65: Tia Bell and the T.R.I.G.G.E.R. Project

In early 2020, DC native Tia Bell launched the T.R.I.G.G.E.R. Project (True Reasons I Grabbed the Gun Evolved in Risks Project), a gun violence prevention program. The T.R.I.G.G.E.R. Project aims to change the normalcy of gun violence within communities of color. The initiative incorporates film, empowerment programs, education, and development initiatives. Tia joins host JJ  to talk about why authentically telling the untold stories of everyday gun violence users to all walks of life is so important, and how-to bring compassion for young people who feel invisible.

Mentioned in this podcast:
TRIGGER Project Aims to End Gun Violence (Howard University)
AIM (TRIGGER Project)
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Quiz (American Society for the Positive Care of Children)

For more information on Brady, follow us on social @Bradybuzz, or via our website at bradyunited.org. Full transcripts and bibliography available at bradyunited.org/podcast.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255. 
Music provided by: David “Drumcrazie” Curby
Special thanks to Hogan Lovells, for their long standing legal support 
℗&©2019 Red, Blue, and Brady

Transcript

spk_0:   0:08
everybody. This is the legal disclaimer where we tell you that the views, thoughts and opinion should on this podcast belong solely to our guests and hosts and not necessarily Brady or Brady's affiliate. Please note this podcast contains discussions of violence that some people may find disturbing. It's OK. We find it disturbing. Teoh. Today I am so happy to be joined by the fabulous T. Abele, founder of the Trigger Project, also known as the True Reasons. I grabbed the gun of All from Risks Project Ah Youth organization that is devoted to discussing and de normalizing gun violence and communities of color across the nation, largely through education and youth activism. Together, we're discussing everything from child development being impacted by gun violence to the importance of language then and are unbelievable. But segment I'll share a story that shows exactly by purchasing guns during Cove in 19 can be dangerous. Finally, and our news rub up, I'm covering how stay at home orders are or aren't impacting gun violence, and we'll take a look back at two mass shootings from last year. Yeah, I am. I am so thankful to have you here today, even just through zoom from the first time I saw a video of you And then listen to You wanna call? I've I've just been in awe, so I can't wait to jump into it. So I'm wondering if for our listeners if you could just do a brief introduction sort of into you and then into the trigger project.

spk_1:   1:51
Yeah. My name is Tia Bill. Um, I am a lover and a mom. Um, and a believer that gun violence can end. Yes, that's going all the way down to 0%. I am We in nearly call where I'm from uptown on an uptown girl, Uh, born to a single mom and a team Mom. I'm the oldest of five, and i se although this to say, everything in my life has built me to approach gun violence holistically and with compassion in love and to teach how to do that. Um, and that needs needs to introducing what I'm working on right now, which is the trigger project and trigger stands or true reasons. I grab the gun, evolve from risk. And when we say risk, we think of those risk factors from youth development. Ah, psychological standpoint and respect. Those are pretty much just those individual social, community based elements that keep a young person from living a life that's worthy and well and n bridged. And I want people living in the community of everyday gun violence like myself going up and losing 60 plus people that I love to the involvements. Um, I want them to know and my babies as I call you young people in D. C. Um, I want them to know that internally, you do not have to prepare to deal with gun balance. You don't have to, except it it doesn't have to be out. Nor you don't have to run to it when you hear gunshots not

spk_0:   3:41
run away from

spk_1:   3:42
it. But run to it because you're curious we can change what is expected and normal in our community. If we understand the inspectors that were born into, I want people outside of everyday Gun about his communities, which also

spk_0:   3:56
considered black and brown

spk_1:   3:57
people which considered people in political seats. Um, it's considers people who are not survivors of Gun battleship, which, if you live in America, I don't know how that is you because you've been impacted by what you see, But I want people outside of everyday gun violence to understand that the risk factors, such as adverse childhood experiences that we face our was our of systemic issues and black. I want you to combat that with some compassion and understand truly with these risk factors are that are also validated by the CDC, which is the same infrastructure of this studying and trying to in Kobe. 19 over 300,000 black people have died since I was born in 1989. My mom was shot. My stepfather was killed, my stepmother's that father was shot and survived. I've lost too many friends. I was the first in my family to graduate high school and then go to college when I would write people with my shoe and play basketball and N. C. State in honor of them. It was because they had died, and most of them lost their last two. A bullet as opposed to some of my teammates who were right there. You know, loved ones and family on issue because they might get a view on television in my life and my young people's right laughs and my babies lives um, it's more intervention. And unless we started from cradle to college, this is something that's going to continue. And like Brady, I want it. I want to reduce by 25% in a few years and in another 25% in a few years. And they really work all together because we all have a trigger finger. We all our shooter, we just Some of us have protective factors increased in our lives that lead us to not

spk_0:   5:53
pulling attribute.

