A Survivor and Educator on the Need for Gun Violence Prevention Advocacy

When Jonathan Brocco, a school administrator, got involved in gun violence prevention, it was after a mass shooting rocked his school community — one of his students had lost a brother in the 2018 Waffle House mass shooting. Sadly, soon Jonathan would be directly impacted, when his father Charlie passed from firearm suicide in February of 2019.

In the wake of that combined trauma, however, Jonathan continues to give of himself, sharing his message of the urgent need for sweeping reform. Together with hosts Kelly and JJ, Jonathan explains not only his own loss (and what he wishes everyone knew about firearm suicide) but also the emotional and practical challenges educators and administrators face as they grapple with the repercussions of school shootings. Jonathan then details how the toll of gun violence extends beyond the immediate tragedy; it's a public health crisis that leaves a ripple effect across entire communities — and what you can do to help stop it.

Further reading:
Is Arming Teachers a Solution? (This is Nashville)
How to Support Survivors and People Impacted by Gun Violence (Brady)
"Forget about Making a Hashtag, Let's Throw All the Guns in a Trash Bag" (Natrix Dream/Akilah DaSilva Foundation)
'Oh my God, not again': Mom of Waffle House shooting victim deals with other son shot(Nashville 5)
'Help Us Stop the Attacks': Educators Urge Action on Gun Violence(National Education Association)

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:08

This is the legal disclaimer, where I tell you that the views, thoughts and opinion shared on this podcast belong solely to our guests and hosts and not necessarily Brady or Brady's affiliates. Please note this podcast contains discussions of violence that some people may find disturbing. It's okay, we find it disturbing too. Hey, everybody, welcome back to another episode of Red, blue and Brady. I'm one of your hosts, jj.

Speaker 2: 0:47

And I'm Kelly, your other host.

Speaker 1: 0:49

And today, kelly and I are excited about the reword for this episode. Kelly, kelly and I are disheartened that we are dropping this episode when we are. We had sat down just a few days ago with the great Jonathan Brueco to discuss the reality of being a survivor and an educator, and our hopes and our dreams for 2024. And then this episode is coming out on the fifth day of January. We are five mass shootings deep already in the US, one of the most recent being at a high school in Perry, iowa. And I am mad, kelly, I'm really mad.

Speaker 2: 1:33

No, like, let's just, we just have to keep it real. Like we are five days into a new year and there are some people that rang in 2024 on December 31st, and now they're not here because of gun violence and we're upset about it, and I'm sure if you're listening to this, you're upset about it too. And when we recorded this episode originally we thought it would take we would release it a little bit later. But because John talks about violence both in a school and outside of a school and being a survivor and also the experience of firearm suicide, he in a way is like a microcosm of the problem, and so we are releasing this episode a little bit sooner.

Speaker 1: 2:13

And while we loved Jonathan, we could have talked to him forever and we ended the episode on such a hopeful note that I still am really hopeful for Listen to the end. Jonathan has some, some solutions and some action steps we can all take here. That that I am taking to heart. I am just reminded, as I was when we first recorded this with him, that we are asking so much of our educators and so much of our students, and then just so much of people living under an epidemic of gun violence and man, I really hope 2024 gets better. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:43

And I think that, to your point, jj, we are being honest about being a little disheartened, but we also know that there are we can do things to make 2024 better. So, if you're feeling disheartened, and listen to this. If you're feeling amped up and ready to go, listen to this, because we can acknowledge that this is really messed up and we also are trying to do the work to make sure that we prevent this.

Speaker 3: 3:06

Agreed my name is Jonathan Brocco. I'm a school administrator here in Nashville, tennessee, also a gun violence advocate, who's been working in that space for a couple of years now and been an educator for about 10 years.

Speaker 2: 3:23

Yeah Well, jj and I have tremendous respect for educators, especially in the climate that we're in right now, and you know you talked about in addition to being an educator and a gun violence prevention advocate. You come to this work from many of those perspectives and including you've lost a family member to gun violence and I'm wondering if you could share the story of how you got into this work.

