Open Space The Violence Must Cease (1992)

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:01][music] [music] Tell me [music] [music] an idea.

[00:00:31]I woke up this morning. What did I see?

[00:00:34]Gun standing over me with their gun.

[00:00:38]>> A group came in and must have been looking for somebody specific.

[00:00:41]>> One man had fired off a shot at another man.

[00:00:43]>> Shot was fired.

[00:00:44]>> Shot in broad daylight. Dead.

[00:00:47]>> Money or your life.

[00:00:48]>> Gun.

[00:00:57]We know [music] we know one day [music] we know one another day.

[00:01:09][music] We know one day.

[00:01:15]>> I'm Sheldon Thomas. I go in the recording name of curfew. I am head of the brother movement.

[00:01:21]>> You don't wait for your bridging to get down. You don't wait for your cousin to get laid down. You don't wait for your daughter, your son to end up on drugs.

[00:01:29]You do something about it. Now, >> I'm making this open space basically because I'm sick of all the violence that's happening in the black communities right now.

[00:01:38]>> Choice FM local news.

[00:01:40]>> Mark Bernett was gunned down at the podium in Vauxhall during a concert by the Jamaican reggae star Capton.

[00:01:46]>> Had a few shootings and around clubs in London quite recently. I'm a club DJ. My name is Martin J.

[00:01:53]>> I heard a gunfire. At first I thought it was a gun salute because a certain track was playing.

[00:01:58]>> Shooting a gun well in the air as a salute in a dance has become accepted as normal.

[00:02:04]>> Down the bottom of the stairs was a black guy.

[00:02:08]>> A young black guy was shot in the lobby.

[00:02:11]>> He had a bullet in the back of his head and blood was all over the place. And I've never seen that kind of thing. Only in films. And like it was a black guy and this was a black club.

[00:02:32]>> I think it makes me think twice before I go to certain places.

[00:02:36]>> Someone who's just going out for a good time could end up dead.

[00:02:39]>> Two other people also received bullet wounds >> on this dark road 6:00 in the morning.

[00:02:45]It was just me and another guy walking towards me. My name's Formula. I'm the technical advisor for Super Click Sound.

[00:02:52]And as we got like, I don't know, a meter apart. He pulled out a little revolver. He aimed it straight at me like this and said, "Money, you're your life." There is a rise in this kind of violence, this black and black violence.

[00:03:08]>> A man seriously ill in hospital after being shot at a Shaba Ranks concert.

[00:03:14]The thing is though, can you let incidents like these stop your life? You know, put your put your life on a temporary hold out there. So talk to Uno.

[00:03:26]>> This film will look at why the violence has increased in the black communities and what we are trying to do about it.

[00:03:32]>> Now fed up hear about all this black on black violence. Black man, I take out gun shop and next black brother. I draw out knife and I chop up next black brother. WHAT THEM THINK HAVE TO STOP THIS YEAR? NO. BIG UP ALL OF THE B R O T H E r movement.

[00:03:48]>> The brother movement um stands for black rhyme organization to help equal rights.

[00:03:52]>> The brother movement has released a record called ghettodon.

[00:03:56]>> Ghetto. Well, that's the l that some people are living in the ghetto right now >> which deals with the issue of black and [music] black violence.

[00:04:04]>> Are you growing up in a ghetto witness of that jewelry [music] to black? The message is the most important situation here. What we're trying to put across is that black-on-black violence must cease and black awareness is very important right now as we're living in revelation times.

[00:04:24]Come and show them.

[00:04:25]>> When I was growing up, I owned the sound which was based in Brixton. I mean, I myself was in the reg sound. So, obviously I had an attitude at that time because Simon in those days, you had to be rough and you know what I mean?

[00:04:38]Otherwise, the next sound will step all over you. Every week we used to practice in the garage and on weekends we used to take the sign out and put the speaker box across the road and test the weight of the sound.

[00:04:50][music] >> And it's like everybody knew each other in the community and like the vibe was a lot different. It's like everybody was into sound and wanted to know more about what was happening with a sound system.

[00:05:06]>> The sound [music] had a lot of MC's because that was the in thing at that time. You know we had lyrics formula we had red man. And do you remember that lyric that red manchester blah blah blah blad [music] [music] diamond stereograph small action jam down rocket. Yeah, I know. It's true.

[00:05:43]Jam [music] gun rockers, King Tubbies, US, Taus. There was so much sound.