spk_1:   5:54
And some of us have. Respect is in our lives that lead us to do so. So understanding that we all are the same bridging, um, you know, advocacy and the streets. Bridging policy and community, um is all a part of this overarching goal of trigger project, and more simply, it's to understand the shooter on. And I told you I felt like I was on the couch because you just pulled everything out of me. I didn't even come up with that beforehand. But it is an intensive, understandably all our shooters in our own right, because the gun is a tool. It's a little too. But if you I don't consider that to for a moment and just look at the person, the whole person, the broken person and once a hell instead of fix. Then we have an incident about.

spk_0:   6:49
I think that that's such a new, interesting way to freeze it because, like, I know a lot of people would hear that Hear you say something like Were all possible. We all have the possibility being a shooter and sort of have, like, a visceral response that, like like no, absolutely not right. I think that that's sort of a natural response, especially for people who you don't have any experience with violence, right? But I think it's interesting that you frame it in sort of the space of there's as long as there's a gun. There's the potentiality to be

spk_1:   7:25
the more important word than shooter is the understanding part. And my grandmother, great grandmother raised me because my mom was young and still having fun. Um, and I'm a mom now, so I understand completely growing up it made me a little name resistant, but my great grandmother said, Be brave, strong, sweet and smart every day to us, and a sweet part of that mantra is was stuck with me. So I'm a 63 gentle being. Who cares about the whole person with any Kurt body? I mean, you know, and I just think because of that, it's made me more receptive. And it's a young people with them to wanna gravitates to me. I actually have a masters and youth development, so I understand exactly that bridge that has to be built in orderto have a successful transition from childhood. It's with Darla Hood, but in D. C. We don't have that. We see people strung out on drugs regularly. We hear gunshots regularly. We hear arguments and we don't We don't see a problem solving skills being practiced. We don't see self control, don't see self regulation. We don't see those things. So so expect us to just end it ourselves with no help without voice being muted, because now the mass shooter has kind of taken, you know, ownership of media. I think it kills us more, and D. C has a shooter every other day. Every other day there's a shooting that happens in the nation's capital, and I grew up in north was like I said earlier, I was in Uptown Girl. I didn't know I was working distance from the White House. So all of those elements played a part in my development and again because I am, I was told and I had stature and people gravitated so much sweetness. I had people support me, and because of that support, I could talk to people, and because of that, I was able to talk. I can digest and and fully dissect what I was going through as only being a 12 year old in charge of it's 10 kids because everybody is just leaving their kids of my grandmother's house for me to watch and be enforcing toe autonomy and realize that I live in apprehension like I know somebody's going to shoot down the street. I know it might be a fight in front of us, so you know, I was the same. Apprehension kind of comes back now, being in the house and being constricted with cold it. But I know how to process it, and I'm emotionally intelligent, and that's a tool that I use in my program. Another made up triple project is understanding herself, and knowing is so giving yourself permission to seal it to get an ownership with Skilling's to talk about it, not to go and pick up a gun and shoot. Because again, the gun is just a way to communicate in our community is

spk_0:   10:26
completely normal. Gentle? Yeah, and I think that that goes to something that the trigger project talks a lot about and that we talked about very briefly on this podcast before with a verse childhood experiences Aces, which maybe Could you go into that a little bit because of your background and use development? But I don't think we talk enough about how these things that happen to people in childhood have a huge impact, not just on themselves in their health, but then also sort of their view of the world as they grow up.

