“I work in Seattle schools, and I think the most effective thing that I’ve been able to see is people building relationships with kids. Being able to talk to kids and being present for kids all of the time. I don’t know if that would have prevented what happened this weekend at the Bite, but I know that the more connections that kids have, the more adults they feel see them and just show up and are there for them, I think the better off we’re going to be.”
“Watch, protect, and take care of the young kids. We need to look out for them.”
“Make it harder for people to get guns.”
“I think about that a lot. I think one thing that community can really do is talk to the children, the young people who are committing the violence, and see how we can heal them. I think a lot of the problems kind of stem from neglect and abuse and their inability to kind of regulate their emotions. So, I think if we ask kids to kind of be honest about what they’re dealing with internally at home and why they’re showing up and how they’re treating people, then I think we actually can find a way rather than just assuming.”
“It is all about the youth. We have to find some way to give them some hope. I think they’re just kind of stuck, and they don’t see their way out. So, they lash out with violence. We’ve got to find some kind of way to give them that hope.”
“We need to focus on the young kids. When it comes to our Black community, we need present fathers in the home. We need the education system to give more structure to kids, go back to some corporate deterrent. If you don’t discipline your kid at home, then they end up doing things involving gun violence.”
