Huff Post Front Page Graphic Highlights US Gun Violence Epidemic

April 22, 2013 - Friday night, The Huffington Post debuted on its front page a striking graphic representing US deaths related to gun violence since the Sandy Hook shooting in Newtown, Connecticut on December 14, 2013. The moving graphic illustrates nearly real-time statistics of gun deaths across the country. Many of these gun related instances appear to be concentrated on the eastern part of the country (with the exception of California and Texas). It also appears that most gun violence is situated in densely populated areas. Congress has since failed to pass an assault weapons ban.

For some perspective, according to the Huff Post graphic there have been 2,244 deaths since the Sandy Hook shooting (98 days). There have been a total of 852 civilian deaths in Iraq since January 2013 and 2,537 civilian causalities in Afghanistan from 2009-2010.

Huffington Post states it's methodology is based on "compiled news reports of gun-related homicides and accidental deaths in the U.S. since the massacre in Newtown, Conn. on the morning of Dec. 14."

This is perhaps an example of digital media journalism at its finest. The use of interactive mapping, data visualization, and infographics are becoming increasingly popular means of documenting and showing information. As gun-related violence continues to infiltrate cities and neighborhoods across this country, the use of media here seems like the most appropriate means of providing the public with necessary information while raising awareness.

A question we're most concerned with here at MEDIA MAKE CHANGE is what do we do with this visual information? Related to this question concerns, how can media, in this instance, work to inform and evoke necessary action to change the current epidemic in this country related to gun violence? What calls-to-action might we engage so this graphic doesn't simply collect virtual dust?

A good place to start would be to contact your local congress person (senator and HOR) and, as professor Sarah Jackson suggested, email the graphic directly to your representative.

Kudos to Huffington Post for using media to spread information and evoke awareness. Here's hoping we can use this online media artifact to change the course of gun violence spread across our neighborhoods offline.

Founder Tara L. Conley Named 2013 Media Ideation Fellow

I'm so pleased to announced that I've been named as one of the 2013 Media Ideation Fellows! I, along with Kristy Tillman, Charles DeTar, and Yongjun Heo are among the very first class of fellows supported by the Media Ideation Fellowship, a Voqal initiative.

Several months ago, I asked for your nomination for the fellowship and many of you came through with support. For that, I thank you. I'm humbled and overwhelmed with gratitude, especially knowing that my work will be supported financially and by way of professional mentorship. Through the generous support of the Media Ideation Fund, I will be able to begin developing a text line for court-involved youth in New York City.

The Text Line for Court-Involved (CI) Youth [official name TBD] will provide anonymous means for young people who are tethered to foster care, juvenile justice, and criminal justice systems in New York City to access resources and seek support beyond the institutions to which they are bound.

Eventually, users of the text line will be able to:

• Access available tutoring services and job listings in their neighborhoods.
• Access family planning and mental health services.
• Connect immediately to crisis and emergency response hotlines.
• Set up reminders for court dates and other appointments.
• Receive automated information about Know Your Rights (ACLU) and tips/suggestions about how to talk to lawyers and caseworkers.

There is a tremendous amount of work ahead and the fellowship marks only the beginning of further development that will need to be completed to ensure that young people involved in foster care and juvenile justice systems receive the support and resources they need and deserve.

So far this month I've been meeting (and hanging out!) with several young people who are serving as youth advisory board members. Their insights, stories, and perspectives will inform the purpose and uses of the line. The youth advisory board members will be making their public debut on MEDIA MAKE CHANGE very soon, so stick around and prepare to be touched and inspired by the work these incredible young people are doing. I can't wait for you to meet them!

I'll continue to keep MMC readers updated on new developments within the next few months. In addition to a beta launch of the text line, we will also be launching an official Facebook group page that will begin connecting agencies, organizations, resources, and CI youth online and via social media.