[00:05:48]>> In the pregun days, there was still violence in dances.

[00:05:53]>> In those days, there was violence. Of course, there was violence.

[00:05:55]>> Things like knives and baseball bats and axes and swords >> or basically their fists. Whereas nowadays, man's ready to draw a gun and they can they can take you out from a distance.

[00:06:11]It would be very easy to get your hands on a gun.

[00:06:13]>> If you know the right person, you're able to get a gun.

[00:06:15]>> Very easy.

[00:06:16]>> If I needed to buy a gun, I could get one.

[00:06:19]>> There's no problem.

[00:06:20]>> Black people dying, [music] crying, bleeding, murdering each other. No one to care. No one even seems to bother.

[00:06:24]>> I think that it's important to bring um the issue of black and black violence to the forefront so that we can deal with it. My name is Radical D. I'm a rapper.

[00:06:32]Anytime you hide something, then it doesn't get dealt with. It escalates quietly. Something which is wrong in our community affects all of us. I'm Kimani Jose and I do lots of things mostly with the recovery of the history and culture of the African people. We cannot expect other people to solve our problems for us. We're the ones who've got to do it.

[00:06:57]>> Our lining is being washed by others. um and it's being tailored or channeled in a way to suit a a a particular stereotype view.

[00:07:07]>> And therefore, as black people, we need to speak out. We need to let people know exactly where we stand and to say no to violence.

[00:07:16]But when we have said no to violence, we have to look at the reasons. I'm a Methodist minister. Why people turn to violence? Some [music] smok.

[00:07:31]>> When one looks at the dynamics of criminality, most studies will show that when you have economic deprivation, >> bad housing, homelessness, >> injustices, unemployment, and this continues, >> you will have a parallel rise in crime.

[00:07:48]I'm Peter Herbert. I'm chair of the Society of Black Lawyers, and I practice as a barristister. areas that are very deprived tend to breed >> crime because of the obvious uh manifestations that people have to survive in a society.

[00:08:03]>> Having to survive means that many of our black young men are actually turning to violence and to to to to crime and to drugs as a way out. them fall into it as well because them believing of themsel well that's the only way for them to be successful by oiling a gun or start sell drugs very close to the area where I live there's a crack spot people selling crack and to me now when that's happening near my front door that's when I start thinking about my daughter my daughter Karen is 3 years old.

[00:08:45]What kind of future she going to have at the end of the day? If if they're selling crack now, what is it going to be in 10 12 years time when my daughter's a lot older?

[00:08:58]I believe that once all people get involved in selling and buying and using drugs, it's it's it's the way it's a very good way of destroying them. I mean destroying them physically, mentally and spiritually.

[00:09:14]>> Things are getting worse. Things are getting desperate. My name is Dave Weaver. I represent an organization called the National Black Caucus. I think fundamentally one has to look at the situation uh that we find ourselves in as black people.

[00:09:28]>> For us black people, it is as though we are in a a vice grip and is hard for us to get through. People think, well, I'm not getting anything from society. I'm not getting anything from government. I'm going to go out and get it for myself.

[00:09:43]>> It's important that you get ahead even if the rest of your family or your community can't get ahead.

[00:09:48]>> Very much like a rat race.

[00:09:50]>> And you will step on your family and the rest of your community.

[00:09:53]>> Do eating dog >> in order to do so.

[00:10:01]>> Yeah.

[00:10:03]Black is the color of the African skin.

[00:10:06]Black is the color. Black is the color.

[00:10:08]Black is the color of the African skin.

[00:10:12]So don't let no man make you feel ashamed.

[00:10:18]>> Traditional African society before the intervention of Islam and Europe.

[00:10:24]>> There was a time when as a people we were together. It was the community, the collective which was more important than the individual.

[00:10:36]>> We do everything together.

[00:10:40]We would see ourselves as our brother's keepers and so on.

[00:10:45]>> Keep it up.

[00:10:47]>> A capitalist society does the opposite. It places primar primary info um emphasis on the individual and the individual by whatever means necessary can reach the top.

[00:11:01]>> You're thinking, "Yeah, I need the money. I want to have a um BMW, >> the car, the gold, the clothes. I want to have a walk about with a phone."