spk_1:   10:58
40% of our will being is based on my set, and if you grow up in deprivation in lack and negligence, you, by definition, in science, you your brain doesn't develop. So I started to mention that when I was in college, I was in my junior year at N. C. State University. I was first in my family to go to college, so oh, new, um, each year was a different experience for my family being four hours away, but never really had an opportunity to come down. I had

spk_0:   11:33
three knee

spk_1:   11:34
surgeries, uh, from the middle of my jury year to the beginning of my super senior year. And because of that proof, it was the most devastating time of my life. Because of that, I will call it now a speed bump. I was able to start my masters and youth development. So my fifth gear at N. C. State. I'm one of the oldest on the team on the leader. But I'm broken because the one thing that saved me from gun violence from abroad told you my mom was shot. I always wanted to act on. Yeah, shooting my mom. My uncle was killed. Which is what? Why? I started at my for profit, for that's fo ur in honor of his birthday. A Before mearkle does, he got right forward to college. So I wanna before at n c State eso When I

spk_0:   12:27
had those knee surgeries,

spk_1:   12:28
when I told you I did not know tear there waas why she existed. What her purpose served. Um you know, I think I was really at my love this moment. But in this time of my life, I met my boyfriend, uh, who was also the father of my two year old sage. And he told me, You know, God is just humbling you and showing you that CIA bill is something greater. And really, in that moment, I started to dig myself out of what I didn't know at the time was depression because I wasn't emotionally sound enough to tell. My trainer will tell my coach what I was going through. It wasn't able to articulate it, and at this time, I'm like, 22 years old. But for him to say, that's when he gave me words to my grief and my heartbreak. And so I started to dig myself out. I applied to grad school for Youth Development and skip a year later, um, which I'm completely disregarding, not being able to play professionally, which was my lifelong dream

spk_0:   13:29
but skips over A year

spk_1:   13:30
later, I found my calling JJ, and this was in my social work quest. We were looking at adverse childhood experiences, and I realized I had experienced seven out of nine experiences. My life was in a textbook and I could not understand like or digest that I was reading all the pain and darkness and happiness. I had just been surviving through expert So it wasn't complete. It was a emotional world wing for me, just completely and wilderness. For the first time in my life, I'm you know, I'm working with the leg trying to pursue grad school on a D. C. Public school education, which, you know, I was completely behind every single body and writing papers and reading comprehension. It was just so many battles I was going through at the same time. I'm still still losing friends to gun balance, but reading all of my life on the page really took me as low as you can think. And then as high as you can think, because again they brought clarity. And then when I changed to the next page, I read about something called Protective Factors. So long story, short Evers childhood experience or a space is a survey that that is given an administer. You can google it and it'll come right up. But you take you answer nine questions and it gives you a score of the end. My professor at the time, said, if you have over four adverse childhood experiences that you, you know, acknowledged in this survey that you, just

spk_0:   15:12
through your trauma

spk_1:   15:13
in life, are at the same health risk as someone with a heart condition,

spk_0:   15:20
and that was

spk_1:   15:21
or I seven. So it was. It was of an awakening for me, but fast forward. Five years later, I'm now you've developer. I'm a programmer. I have my own business and movements and gun violence. Tsunami, using adverse childhood experiences as a score for my young people to be aware of self. Because before we start just trying to solve the world or stop a friend from shooting, you have to understand yourself and be found it again, inhaling and processing life because we got to get through things and not around them or over them or under them. We have to get through them and fully accept them, and you have to understand the shooter is in person. These people were all capable of it. There's a quote from my Angelo. This is when the older we grow them, the more we understand that we have a hand to help ourselves and a hand to help others. And I just think people have to look at and in gun balance through a lens of compassion and healing and helping and knowing that, like, it's very riel. Okay, like 33 die here. 38,000 people die a year. Um, like I said, more Pete, more black people have died. So gun violence, then all of our wars combined, like it's a very real thing. And putting yourself in the shoes of people affected by villages of balance is I like to say,

spk_0:   17:06
Can you can you expand on villages of violence a little bit? Because I eat? I love the language that you used to discuss violence like it seems very intentional, very planned and very well done. So I'm wondering, Can we can talk about that for a second?

spk_1:   17:24
Yes, thank you so much. Um, for us, we words.

