poignant in a call on lawmakers to enact tougher gun laws. He illustrated his point by inferring the recent passage of abortion laws in Texas and Florida.

“The powers of public policy can write legislation that restricts a woman’s right to healthcare that can potentially be life or death situations and yet they fail to restrict an 18-year-old White male from buying two AR-15s in Texas that took the lives of 19 children,” said Parramore, who is White. “There is something wrong with that picture. 

“The heart of that problem is White men in power. Think about it because I’m not ashamed to say it.”