[00:11:08]>> Now, young black people, most of those that are street wise, they they literally listen to that message and they got rich also. um I wouldn't call it actual you know positive rich but um they wasn't they weren't going to be prepared to be left behind. It's not easy because at the end of the day there are so few options open to individuals um within the black community definitely young people unemployment B LTress [music] >> unemployment is bad enough for black people in this country as it is but up in Mosside >> Manchester >> the unemployment for young blacks is something like 43%.

[00:11:56]>> The most injustice that's happening in my side is a high level of unemployment.

[00:12:02]>> Two things I wanted to be when I left school, >> an actor or a football player.

[00:12:07]>> Uh my name is um Coffee John Samuels.

[00:12:10]>> I missed the boat on two of them.

[00:12:12]>> So became a community worker.

[00:12:16]>> There are many have tried but the opportunity wasn't available for them.

[00:12:20]The doors in the open for them. Now I have no sympathy for the person who has an opportunity and didn't make use of that opportunity and then uh find themselves having to do illicit things to make a living. My name is uh John Paul Elliot.

[00:12:34]I actually run the local newspaper in Mside. One can sympathize with those who weren't given the opportunity because I tell you racism in this country is a very powerful thing.

[00:12:46]>> They see the discrimination.

[00:12:48]Repercussion of that is that they get f fed up of trying >> and rather than taking that path which leads nowhere. People drop out >> and whilst they get fed up of trying other things um take place.

[00:13:00]>> They do drift into a life of crime >> because the word is survival.

[00:13:05]>> Cryo people feel it cry.

[00:13:12]Whenever you have a situation where a section of society are clocked out of the means of obtaining employment, housing, education, which many young black people are, and the only viable alternative is a life of crime, the most lucrative aspect of criminal life is presented by way of drug abuse and drug distribution. I'm not saying selling drugs is is good, but for as long as I haven't got an alternative to offer somebody that is selling drugs, or indeed I haven't got an alternative myself and life must go on.

[00:13:51]You are left without option.

[00:13:54]>> When living on the streets, everybody gets physical physical war, physical, they have no blaster.

[00:14:03]As they say, people are products of the environment in which um they live and they're brought up.

[00:14:13]>> Services have been kind of deteriorating in my side for many many years at least um the last 13 years I've lived there.

[00:14:23]You see broken down houses that still are broken down for the last 13 years.

[00:14:32]Our lot in life and in society in Britain is not good enough. We're not subsisting. We're not existing.

[00:14:41]The more on my side that's been deteriorating for the last 20 years and no genuine will to clean it up.

[00:14:50]>> This kind of area where people I can see it for myself. I mean living in something like this but I don't know what I would turn out to be like. I mean >> jeez. Well, I mean the you can see the physical nature of the place. I mean, you know, this is where people are actually forced to live.

[00:15:09]>> We we we're self-destructing. Moside is self-destructing in terms of the black community >> because young people are shooting at each other in THE BACK OF FLATS JACKED BY SAVES CLAIM TO BE BLACK SELLING CRACK TO THE BLACK. Fact of the matter, they're murdering BRUTES WHO SHOOT FIRST IN THE war for the turf.

[00:15:24]>> I'm at a point now where certain people cannot travel in my car. I will avoid traveling in anybody's car because you don't know who's involved into what and somebody may have a score to settle with somebody and accidentally you're in the wrong place at the wrong time. If I tell you some of the things that violence and gunshots have fired in this area for some petty little things and it's all because people have no hope.

[00:15:48]>> The dreams and aspiration that people have um have just been whittleled away.

[00:15:55]So you're actually holding on to a dream nine times out of 10 in a place like this. A dream that is not attainable.

[00:16:01]>> Okay. At the moment economically the country is having some problems. So it means our cries are far more unlikely to be heard because everyone else is crying and we are the baby in this if at all we've been born yet.

[00:16:17]>> After a few days of staying in Moside all I have seen is nothing but deprivation and poverty.

[00:16:23]They call it outside of Manchester where I come from in London they call it Gunchester. But the question's got to be asked is why is this poverty, the guns, the violence, the drugs being allowed to fester?

[00:16:39]>> One thing that hurts me is that um people are readily that are in authority uh let this situation develop.

[00:16:47]>> They're aware as to what's going on and are doing absolutely nothing about it.

[00:16:51]there's a degree of containment taking place.

[00:16:53]>> I mean, the question you got to sit down and think to yourself is who's at fault there? Is it the people that you can see visible, which so happens to be black people, or is it the people who allow guns to come in? Who allowed the drugs to come in?