spk_0:   17:28
You're welcome. It's it's, but it's like it's downright poetic, though, but I think it makes sense. Yeah, it's well, speaking

spk_1:   17:36
of poetry, I had been blessed with an opportunity to be a part of a youth showcase. Back in February, it was called young, gifted and black, and there was a young poet there who said, and I can't say like her name was truth. Actually, I hope she hears this one day. But she said, If you look at our Children, they are a reflection of the village and we say it takes a village to raise a child. But the village is broken, and it just and I was there I was snapping, you know, I just felt it in my soul and that. But it immediately made me go to my notebook. I have, like, thousands of notes and my phone and diligence of balance just change to me. It's sort of just hit me in my heart like the trigger project did in December. I didn't even talk about how that was born, but I'll get into that a little later. You grow up in a lot of the same trauma and deprivation that your care givers are experiencing. So that's your grandmother who's was sinful because she has to take care of 18 people if that is your mother who doesn't have the ability to connect with you. Because when she was 11 she was touched or she suffered from a lack of security and attachment because no one touch and gave her skin a skin when she was six months old. You know, it's so much Brokenness that is normal, and your belief system changes what you think your fate looks like. And And that's, you know, the positive development that happened for me. I always believed because people believed in me first that I was gonna be something. Um And of course, being that 63 I thought that was dumping a vegetable.

spk_0:   19:30
I was gonna say I'm I was maybe 54 So that wasn't gonna happen for May. A whole families little. So

spk_1:   19:40
make me. I think your stature, because I was I used best, were first to educate myself. And that's not just, you know, through textbook and theory, but that's just life and being able to articulate my feelings and it and who I am. And I'm like I said, my work and well being that has developed, I think is just has been so critical in my success for my significance, because I think significance is more impactful of others. But that exposure key is is so key. And again, if you include so many people on this trigger conversation, people can open themselves up and we can build bridges like governors can be ended in Chicago and Baltimore Milwaukee D. C. All these places that have so much value is so much to offer A cities to these young people who, again, who might not have the hope yet. But if you keep working and keep providing people that they trust and have built and an ability to trust, we'll have a good relationship with healthy relationship with the girl. If you provide those people with the resource perform, do trigger to connect and build bridges where resource is can be shared and connection and conversation can be had we start t end it. It's a it's a beginning occur gun violence is so it I know other words. This came to mind. Gun violence is so beautiful because it's a platform to expose. Many did Brent barriers and, um, disparities face a Z. Also the people, but especially black.

spk_0:   21:28
Even now with Cove

spk_1:   21:30
It, you know, being something that's Harman, our community, more grated more greater than other communities, is it's just it's horrific. To think is the same way I feel older than I am because of what I've been through is the same way people view me and expect more of me when I'm a young person or when I'm 15 because I have been through so much and much. And then very that's called adults application. But people have to start to realize how Maney ISMs we we really practice subconsciously, you know, whether it's colorism. My baby girl is lighter than me. She's probably gonna have more opportunity just because she is or racism or, uh, adults is, um, like there's so many things my grandfather calls them records when he teaches cultural responsiveness. But there's so many records in our mind that just complain over and over and over and over that debilitate us and stop us from reaching out and touching somewhere who may just need to hear a voice or feel that contact will know that you have an opportunity to help me change my situation. And truly because if I change my situation that I'm not looking for harmful ways to communicate, you know. So I love how you made me sort of framed that gun violence is is truly like a kaleidoscope big lens toe, everything we're facing. Whether is lead in the water or lack of, you know, communication. And I'm sorry, education and communication. You know, we just constantly have a heaviness to our lives and in a and I want people to know that we're human, where people were whole. We love were funds and that's what I can't wait to expose through argues activism, movement. But thank you. We just just like everyone else at the core, we need belonging and and safety.

spk_0:   23:39
And I wonder so maybe sort of close out our conversation cause I have a feeling I could talk to you all day and I would, and it would be wonderful. So I owe you like a drink or food when foreign scene is over. But, uh, I was, Can you tell us a little bit? Some of the like the practical things that trigger Project is doing to make this happened cause I think you've done it like a wonderful job of sort of setting up the like, the aura of the project, the intention, like what? What what the organization's goals are. But I know that you have, like, four main targets that you're hitting and the New Year, and I'm just wondering how, like, what are the physical steps that our listeners could see and maybe participate out there with all of your doing?

