Local and national gun violence-prevention advocates spoke about community action and engagement during a conference at San Jose State’s Tommie Smith & John Carlos Lawn Wednesday morning.
Elena Klaw, SJSU Center for Community Learning and Leadership director and event organizer, said the three-and-a-half-hour “Day of Action Against Gun Violence” has been in the works since May to encourage community members to promote equity and social justice.
The Center for Community Learning and Leadership coordinates and oversees service-learning classes, according to its website.
“Whether it's through mental health resources, responsible gun ownership and gun safety information or through Walk the Talk America, education, prevention and policy change . . . my goal is that students [and] community members get involved in any way that they feel is appropriate and useful to them,” Klaw said in an interview during an intermission.
Speeches were separated by 20-30 minute intermissions where SJSU students, faculty and staff could interact with keynote speakers and receive educational resources on gun violence including informational and steps-of-action pamphlets and data sheets.
One of the tables stationed next to the conference was that of Walk the Talk America, a nationwide organization that allies the gun-owning and firearm community with the mental health community for gun violence solutions.
Founder and president Michael Sodini said he started Walk the Talk America in 2018 once he recognized the two sides barely communicate with each other because they politically disagree and rely on legislation to “battle it out."
“Someone once asked me what happens after a mass shooting,” Sodini said in an interview during an intermission. “I was like, ‘everybody blames us [the gun-owning and firearm community], we blame mental health and nothing ever happens.’ ”
While there’s no universal definition of a mass shooting, the Gun Violence Archive defines it as a shooting with four or more people injured or killed. The U.S. nonprofit corporation, formed in 2013, provides free online public access to gun-related violence information, according to its website.
Sodini said while starting Walk the Talk America, his idea was to “throw money” from the gun industry to the mental health community to help fund programs that connect people to help when they need it and solve mass shootings.
“There's a focus on finding the next mass shooter, which is like finding a needle in a haystack,” Sodini said. “To what I found is nobody has the answers and the mental health community kept pushing me back to [the issue of] suicide by firearm.”
Statistics
Jessica Blitchok, San Jose’s Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America chapter president, discussed national data on gun violence during her speech at the conference.
Before introducing the facts, Blitchok said: “I want to remind you that when you hear the numbers and statistics, and I tend to get really emotional when I talk about this, this is more than just data. These are people. These are children, parents, siblings, beloved aunts, uncles, cousins and friends and these are families that are never going to be the same.”
Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America is a nationwide grassroots organization that pushes for public safety measures that can protect people from gun violence, according to its website.
“Every day in America, more than 100 people are killed with guns and more than 200 are shot and injured,” Blitchok said. “58% of American adults or someone they care for have experienced gun violence in their lifetime and while mass shootings get a majority of the attention, they’re responsible for a very small percentage of gun violence, only 1%.”
Sodini said suicide by firearm accounts for two thirds of all firearm deaths in the U.S.
The majority, or 60%, of gun deaths were suicides in 2019, according to The Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence February 2021 review of 2019 gun mortality data by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Suicide by any method continues to be the tenth leading cause of death in the country and firearms remain accountable for half of all suicides, according to the February 2021 review.
Blitchok said she was happy Walk the Talk America was at the conference because the suicide-by-firearm data is information “we don't hear very often.”
Solutions
Sodini said there needs to be innovative ways to create time and space between a firearm and a suicidal person including technologies that will shut down safes when someone in the household is having a mental health crisis.
“There’s a huge problem with people that go into crisis and have access to a gun,” he said.
Sodini said after partnering with Mental Health America (MHA) in 2019, Walk the Talk America began including wristbands and pamphlets that promote free and anonymous mental health screenings inside firearm shipments.
MHA is the nation’s leading community-based nonprofit dedicated to addressing the needs of those living with mental illness and to promoting the mental health of all, according to its website.
Sodini said because mental health screenings were “such a hit” within the gun-owning community, Walk the Talk America is now partnered with several top gun manufacturers, sending the cards in shipments nationwide.
Digital media art junior Alexander Jang said while he’s never had to be around guns, he resonated with Sodini’s speech because he struggled with mental health issues growing up in his household.
On a large whiteboard displayed next to the conference, which read “What Do You Think The Causes of Gun Violence Are?” in the center of it, Jang wrote, “Lack of care and emotional support when needed most.”
Jang said while he wishes everyone felt as if they can confide in their loved ones regarding personal issues, people should encourage each other to overcome the fear of seeking help.
Blitchok said the solution to gun violence isn’t singular and it’s not only about passing laws that limit firearm sales and possessions.
“We need to look at access to firearms for children and people in crisis. We need to look at police violence,” she said during the conference. “We need to look at community violence intervention and prevention and we need to vote individuals into office who are committed to ending gun violence.”
Blitchok said examining how systems of inequality have left communities of color disproportionately affected by gun violence is a place to start.
“Nationally, Black Americans represent the majority of gun homicide victims,” she said. “In fact, a Black male is 16 times more likely to die from gun homicide in the U.S. than a white male. Black children and teens are 14 times more likely than white children and teens of the same age to die by homicide.”
Engagement
Blitchok asked the attendees to text a message to Congress, requesting the funding of community organizations to be part of President Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better” bill, on which House Democrats are expected to vote this week.
The social-spending bill includes a framework regarding funding education programs and housing, fighting climate change and expanding medicare, healthcare and immigration provisions.
“You guys are here today about taking action to prevent gun violence and about asking your friends and family to get involved to do the same because the more of us there are, the stronger we are and the more likely we are to make a really positive and important change,” Blitchok said.
Jang, who stayed for the entire conference, attended alongside his Art 13 classmates in support of their teaching associate John Contreras, an SJSU VET Connect peer leader.
The Veterans Embracing Transition (VET) Connect assesses and addresses SJSU’s military veterans’ needs, according to its website.
Contreras’ spatial murals respectively included a sandbox brimming with bullet shell casings and Disney character Christopher Robin shot dead by Pooh Bear, who could be seen standing about two feet away.
Jang said he thought the art pieces were outstandingly inspirational.
“[Contreras] is letting us know this stuff happens. Don't run away from it. Accept it. Understand it. See what you can do to find a solution around it,” he said.
Jang said people shouldn’t be afraid to talk about gun violence because “you never know when you’re going to be the person who might witness it.”
