The Bay Area has experienced a number of shootings where the suspected shooter were all young people. In November, gunfire rang out at Oakland’s Skyline High School and San Jose’s Westfield Mall and Burton High in San Francisco in December.
NBC Bay Area sat down with a group of young people in San Francisco, both survivors and perpetrators to ask them what was driving this gun violence amongst youth, the impact of social media when it comes to guns and what can be done.
High school teenagers, Ziggy Brown, Xavier Ballard, Terronnie Fields and Keenan Erwin, have attended programs at San Francisco’s United Playaz, a violence and prevention youth development program.
The 18-year-old Erwin was shot in December at Burton High in the city’s Portola neighborhood. He says there was a dispute with another student and that student shot him. Keenan’s femur was shattered.
“It was just crazy, hearing it happen to people and like not even thinking it could happen to you. What hurts more than that bullet was hearing your mama cry thinking that was her last time. Hearing you, seeing you breathe on this earth and hearing her cry,” he said.
NBC Bay Area asked them about the problem of gun violence amongst youth.
“No matter where you are, you could really just run into the wrong person that day,” Brown said.
“It could be anybody any age because it’s such a problem, like we have kids running around thinking that guns are cool to have,” Ballard said.
Brown and Ballard thought it was cool. In December 2024, the two ended up in juvenile hall for theft, robbing other people with a BB gun at Serramonte Mall. Ballard spent a week in a half in juvie. Ziggy three weeks.
“It’s such a bad mistake and it was so like dumb,” Ballard said.
Brown talked about a question his lawyer asked him.
“He asked me, ‘Why did you do that? He’s like, he spoke real to me. He’s like, Why did you do that dumb** s***? You’re speaking to me with intelligence. Why did you do that?’ I told him I didn’t love myself. I didn’t care about myself enough,” he said.
In 2021, gun violence replaced car crashes as the leading cause of death for children in the U.S. and has remained the leading killer, disporportionately affecting communities of color.
Social media is also having an impact on them.
“I feel like the social media is like it’s the humiliation part,” Ballard said. “It makes it to where people want to prove a point. Cause like for example, if somebody were to get like beat up or something and they seen it on the internet, then it’s like, okay, now I have to like get back.”
There is no data directly linking social media to crime, but research suggests social media is an accelerant. Erin Grinshteyn, an associate dean and professor at the University of San Francisco, studies gun violence as a public health issue.
“Social media has the capacity to disseminate gun violence information far more broadly than if you’re just exposed within your specific community,” Grinshteyn said. “What we’re seeing is that people who are exposed to gun violence in their community have negative mental health consequences. I think often times people think that a gun will make them safer, and all the research shows that having access to a firearm puts you in far more danger.”