spk_1:   24:23
Yes. So the trigger project is many things is a holistic approach, ending gun violence mainly through social emotional learning, character development and youth activism. So in that overarching go and target one, we have the film project that we're working on right now, so trigger the story, and a lot of people think this is documentary coming out, but it's actually a really movie. We've written this script. It's a short film, but we have characters. We've obviously been slow down a little bit from Kobe, Uh, confinement and raising money for the film is Aziz well, But in this film, we're bringing the untold stories of a lot of what I've described about in our conversation today. So the table so you'll see a young man who has a 13 year old mother with friends who want to be deviant and friends who know no better than to abuse substances and a person who doesn't have high aspirational goes, so you'll see from the scope from the lens from the vantage point of a young person growing up in D. C. And this is raising awareness. So again, I mentioned to you earlier that my young people don't know how normal gun balances. So this is going to show them those risk factors and screen that they're exposed to every day as an educational tool and therefore people outside of living our experience This is going to show them that we don't choose, uh, the gun, that the gun almost chooses us. And we're the victims as well. So I internalize everything. If you haven't noticed, it's we Yeah, um, always, because we have to understand that we have a trigger finger as well. And again, increasing your protective factors allows you to the capacity to support somewhere who may not have that healthy adult relationship. So hopefully they see this through the film and see the need and how they can meet the needs. Phase

spk_0:   26:35
two looks

spk_1:   26:36
like year round programming. I host a project every year. Call used a. D. C. Is a to end of my summer youth employment program where young people are paid to come and work on themselves and then do some research in the communities on gun violence. And then from that research we build do project based learning we booed and even a thriller event for the community. So we have are the concert food. I'm fun, and it's all towards any gun balance and raising awareness. Well, I learned four years ago when I had my 1st 11 that I want to see young people all the time. And one event wasn't enough. And then to I really want to intervene and provide a sustainability and capacity for them to choose healthy behaviors over risky behaviors after really provide structure for them. So we're raising money to provide year round programming, and that's form from kindergarten to college. Because we have my vice president's son. She he's, uh, eight years old tomorrow, and he is the second youngest. We have Sage, my baby. You're she's too. She's practicing gun violence prevention. Teoh uh, as a Allen who was one of our used investors. He's 24 so we are trying to permit I'm sorry, create sustainability so that we can program and do it full time and really be like a pioneer and bringing gun balance to home conversations to school conversations and laying out a model again foursome for change for behavior Change The third Days looks like my I came up with his name and just God has been stuck in me with ideas. I think him I would not be here without him or his love and unconditional away that he showed me. But the advocating and intervening through Mentor ship It's caught the aim program, and that's intentional to designing, um, again, more of a sustainable approach. So it's a just too, and she's working on self regulation and how to think reflectively. And when she's 14 she's a high school. It could start a gun violence prevention program at her high school, and then when she's 18 she's at Harbor and she's taking public health classes. And at 21 she's coming back to trigger working as a researcher or, you know, advocate. I hope to provide a pipeline instead of prison throughout AIM program because that was inspired. If you aim for nothing, that's what you hit. So aim again is advocating it, intervening through mentorship. So if you could provide internships, extra ships shadowing opportunities, community service with these young people coming out of college and coming out of high school. So this gun violence prevention industry then we bridge the gap and also elevate our voices as color people being affected by gun violence and then final target, uh, the overarching goal of trigger project. And through youth voice. It's intertwined in every one of my targets that I discussed previously because we have to bring them to the table if we're going to see grow change. There is no true engagement from our young people. If they are voices at the table creating and designing the programs and the approaches that obviously include them and then thinking more so in the future. These young people have to be the voice and be the carriers of our mission and our legacy that we lay forth now, so really quipping there to learn their voice a lot like Team Enough. I love it. All those young people work so much in conviction, hoping my young people, who again may not have the foundation with the upbringing for the platform to be themselves and know themselves and value themselves. I'm being intentional about developing that voice within their and then being the creators. Uh, constant research ver b ege that explains who we are and writes the narrative who we are.