[00:17:09]>> The drug comes in in bulk. Two tons of cannabis and 53 kilos of cocaine were concealed in the shipment of balsa wood >> brought in in bulk by the organized um criminals, indigenous criminals.

[00:17:22]>> Edward Richardson and Donald Treadwin were the principal British dealers.

[00:17:27]>> They're making the large sums of money and but they're unseen. My name is Viveid. I'm the coordinate revenue and drugs advisory project. Now, the retailers, the individuals who who now distribute the drug on the street, um for the most part, um one could uh identify as being black because that's the way they're always portrayed.

[00:17:49]Um there is no way that this small group of individuals could bring in um the amount of drug of that drug necessary to um supply all the major cities in this country.

[00:17:59]>> Its street value 43 million pounds. We mean we're living in a white power structure and and um the institutions are run by white people and that is the same with regards to organized crime.

[00:18:13]Who allows the estates to be deprived of the the normal necessities what people can strive on those things ain't caused by black people. The symptoms is the cause of as I said policies policies from central government local government >> the reason of the [music] government who never implemented implement >> the government have to take some responsibility for all this violence they're aware of the situation >> there comes a point when our self-destruction will actually spill over into next door do you know what I mean >> the black community is forced to live in live within a restricted Syria.

[00:18:53]Um, and at one point obviously they were trying to break out and that's when we saw the riots and so on and so forth.

[00:18:59]>> In the early 80s there were a lot of uprisings, rebellions.

[00:19:05]I supported uprising in Brixton in 1981.

[00:19:08]>> People felt that look we need to have a change.

[00:19:11]>> We was pushed. People was pushed living in Brixton.

[00:19:14]>> We want to have a change now.

[00:19:16]>> And when you push somebody to the limit, something's got to give.

[00:19:21]We've moved on from that trend and what you see now is a lot of this hate >> just took out a gun and shot him >> and frustration.

[00:19:28]>> He pulled out a little revolver >> and anger being internalized >> because of the fact that they can't touch the real perpetuators of their misery.

[00:19:39]>> Central government, local government, >> they feel entirely surrounded and cut off. It becomes easy for them to turn this violence on the self onto each other in a way which no other section of this society does.

[00:19:54]>> I've seen about three murders altogether. That means I saw the dead bodies, not actually see who committed the crime.

[00:20:02]>> What we're seeing now to an extent is what I would I term as um black on black um genocide. Maybe that's too strong, but that's really what we're looking at.

[00:20:11][music] Man, genocide of a tribe, but we mad man.

[00:20:15]>> The man who was murdered at a South London nightclub has today been named by police. Two other people also received bullet wounds.

[00:20:23]>> Give a damn because [music] the killing was don't even bother trying to call the police.

[00:20:27]>> There were around a thousand people at the concert on Saturday night and police are appealing for witnesses.

[00:20:33]>> I think first of all um people wouldn't go to the police simply because they don't want to get involved. My name is Carl Lammy and I'm presently unemployed.

[00:20:41]But also remember that there's always been a friction between the black community and the police >> because it's a question of trust.

[00:20:48]In my community, the people would much rather live with the criminals on the gunman than call the police because they don't know which is worse.

[00:20:54]>> The police are seen as the oppressors basically um or or the right arm or the enforcing arm of an oppressive structure. very often they are the repository of much of the racism which we face. But of course, racism has got no part within the police service.

[00:21:14]>> Well, the police, I think, are still seen as an enemy by black people.

[00:21:19]>> We've got to get people to trust us. I'm Inspector Mcconey. I'm the community las officer at Brixham Police Station. The on is on us to actually go out to them and prove that we can be trusted. We have to work with those parts of the police force who are sensitive to race issues and which are receptive to our needs and not to the wider white society.

[00:21:40]>> The solution to the problem only can only come from the black community >> and I think it's up to us to take the the initiative to deal with this problem now.

[00:21:47]>> No one else can deal with that more than the black community. We need to take action now >> anyway, anywhere, anyhow.

[00:21:54]>> National Black Caucus are holding a conference, a big conference on the theme of drugs. uh and the increasing crime and uh use of guns and so forth in the spring of 1993. And that will be a large conference of great significance because what you'll get from that conference is black people going away to their different communities developing on the concept of pride. Pride stands for Prevention, Rhabilitation, I independence, Dignity, and E education. Because that's what it's all about for us. It's about pride.

