Difficult Conversations: Goddesses and Nolan

To redefine public safety, we have to start with difficult conversations about what safety means and what keeps our communities safe. We all have unique stories to tell about our lived realities.

Watch two strangers discuss their experiences with safety & policing in Minneapolis.

Join the conversation at safetynotfear.com

Transcript provided by YouTube (unedited)

00:06
[Music]
00:10
great day yeah how are you i’m good how
00:13
are you doing
00:14
[Applause]
00:18
do you feel like you and your family are
00:20
safe here
00:22
safe in regards to the city itself how
00:24
is police
00:25
um how it’s being ran the officials are
00:28
they in my best interest no
00:31
on new year’s eve when i was about 14
00:34
years old me and my friends at the time
00:36
being we were popping firecrackers
00:38
outside we had the cops called on us
00:41
and they came
00:42
they
00:43
said that it was gunshots
00:45
then forced themselves inside of our
00:46
home
00:47
at that time we did have dogs the dogs
00:51
since that there was a danger there was
00:53
intruders inside of the home so they
00:56
came outside of the home
00:58
about 14 15 cops three dogs
01:01
every last one of them shot
01:05
our dogs
01:06
i literally am standing here the dogs
01:09
are two steps down from where i’m
01:12
standing yeah i’m a kid i could have
01:15
been shy yeah that’s why yeah
01:19
how do you think things are going in
01:22
minneapolis right now
01:24
um
01:26
like i see the
01:29
inequity and equality i i see that
01:32
it’s not going good for a lot of people
01:34
um
01:36
but you know i try and stay hopeful i
01:38
guess
01:39
what experiences
01:42
have you had interacting with the
01:45
minneapolis police department
01:47
just very very recently um i had a
01:51
male friend who had a female roommate at
01:54
the time um she’s caucasian he’s an
01:57
african-american male completely
01:59
platonic relationship just a
02:01
roommate the situation happened where
02:05
he didn’t want to be roommates with her
02:06
anymore she was not willing to give him
02:09
his things back so i’m like hey we got
02:11
to go about this the right way call the
02:13
cops have him come out have him walk
02:16
through the property itself type of
02:18
ordeal because we don’t want anyone
02:19
going to jail we want anyone getting
02:21
hurt or anything like that immediately
02:23
on the pull-up his face when he saw my
02:27
face went from
02:28
a smile to a frown really really quickly
02:31
and then i knew instantly that this was
02:34
not gonna be a good ordeal okay because
02:37
he knew that we were black period we
02:40
called you for help and assistance yeah
02:42
to protect and serve because that’s your
02:45
job having those type of experiences
02:48
where you call the cops out and have
02:50
them come out to protect and serve you
02:52
and then
02:53
each and every time without a shadow of
02:55
a doubt you’re being shown
02:57
and towed and you’re being treated as if
03:01
you have done something wrong that
03:03
doesn’t make me feel humane yeah i mean
03:07
you got tom that’s coming from hastings
03:09
to north minneapolis he might be shaking
03:12
in his boots because of the environment
03:14
but here you are coming to police this
03:16
same area that’s not okay either yeah
03:19
that doesn’t make me feel safe you
03:21
already are afraid of me yeah so what
03:24
makes me think that you’re gonna protect
03:26
me
03:27
who would you feel better about in that
03:29
situation to try and help out people
03:32
with like gun holsters and like
03:33
bulletproof vests like
03:35
that’s not what
03:37
i feel
03:39
i would want
03:40
here in minnesota we’ve had several
03:43
high profile police
03:46
murders
03:48
i live here
03:51
that makes me feel some type of way when
03:52
i get pulled over and my daughter’s in
03:54
the car and it’s like should i go live
03:57
today because
03:58
somebody might feel some type of way
04:00
that i might not want to roll down my
04:02
window the entire way because it’s a
04:04
male cop and you call it a backup i
04:06
don’t feel protected yeah
04:10
we don’t
04:11
need to have someone with
04:13
a gun on their hip go up to a door to
04:15
tell someone they were going too fast or
04:17
all that i mean or they went through a
04:19
red light or you know having the police
04:22
come out because somebody’s having some
04:24
type of a psychiatric episode you know
04:28
why is there a cop i have family members
04:30
that have schizophrenia and i can only
04:33
imagine hey they’re having an episode of
04:35
some sort and we call the ambulance 911
04:39
and we specifically say hey
04:42
sunny ambulance yeah you know because i
04:44
don’t want anything else to transpire
04:46
out of this and the police comes to my
04:48
door before the actual ambulance does
04:51
before the paramedic
04:52
that’s an issue you’re not prepared you
04:56
are not
04:58
certified to handle this yeah so why are
05:00
you here exactly and in those cases
05:03
because you’re not certified for this
05:06
now you’re taking lives
05:09
what would make your family and
05:11
community safe
05:13
i mean if people had more
05:16
like i talked to my neighbors they’re
05:17
worried about like their garage getting
05:18
broken into the people who are
05:22
struggling that feel the need to like
05:26
take something from someone’s garage
05:28
i wish that
05:30
they could
05:32
get the help they need you know whatever
05:34
like
05:35
struggle or conflict they’re going
05:37
through defined resolution and peace
05:40
that
05:40
they can feel sustained
05:42
or growth even you know
05:44
don’t have your first thing be like i
05:46
don’t want to deal with it i’m going to
05:47
call the cops
05:48
but it’s like you gotta you gotta see
05:50