Speaker 3: 3:47

Absolutely yeah. So I was teaching at a middle school here in Nashville prior to becoming an administrator and there was a student that attended the school named Aldane Brooks. He just an awesome kid. He was in sixth grade at the time and I taught eighth. So we kind of only interacted, you know, in the hallways and you know extracurriculars, but we got to know each other pretty well.

Speaker 3: 4:09

And then there was a mass shooting in Nashville at a waffle house in April of I think it was April 22nd 2018. And he lost his older brother in that mass shooting. His other brother was also there with him. They were just having a meal celebrating a music video they had just released and it you know it just caused an insane amount of turmoil for their family. Like, I mean, how do you I don't even know how how you kind of square that. You know it's just like you're out celebrating living life? He released his music was was uh was gun violence awareness music. Like he talked about the impact in his rap lyrics about losing friends, about why access to guns is a problem, and then to lose his life in a mass shooting is just unimaginable. And so their family kind of banded together. Our school community really rallied around them and they, they, they established a foundation called the Akilah De Silva Foundation, which is aimed at educating the public about the issues of gun violence and the ripple effects associated with that. So that was in 2018. We kind of got involved.

Speaker 3: 5:20

I started attending some of their rallies, some of their work and then, in February of 2019, I found out one night that my father had had ended his life with a firearm and so that you know, really really tossed our family into an intense amount of trauma and grief. And you know, that experience made me start looking at the issue of guns and gun violence in a completely different light. And from there I remember we were having dinner with Shondelle Brooks all Dane's mother and their family in 2021. And she said a phrase that really sat with me and made me think about this in a new perspective. She said it just was talking to us and she said you know us survivors of gun violence.

Speaker 3: 6:11

And that was when it hit me like, oh, my family, we're survivors too. And I think that that kind of reflected to me in that moment how deep the sickness of gun violence is in our country and made me start seeing it as a public health crisis, just to think that, like I had lost someone for almost two years at this point and I had never really seen myself as a survivor of gun violence until two years later when someone else who also lost someone, you know, to a firearm, set it to me. So she asked me to join their foundation as a board member, focusing on educational outreach and a scholarship program that they started in memory of Akilah, and so I've been doing that for a little over a year now. But yeah, that's kind of how I got into the work and why I stay in it.

Speaker 1: 7:04

Well, and before we move on, I wanna thank you for sharing, because I feel like this is and Kelly can back me up here this is the really awkward and hard part of our work, like not just on the podcast, but working in this space and gun violence prevention, because to do this work, we have to ask survivors to give a lot of themselves and other families by telling their stories, I think, to make policymakers and folks out in the world actually realize that this is a thing that happens. This isn't a statistic. This is your dad, these are your students, and so I appreciate you a lot and I just wanna appreciate, like you and your family, for being willing to step forward and speak about this, and even like you and your school community.

Speaker 3: 7:49

No, thank you for acknowledging that and thank you for providing us with the space to open up and to share these things, because, like any issue we've ever seen in history, it doesn't get better if people are silent about it. And so for me, I really think about. I was a voidant of telling people how he died. At first, there was a immense amount of shame and feelings that came associated with growing up in the South and the mindsets that may exist in communities around issues like suicide and the topic of gun violence. So doing all the personal healing work to get to a space to share and then have an outlet to come, outlets to come talk about this is so important. So I appreciate y'all as well.

Speaker 2: 8:37

Something that your experiences get at is the fact that gun violence obviously we have the statistics about people who are shot or people who are injured, but that doesn't really convey the full scope, and you talked about with Akilah that, what you saw with his family and even your own experiences honoring his memory. And then you also talk about with your father some of the ripple effects, and so I'm wondering if you could, to the extent that you're comfortable, share with us. You already talked about shame and stigma, but what life was like for you and your mom in the aftermath and some of the things that we don't necessarily see in statistics but are very real impacts of gun violence.