[00:22:29]It's about selfrespect. It's about our children and our children's children >> arguing.

[00:22:36]All right. See, now look at him. What is he doing? Crane, >> we need to start with the children from a young age. Four, five.

[00:22:43]>> He was too small and weak. Tried it.

[00:22:46]>> And start teaching them history, a a wide scope of history, so they know what they're about. They know where they're coming from. so they can have a bit of respect for themselves.

[00:22:57]>> What we found also in in in most of my side anyway that there was a lack of identity regarding um young black people. the youngster in the street who does not know himself, who does not have any proper role models, who does not have very very strong proper African values, who does not understand what is right or what is wrong, is primarily suffering from a loss of self, from a loss of his history. And we felt that um it's one has to know their roots before they feel um should I say conscious of themsel.

[00:23:39]>> So don't let no man make you feel ashamed.

[00:23:43]No. Yeah.

[00:23:47]>> So that means say you know educating people say well you know violence another key thing you know when no need for kill one another for be on top. My name is Andre Slowley and I'm into music in order like make it into the music world as a singer. We can work together you know I use our resources amongst each other you know for make something good.

[00:24:09]>> The message is quite clear. We need to get together because we lack unity.

[00:24:14]There's no doubt about that. We lack communication. We lack education. We lack selfrespect. You need more man really a sing about more love and unity and them thing you know and a singer DJ about you know bringing us back together as a people DJ BOO >> and we should aim at making every single one of us a very very powerful example >> and there are many black people that's been successful but yet we see what happens that um get rich and switch the word is and um young people don't see them and because of that there is that kind of vacuum >> in some of those environments the people that have the money >> getting ahead and acquiring all the material things that they would like to have >> and can buy cars and can afford to live are those people who are making a living out of the distribution of the drug >> and they in that particular environment are seen as positive role models.

[00:25:22]>> We need now to get black people that have been successful, those that have um taken academic courses to come together from the community to put back something into the community >> and portray that positive image that you can succeed to young people, you can achieve, you can you are somebody as Jesse Jackson say and um you can be what you want to be.

[00:25:45]>> Essential plastic. Essential plastic.

[00:25:48]>> That's good.

[00:25:51]Yeah, man. You know that >> one of the things that I I feel the black community is increasingly recognizing is that it's going to have to empower itself and actually if we want a service, the service has got to be of the community and and born out of the community on any level. And unfortunately in terms of enforcement, that's going to be the case going to have to be the case. Also >> you have a situation where it is possible that the black community itself even without the police can address the drug related issues within our own communities. I'm mindful that where where firearms are concerned in particular and where violence is concerned that that it could be very dangerous for members of the public to take the law into their own hands and to go forward and to deal with these things themselves. You do have groups in America who have um adopted certain methods.

[00:26:43]>> In the United States, communities in St. Louis have taken effectively the law of policing its own communities into its own hands.

[00:26:50]>> Like the Nation of Islam, for example, who have basically gone in and just cleared out areas by force.

[00:27:01]The community have to take the responsibility themselves in terms of defending themselves and sorting out.

[00:27:07]There's very few within our community who are determined to destroy our community.

[00:27:11]>> We have to prepare ourselves to you know to stand by those young people not just to condemn them and say that they are you know they are bad or they are not doing the right things.

[00:27:23]>> So it's about talking to them making them see the error of their ways. Uh, and if at the end of that all that fails, then it's a sanction. They have to go.

[00:27:31]>> We can't waste our energy on fighting each other. The energy that we're using to fight each other, we have to channel it into unity, peace, love, and respect for each other.

[00:27:40]>> This is perhaps the most important beginning to a solution. If we do not go around and bring to the attention of people what is developing in our communities the trends that are emerging both good and bad.

[00:27:57]>> I don't think we can look outside for support. It's definitely got to come from within >> and discuss them understand them and be prepared to do something about them.

[00:28:05]Nobody's going to do it for us.

[00:28:08]>> With this documentary and the [music] record we have tried to show why the violence is increasing. We have brought black people together to say with a unified voice, the violence must cease.

[00:28:22]>> The old process of us bringing about peace, unity, and respect amongst ourselves as black people is so we can secure a decent future for our kids.

[00:28:34]If we don't try to solve the problem of drugrelated gun crimes in our community, at the end of the day, the problem would destroy us. Peace