the faces of the people you’re trying to
05:51
help you got to try and understand
05:53
what’s happening and i think
05:55
volunteering is a way to do that give
05:57
some of your life not just your
05:59
checkbook i think that would make
06:02
people in the community feel safe
06:04
or i don’t know i don’t understand why
06:06
people don’t feel safe all the time
06:09
i wish there was something that wasn’t
06:11
like these loud lights loud sirens
06:13
that like could go into the situation
06:16
where people were arguing and trying to
06:18
like cool things down and get to the
06:20
root of things figure out
06:23
how these people can not have arguments
06:25
in the future i’m curious when a cop
06:28
gets behind you
06:29
how do you feel
06:31
well
06:32
i try not to drive as much as i can i’ve
06:34
even been pulled over on my bike and
06:36
that
06:37
like i just remember my heart thumping
06:39
do you feel like you’re gonna get shot
06:41
uh i do i don’t feel like i’m gonna get
06:43
shot i feel like hey if i don’t comply
06:46
with what he’s going to say or you know
06:48
there’s a possibility he might beat me
06:52
nah
06:53
i guess that that thought doesn’t cross
06:55
my mind uh just curious have you ever
06:58
thought about you know taking a jog at
07:00
nighttime and then a cop stopping you
07:03
because they think you look like
07:06
somebody that was called in
07:09
no i
07:10
no i just think well like
07:12
i don’t i want to get these three miles
07:14
in so i can feel good afterwards i know
07:16
yeah yeah that’s what we have to deal
07:19
with on a daily basis so when a cop gets
07:22
behind me especially everything that’s
07:24
happened
07:25
i almost want to flee
07:27
catch me if you can because i’m thinking
07:30
about like
07:31
the worst that could happen if i just
07:33
comply right
07:35
that’s sad
07:37
just by getting pulled over just by
07:39
having a cop behind me
07:43
i can’t i know that i can’t ever
07:46
understand that reality because
07:48
i am who i am there’s there’s empathy
07:51
and sympathy and those different ways to
07:53
try and like make people
07:56
put themselves in other shoes but they
07:58
won’t ever really know
07:59
for change to happen for the police not
08:02
to have to be the ones to like
08:04
pull somebody over for speeding because
08:06
they don’t have a good track red record
08:08
of stopping people there’s other ways to
08:10
deal with this
08:11
and how do
08:12
we get
08:13
the majority of people to think about
08:15
that be in it be in the fire as well
08:18
be in the fire
08:20
you see mothers that are out here crying
08:22
because the shootings and things like
08:24
that are happening it’s like yeah you
08:26
know there’s been a lot of great
08:27
supports from from
08:29
a lot of white people here in minnesota
08:31
but at the same time it’s like what are
08:33
we doing past that point
08:35
here hear your personal stories i think
08:37
that that
08:38
is storytelling for me is what sparks
08:41
people’s imagination
08:42
hearing people’s stories allows you to
08:44
imagine something different you are a
08:47
white male okay uh so there’s a lot of
08:49
things that you just have not
08:50
experienced because you don’t have skin
08:52
in the game point blank period to come
08:55
from a more of a privileged lifestyle
08:58
where you don’t have
09:00
these type of dynamics
09:03
to actually give you the life
09:05
experiences to reflect from it makes
09:08
sense
09:09
you know this conversation makes sense
09:12
do you feel like you all want a similar
09:14
minneapolis no
09:17
no the system that we have people can
09:20
say again
09:21
that they’re oh my gosh the system is
09:23
broken
09:25
the system has never been broken it
09:27
works perfectly fine for whom it is
09:30
designed to work for
09:32
the type of protection that i need
09:33
doesn’t look like the same type of
09:35
protection that you need
09:37
i want
09:38
more like
09:39
mental health like you were talking
09:41
about
09:42
your relatives who have
09:44
mental health issues
09:46
and like how to get
09:48
them the help they need in those times
09:50
of stress like we have to help those who
09:52
are struggling to be stronger together
09:54
and i don’t know if like
09:56
that plays into safety or how that comes
09:58
about or what we change to make that
10:00
happen
10:01
just because of the uprising where we
10:03
are right now this is like the main this
10:05
is like the topic it says this is where
10:07
it is police brutalities uproars the
10:11
unprecedented numbers with colvin how it
10:13
affects us and those are the topics so
10:16
it’s how we get past this point
10:18
everybody’s so ready to heal and it’s
10:20
like we haven’t really
10:22
dissected
10:24
the problem we have a disease going on
10:27
right now what’s causing the disease
10:29
because we’re dealing with the symptoms
10:30
yeah you know let’s deal with what’s
10:32
happening first
10:34
then how we’re going to deal with it and
10:36
then let’s get it knocked out i haven’t
10:40
felt any disagreement with what i’ve
10:42
heard from you
10:43
so i wouldn’t say that we don’t share
10:44
the same vision but i don’t know if we
10:45
like
10:46
hashed out the details and put it on a
10:48
big like chalkboard or something
10:50
no some similarities definitely there’s
10:52
be some contrast yeah yeah we’re making
10:55
baby steps and having conversations like
10:57
this you know having the block party
10:59
safety block parties those are good
11:01
initiatives because it gets people
11:03
together it gets us
11:05
together start these conversations about
11:08
what these issues are yeah
11:15
[Music]

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This post was previously published on YouTube.

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