Speaker 3: 9:17

No, absolutely. I think one thing was losing my dad in this way was so challenging for our family, but it hit me that it was a challenge for, like, the broader community that he worked in and lived into. So he was a. He was just a great human being, so positive, so happy, and he was a Grammy-winning recording engineer Like. He had a really awesome life and I remember when, at his memorial, there being like somewhere between 200, and 500, and 300 people that came to this memorial and just being there in that space and being shocked like, wow, what an impact he made, and I think it was also a reminder of just what a force of good energy and light he was to so many. And so for our family it left a massive, a massive hole, and my mom got diagnosed with cancer six months after he passed, and so I had to step into a caregiver role.

Speaker 3: 10:23

My brother was in physician assistant school in Knoxville at the time, and so we're all just trying to move forward with life as normal as you, as normally as you can, but life is never normal again after after something like that, and so we all began you know intense trauma and grief, counseling and unpacking our healing in that way and leaning on each other and community members that you know supported us and you know that's why we're able to sit kind of comfortably and talk about it today. But it's the ripple effects. You can't really count them because you still are learning them. I'm still learning them. Today there's a new thing that happens and I go, oh you know he's not here and someone kind of do that, and so then I'll step up and take care of whatever it may be, and my brother will when he can as well.

Speaker 3: 11:15

But yeah, it's I. We kind of talk about it in the sense of it's like this rolling experience. It never really stops. I remember, you know, we had the last February it was four years since he had been gone and just thinking through how to support my mom with all the treatments that she's been going through. You know how to be a, you know a brother. And then also, you know, give yourself the space when the grief comes up, because it just comes up at random times and it's so strange because in one day you might experience this emotional high from a great life achievement and then that night be at home and grief hits you because he's not there to celebrate it with you, and so yeah it's. It's never ending. It's the word that I would say.

Speaker 1: 12:00

I feel like, in some ways, what you're speaking to is just the grief experience, right, it's like you're staying at the ocean. You don't know when the waves are gonna be big, you know they'll be small, you just know you're gonna kind of get wet, but you can't. You can't plan for those like waves of sadness. But I feel like and I don't know if, kelly, if you've had the same experience, but through this podcast, I feel like when we're talking to people who've experienced this particular grief, they're like gun violence.

Speaker 1: 12:27

Loss is its own special kind of grief and I don't know if that's because, if it's a grief that's maybe not discussed openly, I don't know if it's because it's a grief that's become politicized. I don't know if it's a grief that you know like there's never a break from it. In America there's always, every day, you're seeing in the news this violence again. So I don't, I don't know why. I don't know like all grief is hard. I don't I don't want to discount all grief or all or any loss, but it's just like this seems like a different Sort of loss or pain.

Speaker 3: 12:58

Yeah, and I and you know, and I've never wanted to, you know that's like it's such a good point because I've often said that to people where you are dealing with grief, you're dealing with loss, and then there's these other layers to it, right, there's the layer of suicide and then there's the layer of gun violence, and so the experience of what it's been like to navigate kind of all three of those phases has been really, I think, unique, you know, to individuals that go through this, and so you know some examples I've kind of run into or people coming up to me and you know I can't believe he did that.

Speaker 3: 13:35

I just and that's and that like just I'm just at a grocery store on a Saturday running to someone I haven't seen in 13 years, since I was a kid or whatever another, coming up and I Can't believe this and I can't believe that, you know, and and even really insensitive comments about, you know, the preservation of Gun rights, it's just it's it's kind of mind-numbing. And so, yeah, there's, there's many additional layers to this experience and kind of changes, what those waves kind of feel like, because, you know, I might have a conversation, that's, I'm having a good day, I'm not really grieving, but someone comes in from one of those angles and then you find yourself back in that kind of space and it kind of throws you off a Little bit. So, yeah, it's a really good point and it's something that I think the broader community should reflect on.