Finally, I invite those who will be in the NYC area on March 29th, 2013 to come support me as I audition for TEDxTeachersCollege. I'll be giving a brief pitch on a proposed TED talk about participatory design and how mobile technology can enable members of transient and displaced groups to build stronger connections and networked communities across contexts. It'll be like American Idol for nerds! You can register for the conference by going to TEDxTeachersCollege.com

With that, I leave you with an excerpt about critical connections that has stayed with me since I began this work. The quote comes from Margaret Wheatley.

Rather than worry about critical mass, our work is to foster critical connections.  We don't need to convince large numbers of people to change; instead, we need to connect with kindred spirits.  Through these relationships, we will develop the new knowledge, practices, courage, and commitment that lead to broad-based change (2006).

If you are a mobile strategist, funder, or developer and interested in learning more about the text line, please email me directly at tara [at] mediamakechange [dot] org.

MEDIA MAKE CHANGE Remembers Joshua C. Watson

It is with a heavy heart that we share the devastating news about the passing of Joshua C. Watson. Josh was an inaugural fellow of the 2012 Community Producers Program that MEDIA MAKE CHANGE co-authored with the Beyond the Bricks Project. He was known as one of the most brightest fellows in his Atlanta cohort. Josh is shown in the video below speaking proudly about his work and his hopes for the future. We learned yesterday that Josh was victim of an apparent robbery while walking home from work. He was murdered on Christmas Eve.

From the Beyond the Bricks producers, Derek Koen and Ouida Washington:

18 year old Joshua C. Watson, one of the young men that graduated this past June from the first cohort of Beyond The Bricks Community Producers Program, was murdered in Atlanta, GA December 24, 2012, robbed on his way home from work. I had the pleasure of meeting Josh in person once, I spoke with him a few times over Skype and we awarded him with a certificate for his dedication to the program. The entire BTBP team was horrified to hear the news that yet another young person with so much promise and potential was taken away forever. Josh was the result of hard work, sacrifice and love by a community of people; evident by the way he presented himself to the world. We here at Beyond The Bricks Project struggle to make the message clear, we ALL have a role and duty to give ALL our children brighter futures and the chance to live their life the best way possible. Senseless violence that we see almost daily in news headlines, in our communities and in our schools is destroying this country. In the life of Josh, lest we forget that too much has already been lost.

If the person who took Joshua from this earth can some how come across this message, I would like you to know that this is not acceptable you deserve to be punished and you are redeemable.  To you all, we would like to introduce you to Joshua C. Watson.

We share the sentiments expressed by the BTBP team. The news of Josh's death only strengthens our desire to ensure the work that we do at MEDIA MAKE CHANGE benefits young people like Joshua Watson. He was an inspiration, shining light, and a gift to us all. We would like to send condolences to the Watson family and express our deepest sympathies to anyone who had the pleasure of befriending Joshua during his short eighteen years on earth.

You can pay tribute to Josh's memory on RIP Joshua C. Watson Facebeook page made in his honor.

MEDIA (CAN) MAKE CHANGE: ImmaTeen Fans Speak Out Against Bullying

I've been thinking, since so many teens are on the Internet, why don't we start there?

I'm pretty active on the Internet. I'm especially active on my facebook page, ImmaTeen. All my admins on ImmaTeen have been actively using this page for fun, games, and anti-bullying awareness.

So today, I asked my fans on ImmaTeen if they can post some of their bullying stories, and they agreed to! Here's one story below.

"I was getting bullied in 7th grade because I liked a boy who a girl liked. She never would leave me alone. Her friends would start and they would message me saying I'm a slut I'm fat and ugly no ones wants to be with or around me. After awhile I started to believe them so I started drugs, then burning my self. One night I took a full [bottle] of sleeping pills the ambulance had to revive me. I'm now not doing drugs or bullied and I'm not harming myself things get better. Trust me"

- Katlynn

It makes me sad to think that this happens to kids and teens all around the world. Just hearing some of these stories give me chills down my spine. It's not something that needs to happen to people. Most reason kids bully each other, especially over the Internet, is because they were hurt themselves. They had gotten bullied or abused at home. They can't take away the pain and suffering so they bully someone.