spk_0:   31:04
That is amazing. I want to know when your book is coming out. That's what I want Next. She took the pressure. Good idea. Maybe that's right. Now in these I

spk_1:   31:22
really, really, really pray that people hear me fill me. Um, it understand me? Because I'm just one little pebble in the ocean of gun balance again. Prevention. Remember I told you in our communities, more intervention. So in stages, child, with my granddaughter or my great grandson, um, could could be another pebble in the ocean And amongst people who all want to be a part of that change than the ripple effect is is just gonna be beyond, you know, powerful. So I thank you so much again. And I don't know what this is the appropriate time, but I just want to thank my team because without them, I would be nothing. Brady for the opportunity team left for what you're doing. I'm just, you know, forever embedded anything and thankful.

spk_0:   32:24
Well, I will say thank you to your team shoe and thank you to you for coming on. And thank you for taking on the trigger project because again, and I think everyone, if they don't know you, they should google you and look up everything that you've done. You know, I honestly, like you could be doing anything. And so it's amazing that you've chosen toe sort of dedicate yourself toe saving folks. So thank you so much in today's unbelievable. But we have a key example of why panic buying guns is not a good idea. A Michigan man was being treated at a hospital for a gunshot wound when he told police that someone has shot him during an argument. Of course, they investigated. But upon further investigation, police discovered that in reality the man had unintentionally shot himself in his living room. The man said he purchased the weapon to protect himself during the Cove in 19 Pandemic. The irony. It seeps. This shows I think us exactly why purchasing guns without the proper training is so dangerous, and I've gotten so many stories like this and end by all of you out there use this week. I'm happy to report that most types of crime, from drug offenses to robberies, have dropped considerably during stay at home orders for current of IRS, but I'm not happy to report that gun violence has continued with no signs of slowing down. In Dallas, for example, the city stay at home order hasn't impacted the city shootings, but rather the number of shootings has gone up. Between March 24th when the state home order took effect in Dallas and April 25th overall violent crime was 14% lower than average. But the city recorded 67 shooting incidents, which is 46% more than the average for this time of year. Analysis of data collected by the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that track shootings in close to real time that we've referenced here before, shows more than 2000 gun deaths in the United States between March 1st in April 19 a 6% increase over the same period in these past three years. Experts have also predicted an upswing in cases of domestic violence, much of which is committed with firearms. An analysis by the Marshall Project found that in a few cities, domestic violence like gun violence has fallen less than overall crime. Yet the increase of gun sales continues. For example, Pennsylvania's background checks server P. I. C. S has crashed at least twice because of the surge in gun purchases. People, many of them first time gun buyers, have waited in line hours to purchase guts. Now, notably, Pennsylvania has no universal background check system, so guns can be purchased online or from a private seller with no background check now in mass shooting news. Another person shot in the El Paso Walmart shooting has died after nine months of fighting. Game role. Memo. Garcia has died due to injuries he sustained. He coached the local football team and was shot while selling lemonade at the Walmart with his wife in order to fund raise for the team's Children. His wife, who was also shot, said she quote, lost a warrior, but gained an angel unquote. The death toll in the Dogs attack, which officials say was a hate crime against the Latin next Hispanic community, now stands at 23 this week. We also marked one year since the PAL Way Synagogue shooting On April 27th 2019 a gunman armed with an AR 15 style rifle fired shots inside a synagogue in power, a California. The attack took place on the last day of the Jewish Passover holiday, which fell on the shop US. One moment was killed and three other people were injured, including the synagogues. Rabbi, I believe you found them. He seems sorry. We very clearly told him not to look up there. I'm honestly impressed that he was able to do it right, balanced on that big chair. I mean, I guess he'll just know what his gifts are. This year I really thought we had it in them. Well, if they can find their presence, they confined a gun every day. Eight kids and teens air unintentionally killed or injured by loaded and unlocked guns. Learn how to make your home safer at end. Family fire dot org's brought to you by the ad council and family fire. As always, Brady's life saving work in Congress the courts in communities across the country is made possible thanks to you For more information on Brady how to get involved in the fight against gun violence, please like it. Subscribe to the podcast, get in touch with us it brady united dot warg or in social at Brady Bus. Be brave and remember, take action, not sides