Speaker 1: 14:26

And I think also to the fact that you came into this activism before you lost your dad because of another trauma You're going through. Like you know, we've had many conversations about what is a survivor and what to find someone as a survivor, but I want to say that I personally think that to be an educator and to know that one of your kids or one of your students has lost Family members or is going through that trauma, to live in a community where there's been a mass shooting, to be an educator where you're worried about Violence at your school or violence that's impacting your students I Feel like that makes a survivor, and I feel like educators or teachers in the US already take on so many burdens for their community and For their kids. You know, if you're a teacher, you love your kids, and so that's already present too, I'm sure.

Speaker 3: 15:08

Absolutely it's. It's kind of changed how I think about my work One when I when all day lost his brother, to when when my dad passed, and then when covenant happened recently, you know, just this past year in Nashville. Every day, literally every day of my job, is impacted by guns and gun violence. If I'm in the hallway and I hear, you know, there's like a operations team member working in a chair falls over and hits the ground like my head, immediately goes to the protocol for what to do in a lockdown, that's. That's just, you're walking through your day trying to just educate, support teachers and you know, and be a support for kids and their families and then at every turn you're like kind of, you know, expecting or preparing for some, some, that, some horrible thing to happen and and that what.

Speaker 3: 16:04

What really gets me is like how, nor like how normalized this issue has become.

Speaker 3: 16:09

What, why, why is death by guns and guns such a normalized experience for so many of us that you know, I'm just a school administrator and Every hour of every day there's a thought tied back to the safety of my students in connection to gun, guns and gun violence, and it's you know.

Speaker 3: 16:30

And then when I have a student who's dealing with a social, emotional issue, then you know being supportive of like respective, of the family and their rights, but also like, do they have access to things that can hurt them at home, and trying to like make them aware of that in the process. It never really stops in my work either, and it's really our teachers are very aware of it, and I don't want to use the word disturbing, but it is disturbing. Like you know, covenant happened and we were back at work the next day. Every teacher in Nashville was with the exception of covenant, and rightfully so. But why didn't we stop as a community? And why is that the expectation? You know, mass shooting after mass shooting, these individuals just have to keep going and it doesn't really make a lot of sense to me.

Speaker 2: 17:26

I think it's really telling that oftentimes, I think the perception can be if you're an educator, then gun violence will only impact you if it happens at your school and what you shared is if something like covenant happens or in the case of the Waffle House shooting, if something happens in the community, that still will impact you as an educator, as you're going in and now you're trying to teach students who don't live in a bubble and who see these things and they're supposed to think about geometry or Shakespeare or something, but they've just seen something that their brains may not be able to handle, because even as adults it's really hard to handle.

Speaker 3: 18:08

No, absolutely. You know when you're like walking through classroom to classroom after an event has happened in your community, because even when there are shootings in the neighborhood that may have led to the loss of a student's family member I've even lost I lost four former students last year to gun violence alone. I mean you're just walking through reminding kids why they're safe, why they're safe, why they're safe, and at a certain point you just go. Why do I feel like I'm? Why do we as teachers, as school leaders, feel like we're the only ones really supporting these students or reminding them why they're safe? Why isn't their leadership externally above us in the legislature? You know doing things to show kids we're going to keep you safe. It's just troubling to me when you're faced with tragedy after tragedy and the solution continues to be more guns that'll fix the problem, and so that really really is a. This is a challenging experience, I think, for all of us.

Speaker 1: 19:14

And I imagine this has to be so difficult because already when you're teaching during COVID or like in the midst of a global pandemic, or you know after now that kids are back in school in person, for the most part we don't know what effect that has had on kids and their educational experience fully yet we won't for quite a while. But we also don't know what this amount of gun violence that these kids are confronting, what that's doing to them or what it's going to continue doing to them, because I know as an adult it's not good for me to be constantly seeing this amount of violence out in the world. So I can't imagine for a kid that it's good. But it's become so normalized and so kind of baked into the life experience not just of kids but of teachers and just people in the world Going through school.