I made this video a while ago and posted it for all the ImmaTeen fans to see, Its called "Stop The Tears and End The Fears". It's a video featuring people who had been victimized by bullies. Some of these kids and teens have been so close to committing suicide because of these people. The main way I have chosen to help these teens is by using the Internet.

This is why I want to start a program at my school to stop cyber, verbal, and physical bullying. Today is the day you can help someone who's been bullied. This is your time to make a change.

Media Speaks! So use it!

Also, check out this page: Stop The Tears and End The Fear! Its a great page and they're very helpful on there!

-Zoë, Youth Correspondant/contributing writer

Have you been bullied? Share your story with Zoë at Media Speak! or on ImmaTeen Facebook page.

Image source

Meet Andy Kopsa The Woman Behind NOLA to NYC Tumblr

Andy Kopsa is a freelance journalist who currently resides in New York City. She (yes she) is the creator of the much-talked about Tumblr From NOLA to NYC, which appeared the week after hurricane Sandy. When I came across Kopsa’s Tumblr page via Twitter I immediately wanted to reach out and get to know more about her work. Like Kopsa, I too have a connection to both NOLA and NYC. Though I never lived in NOLA, I was a volunteer during hurricane Katrina while living in Houston, Texas. Over the last several years I’ve collaborated with Katrina survivors on media and research projects. Hurricane Katrina undoubtedly changed my life and fueled my ambitions to be a better storyteller and advocate.

Having recently experienced hurricane Sandy as a resident of New York City and as an Occupy Sandy volunteer, I’ve found myself reflecting on the similarities and differences between hurricanes Katrina and Sandy. I’m beginning to think hurricanes follow me, or perhaps I follow them.

Nonetheless, I’m fascinated by the power of the human spirit to act as a healing mechanism after (un)natural disasters. I’m also incredibly drawn to the ways in which ordinary people, those directly and indirectly affected by natural disaster use social media to create what I call nurture-networks; that is, online/offline support networks cultivated in response to crisis.

I recently had the opportunity to interview Kopsa about NOLA to NYC Tumblr. In addition to discussing her project, she also told me about how disappointed she is with media outlets using images from NOLA to NYC Tumblr without permission. She also talked about being frustrated by various media outlets referring to her as a "he". Kopsa also shares with me how she feels about NOLA seven years after Katrina. In the passages below, you'll learn more about Kopsa, the woman behind the NOLA to NYC Tumblr, and about her plans to continue to support the two cities she calls home; New Orleans and New York City.

TLC: It seems like we share similar experiences having both been affected by hurricane Katrina and hurricane Sandy. What interests you most to the stories of those affected by the hurricanes?  

AK: I don’t think it is hurricanes per se.  For me, this project was about two of the places I have called home:  New Orleans and New York City.  Having a deep connection with New Orleans, and with New York it only made sense . I had to do something.  I am an investigative reporter who went to photo school so these things just happen with that kind of history!

TLC: You wrote in the “About” section of NOLA to NYC that during Sandy you were in NOLA, and while thinking about your family back in NYC, you thought to create NOLA to NYC via Tumblr. What made you think to use social media like Tumblr as an outlet and as means to connect two geographically separate communities?  

AK: Truthfully, because it was easy.  I had a Tumblr account for another project in the works featuring women journalists from rural america who moved to the “big city” and it was simple to add another page.  I know, not a very sexy answer but the truth.  On the road, it is hard at times to get up and run on a blog, new website, etc.  Pitching stories on the fly is difficult for me. Tumblr afforded some serious ease since I was consumed with shooting, reporting, and watching The Weather Channel.

TLC: At what point did you realize NOLA to NYC was beginning to pick up viral steam on the Internet?

AK: A friend tweeted a Salon story featuring the project.  But, I do publish in a wide variety of places and know writers at Salon so I wasn’t completely surprised. It didn’t seem like a big deal initially.  It is when media requests started pouring in from places like NBC Nightly News and other outlets that I was taken aback.

