As many of us play close attention to the George Zimmerman trial, which in many unfortunate ways looks like the Trayvon Martin trial, a Jacksonville, FL group has taken this moment to get more exposure.

Operation Save Our Sons, which is based in Jacksonville, FL, is making an effort to convey its message to more people:

 

[Operation Save Our Sons] organizers are reaching out nationally to nonprofit organizations, school districts and police departments to help them  teach young black men how to respond better when confronted by police or anyone else.

 

If Martin had been taught to call his father “a few doors away” that night instead of getting into a confrontation with Zimmerman, his death might have been avoided, the Rev. John Guns said.

 

Wait. What? Is Rev. Guns suggesting that if Trayvon Martin had made a different decision he’d still be alive?

 

 

Guns, the group’s founder and St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church pastor, said a goal is to empower 10- to 18-year-olds to make better decisions. That education starts with a Sept. 14 event called “Fathers Calling Fathers” and continues with a “Million Son March” next year in Washington.

 

It will take work to find volunteers and nonprofit groups to set up programs locally and nationally to help teens change the way they interact with police and others, Guns said. But he said they are confident that their message can spread nationwide so “we will see fewer funerals, less young men going to prison and fathers being raised out of boys.”

 

“We have to change an entire system because it is a psychosis that has invaded us, and at the end of the day there is this assumption that if you see a certain person dressed a certain way, they must be up to no good,” Guns said.

 

Read more here

 

What do you think of this organization’s tactics?

Are their other groups looking to help protect black youth from the violence they encounter in the world?

Sound off below!!!!