Speaker 3: 20:03

Oh, 100%. I've been really astounded to that. You know, one of the ideas that's pitched around this is is arming teachers, where we didn't sign up for that, and Tennessee and other states in the South have really demonstrated that they don't trust us to pick the curriculum and books for our kids, but they want us to carry guns to keep them safe, and I think that's just so detached from reality and speaks to this dystopia that you're talking about. An interesting story kind of connected to this.

Speaker 3: 20:39

I had a really good friend and I grew up in the South and I was, just to be transparent, I was not politically aligned with those people that I went to school with, and so a good. But I made a lot of friends and met some really great people, and a guy that I consider myself to be pretty close with heard a radio interview I was on where we were discussing arming teachers, and he sent me a message about the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun, and I was like, let me approach this with curiosity and get into just some discussion, and what was so interesting to me is the point that resonated with him, that made him see where I was coming from was when I said imagine a teacher who is one of the people in the building that's required to carry the gun and let's say an intruder comes into the building and let's say your kid were in that room, would you want that teacher leaving that group of kids to go find the intruder? And he was like, oh no, I want them to be there with my kid and keep them safe. I'm like right, because that's basic security protocol.

Speaker 3: 21:48

Any security expert that came in to consult would tell you you never leave kids alone in these situations. Right, but what if you're that person who has to carry and the intruder comes in? The whole idea makes no sense logistically or, to me, even morally. But that's separate. But just if you just look at the basic idea and how it would work in a day to day scenario, it doesn't work. It doesn't make anyone safer and so, yeah, we just have to. We just live this reality of dealing with potential tragedy as normalcy and that's just again really disturbing.

Speaker 2: 22:28

I mean the point that you just made there about basic security protocol. I think it's so important for a couple of reasons. One it just goes to show how important it is to have your perspective in this space, because so often people who are making policies around schools or campuses I haven't ever been on a campus or other than when we were students ourselves but at the same time, I know that one of the problems is that being an educator is extremely time consuming and it's like hours and hours outside of the school hours, and so then, for you to be doing gun violence or intervention work on top of it is a huge sacrifice, and I'm wondering what misperceptions have you seen, maybe from people in your community that maybe you don't align with them politically, or maybe you do, but what misperceptions do people have about being a gun violence survivor or a gun violence prevention advocate that you kind of would love to clear up?

Speaker 3: 23:19

Yeah, I think the first one is that people who are aligned to my values and my beliefs they think like we wanna take away everybody's guns and get rid of everybody's guns. That's not what we're operating from. It's something that we continuously message is we're not here to step on someone's constitutional right. Rather, we're trying to support each other and our community to look at it in different ways and understand that the easier the access is, the more problems you're going to encounter and experience, and so I think about red flag laws as being important.

Speaker 3: 24:04

I think of the issue of gun shows being a massive issue. There are countless documented experiences of kids going to gun shows and leaving with guns and having no problem purchasing them. There are so many ripple effects associated with easy access easy and open access that have led to the problems that we experience as a society, and so we wanna do something about that. And I think that that's an important thing, because, growing up here, while I did not necessarily grow up in a family where guns were present because it was a tradition of some sort, we had them because there was an experience that made my parents feel very unsafe, so they purchased one and, just like 85% of these situations, my dad ended up using it on himself, and so I think that when you look at the statistics, 60% of gun deaths are self-inflicted gun shots. When you think about the massive impact that this open and easy access has made, that's what we're advocating for, that's what we're trying to do something about and make each other kind of think differently about and say that there are other ways to approach this problem.