TLC: What insights, if any, have you gained from the NOLA to NYC project? What have you learned that perhaps you weren’t expecting to learn as a result of creating NOLA to NYC?

AK: That the media, of which I am a part, is an incredibly powerful tool. For good or for ill, you have control how you use that tool.  In retrospect, I may not have used Tumblr simply because everyone and their monkey’s uncle picked up photos and used them without permission.  This started as a deeply personal project, me photographing Katrina survivors, friends.  I listened to their stories and went through some personal anguish reporting on and photographing the appalling lack of progress in the seven years since Katrina. NOLA was my home for a handful of years and I love that place. So when people in the media, I am talking small time blogs to national television networks, started using some of the photos without even an email, well, I was none too pleased.

As a reporter who would never dream of using someones images, writings, anything, without permission - or at least a hat tip or link - it disgusts me.  People were writing things about me that weren’t true.  Like I am a he , which I am not.  And, one publication printed that I was a native of New Orleans and a Katrina survivor.  Both not true.  Nowhere in my personal history will you ever find those kinds of claims.  A 5 second google search would have told you I am an Iowa native and a lady.  Come to find out the “reporter” picked up my twitter feed and read her own fantasy into my tweets about NOLA to NYC.  I asked that next time she write about a person, at the very least, she give a ring-a-ling or drop an email.  Off soapbox.

I should mention that I didn’t learn that New Orleanians are incredibly passionate, resilient and down to earth people, that Katrina survivors are bad ass, love their city and will give back until it hurts.  I didn’t learn that from this project only because I already knew that.

TLC: Some may argue that NOLA to NYC is just another Internet meme that may lose people’s interest when the next meme comes along. Do you think NOLA to NYC is ‘just another Internet meme’? How do you keep the conversations going even after people lose interest in hurricane narratives?

AK: People are already losing interest.  But, that doesn’t really matter.  I wasn’t launching the site to springboard a career.  I will go about my business.  I won a grant from USC Annenberg (Knight Grant on Reporting in Religion and Public Life) to investigate religion and sex education in Mississippi so I need to get back to that.  The only conversation I want to continue is the one about seven years later: NOLA is still hobbled.  The lower ninth ward is still decimated.  The lakefront still bears the scars of Katrina.  Half the population is gone. Graft is still a king of New Orleans.  We need to look at New Orleans as prologue to the long road back we have here in the wake of Sandy.  There are tons of lessons to be learned from how Katrina was handled.  We need to be mindful that although the administrations have changed, many of the mechanisms for disaster recovery have not.  Private contractors promising victims a brighter tomorrow when what they really are up to is testing out new building materials or upcharging FEMA and the feds.  I know, sounds bleak, but this is one of those teachable moments.

TLC: Do you have any plans to expand the outreach of NOLA to NYC offline or to other online spaces? If so, are there ways that other people can continue to support your efforts?

AK: I just made the decision to start selling prints of the original 12 portraits I shot.  I will be donating a portion of the profits, if any, to the Ali Forney Center in New York City.  A drop in shelter for LGBTQ teens. The center was destroyed in the wake of Sandy.  A lot of my reporting in the past dealt with issues of LGBTQ rights and I've donated clothing and other items to the center before.  It seems a natural and right fit.

I am also going to Mastic Beach this weekend to take NOLA to NYC care packages to the people hit hard in that area of Long Island.  This was brought to my attention by the head of a pop-up charity group called New Orleans Gives Back.  The group will be bringing a truck full of useful cleanup and support supplies to Mastic this weekend.  The founder of the group asked if I wanted to be a part of it.  Of course I did, so I am making little prints and bringing some of the words of love and wisdom from the NOLA to New York project to Mastic.  It is a small gesture, but hopefully hearing from people who have been through it will bring a brief moment of comfort.  

Many thanks to Andy Kopsa for taking the time to chat with MEDIA MAKE CHANGE.

To purchase prints from the NOLA to NYC project, please visit: http://andykopsa.photoshelter.com

Photos courtesy of Andy Kopsa