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Forbes profiles Black mom who created Moms of Black Boys United

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It seems Black moms in the U.S. face a world of uncertainty when when they send their Black sons to school, the store… anywhere. There may be a cop out there who views every Black male as a criminal and he/she has his gun ready to fire. Major media has finally been highlighting these stories of tragedy and putting pressure on the powers that be to implement change. Forbes magazine today has a feature on De[elsha McGruder, a high-ranking corporate executive who is also the mother of two Black sons. McGruder has a Harvard MBA and is a senior vice president at Viacom, one of the world’s largest and most powerful media and entertainment conglomerates in the world. Yet, she found herself lying awake at night, worrying about the safety of her two young sons, 7 and 4. Over time, she came up with her own concept of utilizing social media to reach out to other mothers in a similar position and create a vehicle of awareness and perhaps change. Here’s her story: “I kept seeing multiple killings by police of black boys and men in the news. In July 2016, there were two back-to-back killings. As a mom of black sons, I was very disturbed. I saw these graphic images on the news of Alton Sterling shot at close range and all the blood surrounding him. The next day it was Philando Castile. His girlfriend broadcast his death live on Facebook. There have been so many stories. Police say, “Well I thought he had a gun” or “I was afraid for my life.” Someone lost their son, husband, father, brother or nephew. I was in fear, frustration, anger, confusion and needed to connect with people who’d understand. I went on Facebook and created Moms of Black Boys United, inviting 30 friends. I stepped away for five minutes. When I came back, it had grown to 150 people and kept ticking up: 500 in an hour, then 2,000. I went to the grocery store: 4,000. I got back home: 7,000. By the time I went to bed — within 12 hours since starting the group – 21,000 moms from all around the country had joined. We’re more than 183,000 moms from around the country and world. We’ve evolved into two nonprofit organizations. Within three months we incorporated the first, M.O.B.B. United. Two months later, we created M.O.B.B. for Social Change, the sister advocacy organization, to influence policy at the federal, state, and local levels. I never imagined I would start something with a group of strangers on Facebook, a scary proposition for someone like me, who’s an introvert. The linear television world is one-way communication. You decide what you want to program using research. The only way you know if they watched is through ratings. You don’t really know that you’re connecting. On social media, you’re getting real time feedback from thousands of people. It’s a two-way communication with the audience. Someone I didn’t know said we need to get on a conference call, plan a march, plan something. She’s now the head of membership and fundraising. We were unsure what people wanted when the Facebook group started, so we tried different things. Should we have health and wellness information? Should we mobilize marches? Should we have economic information? We were throwing things against the wall to see what stuck.” For the rest of the story, go  HERE.

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