Speaker 3: 25:21

I think about what if, when my dad had had a heart attack and a stroke prior to him starting to struggle mentally and physically, and so his work was impacted, his purpose, his overall well-being was dramatically changed. What if, when, at any point in time where he was going through these massive life changes, if someone a medical professional, a friend, someone said to him us hey, like, are you okay? You're going through a lot. One possible thing that might happen to you from this experience is depression and do you have anything access to anything at home that could hurt you? And just like supporting each other in a more holistic way, I think is a very possible thing and achievable thing, and so I think that's. One of the biggest misconceptions is that gun safety advocates and gun control advocates people often think we're coming for their guns, and that's not what the reality of the situation is.

Speaker 1: 26:26

I think you articulated that really beautifully because I know, when I've had success talking with family and friends maybe who don't agree with what they think that I'm for because I work in gun violence prevention when we sit down and actually start having a conversation, it's sharing stories like yours and sharing the reality of the actual statistics that are out there, not like a talking point that they've heard maybe from, like, gun lobby folks.

Speaker 1: 26:53

That's really helpful and again, that's why I'm just I'm so thankful that there are folks like you who are willing to share because, I'll be honest, I think it's using those stories that really hit folks, because we talked about this a lot, like no one ever thinks necessarily that it's going to happen and yet a lot of Americans who haven't experienced it are just kind of almost waiting for gun violence to happen. As you said, you're walking down the hall, you're waiting. You hear a lot of noise. You expect it. I go to movie theaters. I'm waiting. I see people having a road rage in the street. I'm waiting for something terrible to happen and I don't understand how, as you said, like we got to this dystopian point.

Speaker 3: 27:36

Yeah, I mean, that's one of the. I was prepping for a press conference earlier this year when the legislative cycle was happening here in Tennessee actually the special session. They brought everyone back together to do something about what happened at Covenant and they did nothing. And I remember going to speak at this press conference and I was typing out just my personal experiences. I'm like me as one person, I've lost four students that I directly interacted with, and then I'm in this foundation where this entire family has been impacted, and then I lost my own thought. That's just one single Tennessean with all this experience.

Speaker 3: 28:18

And then I think about, like all the other people like me who have been touched by multiple incidents of gun violence, ms Brooks, the director of the Akhila De Silva Foundation. The thing about this she's she lost one son to a mass shooting. Her other son was shot in the back of the head after a performance this past summer just standing and talking to friends. Afterwards Her daughter had to run away from a restaurant where a shooting was happening and her other child had to sit through countless lockdown procedures and countless drills tied to gun violence. I think when you start to be aware that this is a public health crisis, we, as individuals, start to notice the depth of its impact within our own lives. Whether we've lost someone, personally or not, we're all impacted by this issue. Every Tennessean, no matter what their background is, every American, no matter what their socioeconomic status is, every single person, has been impacted by this issue, and if you think deep enough, you'll see you have a personal connection to gun violence, and that, to me, screams. We need to do better.

Speaker 2: 29:38

Yeah, I mean, it's a pretty damning assessment and you would think that anyone who claims that they want this country to be a good place to live would take that personally, because it is preventable. It's not like you're not talking about people that were I don't know like struck by lightning or something. These are man-made events, these are man-made problems that are really preventable.

Speaker 3: 30:04

Yes, 100%. I mean energy, money, resources get funneled into, you know, get funneled into different epidemics that we see in our society, right, like there was a criminal approach taken to crack cocaine in the 80s and 90s, right, and then, with opioid use, there's this massive investment in supporting people who have lost loved ones, but when it comes to this massive amount of Americans who have been killed by guns or affected by gun violence, we continue not to take steps towards prevention and we have this massive misconception as a society that you know the guns are what's gonna keep us safe and we never really look at them as the issue. And so I think that's yeah, it's just alarming to me. I understand tradition, I understand people's affinity for different things. Like, I'm super, super passionate about guitars right, I have a lot of guitars but when I go back to you know what someone's a friend of mine who was a gun owner and a proud gun owner said to me one time the purpose of this tool is to end a life, and if you look at it any other way, then you really increase the likelihood that it's gonna be misused or the perception of why you have it may change and accidents can happen, and so I think that that is another reason when we're thinking about what are guns?

