- June is also Silenced the Violence Month of Action, which is aimed at ending gun violence.

The annual Silence Violence march and rally began 17 years ago at Church of the Messiah in Detroit.

This year, more than 20 similar events took place across the state.

"American Black Journal" contributor, Daijah Moss, was at the Detroit march where the innocent victims of gun violence were honored.

(protestors chant) - Silence the violence.

Silence the violence.

- I've had so many relatives, it would be unfair to speak on one or two because we've had several relatives that have died to gun violence, so that's why it's important to me.

- On October 16th, 2016, my daughter, Jada Rankin, was murdered by senseless gun violence.

She was 15 years old.

It took me two years to even come out the house.

It took me two years to go back to work.

It took me two years to comb my hair, but I had learned that my daughter was not, she was a butterfly, right?

Every room she walked in and lit up, so it is my duty, not only as her mother to birth her, nourish her, it's actually my duty to keep her legacy alive.

- This is Shawntaze Cameron Moore, my eight year old grandson who was shot last year, August 19th.

It was an unsecured gun on the west side of Detroit at his mom house, and parents was careless at my daughter house, and unfortunately the kids got ahold to it.

I'll never know the whole story.

I wasn't there, but his life was taken with an unsecured gun, so the message today is, lock it up.

- I lost a childhood friend by the name of Gerald Gunter.

He was the first one of us to be murdered.

I've seen individuals rally and look at our friend as a martyr to the lifestyle, and I've seen us go on like a two year campaign of retaliation.

Trauma can be your superpower, 'cause when you had enough, you had enough.

We've seen community members get involved, like most of the people who is addressing gun violence are people who have been caught up in the cycles of gun violence of having enough and bearing the responsibility with holding themselves accountable and holding the community accountable, and holding the community accountable is not just punitive measures or punishment.

Holding the community accountable is figuring out how do we show up as responsible elders, peers in addressing it.

(drums beating) - It takes a village to work together to be able to collaborate and to have it where our children are safe, our women are safe, our brothers, our sisters are safe, and we just trying to make a safe zone for victims being victimized by gun violence.

(crowd applauds) - We started this 17 years ago because in this neighborhood we had a unfortunate incident of a few young people being murdered, and I literally talked to their parents and I said, "I don't know what we're going to do, but we're going to do something."

They would not be a statistic.

We would stand up and we would do something, but it was 58 of us.

Within a few years, it became a citywide event, and as of 2022, it became a statewide event, (crowd applauds) so it turned into Silence The Violence Michigan.

- We've taken bold steps to now fund community violence intervention programs, which again, is looking at it, not from the lens of policing and enforcement, but from the lens of human perspective.

(crowd applauds) - It is our community who is fed up with this senseless violence.

You know, we're not going to lose our balance patting ourselves on the back because we've had some degree of success.

It is still way too violent.

We need community.

We need ceasefire.

We need our CVI.

We need all of the folks in this room to continue to help us drive down violence.

- I thank you for turning your tears into triumph as we cried over people who we have lost, or lives that have been cut short, but know that tomorrow will come when we all hold hands and lock arms and walk into it together, because when we decide that type of unity is what we will not only accept, but demand from our sisters and brothers, that is how we will move forward safely and we will end gun violence in Michigan and across our communities.

(crowd applauds) - I hope that eventually this event becomes obsolete.

That's what I hope, that it becomes something that we remember, that it becomes a victory, and we say we don't have to march for gun violence because we've conquered it.

- Silence the violence.

Silence the violence.

This our city.

This our city.

Keep it safe.

Keep it safe.

This our city.

This our city.

Keep it safe.

Keep it safe.