08/04/2019
Today is a day that should for many of us be about rest, a day of reflection and a day to communicate with God. The last 48 hours has been alarming, it has been concerning and sadly for far to many families it has been heart breaking.
Needless to say that we here at Chop Suey Entertainment are just as saddened as the rest of our country. We like to create content that allows us to temporarily escape reality but there are moments like this that I have to stop as a leader and shift the focus to what is impacting our community and those who follow us.
We have a small platform, but a platform nonetheless and I would be remiss if I did not step up on my soap box for a moment.
This problem of gun violence in America has exceeded epidemic levels and we are approaching a point where we have become so numbed to the senseless violence that it takes events like those of the past 2 days to shock the country and make us pause. An important question is why is that?
Every day, 100 Americans are killed with guns and hundreds more are shot and injured. Gun violence does not just impact those who have been killed, or those who have been injured. It affects every family, it affects the victims friends, it affects their school mates and/or co-workers, it affects their communities.
Put simply gun violence touches the lives of those who witness it, those who know someone who was shot, or those who live in fear of the next shooting.
Lets just reflect on the following grim statistic. There have been 251 mass shootings in 2019, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
That is more days than we have had in the year to this date (that's 216 for those who care to know). But it does not stop there. Mass shootings grab the headlines now but every day there are shootings where only one or two victims are impacted and they get lost in the larger story here.
This is not a political rant where we are pitting Republicans against Democrats, it is not solely a black or minority problem, it does not only affect the inner city. This problem is solely an American problem and the blame games and the politicizing are not needed. Solutions are needed because we have young children in this country who are growing up feeling this is the norm. It is NOT the norm and I refuse to allow them to believe that lie.
We need to start a serious dialogue in our communities not only with the people who look and talk like us but with the people who are different than us because it humanizes them. It helps break down those lies that we are different and need to fear the other person.
Our prayers go out to the victims of the Dayton and El Paso mass shootings, the victims of the shooting in Virginia Beach and the victims of those shootings that didn't make the national news but that matter just as much.
Please join us in not only praying for those impacted and their families but by also changing your social media profiles as we have to honor the innocent victims of these tragedies.
Tarik Joyner
CEO & Co-Owner