Speaker 3: 31:45

What do they do? It's sole purpose is to end lives. So if you look at it that way, you rise. This is dangerous and we need to be more careful about everything connected to this device, to this machine, and what it's intended for. As opposed to, you know, there being more regulations to buy a car or drive a car, or I mean even go fishing, you know like I feel like these days, you will go through as much to get a temporary fishing license to go out on a river versus go stopping at the store to buy a tool that is designed to end someone's life.

Speaker 1: 32:28

No, just on winter holidays I was up in New England and listening to all of the regulations on like going crabbing on your own property and I was like this is surprisingly really hard and really difficult and if you get caught breaking the rules they're really strict.

Speaker 1: 32:41

And I was like, wow, what a difference. And now everyone's gonna write in the crab lobby is gonna be really mad at me for dismissing it. But you know, kind of on a non-crab note, because I don't want folks listening to this to think that because I think one of the responses sometimes when you hear about everything that's happening in the world or you listen to survivors, you listen to educators that are going through this, I think a response that happens is people feel despondent, maybe they feel a little apathetic. And so I'm wondering, as we're moving through 2024, right, new year is there something that gives you hope, kind of in the gun prevention community? Is there something that you're really hoping that folks can get engaged with this year that can be making the world a safer, better place for ourselves, for young people, for our loved ones?

Speaker 3: 33:24

Yeah, no, so I'm optimistic about 2024. One because just in Tennessee alone, there has been a massive increase in individuals running for public office who are running on a gun control platform, and one thing that excites me within that is it's also people on the right side of the aisle. It's not just people on the left that are running. Usually everyone on the left runs on this and believes in this but families were impacted. Going back to what you were saying earlier, until it happens to you were impacted by covenant and I think a lot of people started to realize these people that we voted for actually are not representing us and our interests and they're getting involved and they're getting active and they're pressuring legislators to do something.

Speaker 3: 34:12

I went to the Capitol several times to speak and to protest and be a part of that throughout this past year and the number of Tennesseans that were there was really empowering and uplifting to see the young people getting involved, and then change is going to happen really in the communities where people are electing legislators that do everything to protect guns, and so once they start to change on this issue and they start to pressure their legislators too, I think that's going to make a massive difference. So I'm optimistic about that. I think that a lot can be done. I think if you're an individual who's like, how do I get involved? First, recognize that there are people out there who have been doing this work for a long time and have a lot of great connections and networks and resources and influence, and donate to them. You know, be involved and connect with them, send a message, make a donation. I think that that is always just a great starting point.

Speaker 3: 35:17

Two, when you see these local organizations hosting events, go, learn more, be curious, you know, get involved. And I think. Three, I think this might sound a little I don't know cliche, but like vote, like your life depends on it, because for many people I've learned it kind of does, and so I think take the issue of guns as a really serious public health crisis that something needs to be done about here and now, and whether that's writing a legislator voting along maybe a party line that you haven't. I'm not endorsing anyone by saying that. I'm just simply saying, like, take the issue with a really, really immense amount of gravity and respond accordingly, because it is serious. The stats are incredibly alarming.

Speaker 2: 36:07

I totally your experiences resonate with me in terms of seeing people from all political walks of life sort of taking this issue on, and that's something that gets obscured, I think, sometimes in media. But I've seen the same thing that you have in part of my job is going around to different states and you'll see people saying like listen, I, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm a Republican, I'm blah, blah, blah. I own guns, I hunt, I love it, but this has got to stop. So that's. I'm glad that you raised that and, kind of, as our time together near the close, one of the things that JJ and I always want to give an opportunity for is to humanize people who have been victims of gun violence, because it's not just about how they were taken, it's also who they were. And so, if you're comfortable, or wondering if you could share with a favorite memory of your dad or just an aspect of his character, just as a way to kind of honor him.

Speaker 3: 37:05

Yeah, there's, there are so many, there are so many. I think you know. Actually, I'll tell a story that actually wasn't necessarily a direct impact on me, but I think just goes to show what an amazing human he was. My brother and I, you know, not only were flooded with lots of support from people who we knew directly that were connected to my dad after he passed, but also for people he had never met or ever even heard of. And I remember one day he and I were sitting together and we both got an email that came through at the same time from this random person we had never heard of and he said I was so devastated to hear that your father had passed.

Speaker 3: 37:48

I met him one time at a concert in 1974, and I've never forgotten him and I had all these years wanted to reach back out because of what an awesome person he was. I'm like that's pretty beautiful, you know. One concert at one time in history and this person's emailing over what, like 30 years later, his kids, to just say your dad made an impact on me that I'll never forget, for just a couple hours in 1974. And so I think about the legacy and the love that he's left behind, the hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of music that are recorded, that his fingerprints are all over. You know we're also positive, so many people. He's positively impacted people and they don't even know it because of the sounds and frequencies that he tied together and harmonies that he blended and the way music positively impacts people. And to know that he every day someone is probably out there being touched in some way by work that he's done, is a really beautiful, beautiful thing.

Speaker 1: 38:51

That's gorgeous, you know. I thought that, like music, frequencies, live forever. Your voice in a podcast talking about him is a frequency, an audio frequency that can be out there forever and live, and I think that that's just really beautiful and maybe that can be like our number four before we go. You know, in addition to getting out there and getting so involved just on a personal level, you know, reach out to the folks that you love and tell them how much you love them and appreciate. You appreciate them even if you only met them at a concert once in the seventies.

Speaker 3: 39:20

Yeah, just yeah. You never know what impact it can have. I mean, someone said to me if this could happen to Charlie Brock, it could happen to anybody. And I think that was very true, because if you knew my dad, you never would have thought he was struggling in any any type of way, because he was someone who I get. He hit it very well and he constantly put others first, like I remember calling him because it was like 2012, 2013,.

Speaker 3: 39:47

I was watching the Grammys and I was like, oh, casey Musgrave, just when I think my dad worked on that or whatever like. And you know, just like whatever, went back to writing my paper. I was in grad school at the time and then I called him and I'm like, did you just win a Grammy? And he's like, yeah, how are you doing bud? And it was like just like, yeah, so nonchalant. So just like whatever. Like how's my son? And that was all he wanted to talk about is what I was up to. And so, yeah, just reaching out, checking on your loved ones and telling people the impact that they have on your life, you never know what that might do.

Speaker 3: 40:19

I feel like I want to clap for you and your dad you know, you know, often when someone says, well, the issue is mental health, I like to say mental health, yes, mental health. And you know, safe storage, mental health and red flag laws, like all of these things, are solutions and we all have a lot more common ground than we realize. And so I think when we can accept the stats as facts and we operate off the data and we see a decrease in that data, then we'll know we're really moving toward a better society and a more just society.

Speaker 2: 40:51

No, I feel like I should clap too. No, too kind.

Speaker 1: 40:55

Seriously, jonathan, thank you so much. Hey want to share with the podcast. Others can now get in touch with us here at Red Blue and Brady via phone or text message. Simply call or text us at 480-744-3452 with your thoughts. Questions concerns ideas, cat pictures, whatever.

Speaker 2: 41:16

Thanks for listening. As always, brady's lifesaving work in Congress, the courts and communities across the country is made possible thanks to you. For more information on Brady or how to get involved in the fight against gun violence, please like and subscribe to the podcast. Get in touch with us at BradyUnitedorg or on social at BradyBuzz. Be brave and remember. Take action, not sides.