Saved by a Gold Tooth: Gunshot Ricochets off of his Grillz

It is a known fact that gun violence in the Black community is one of the primary reasons many major United States cities are not safe. It has been said that the most dangerous place for a Black person is the womb, but this is patently untrue.

The most dangerous place for a Black person is hanging around other Black people, where an enjoyable afternoon smoking marijuana can be interrupted suddenly and viciously. The story cited below is proof of the importance of purchasing grillz for ones teeth:

A Central City man was left with only minor injuries from a gunshot to the mouth after his gold tooth apparently deflected the bullet, police said.

The victim was sitting in a car with his girlfriend in the 3300 block of Second Street, smoking marijuna that belonged to his 20-year-old brother, Waltdell Davis, said Sgt. Sandra Contreras of the NOPD Sixth District persons-crime division. When Waltdell Davis came home, he got angry about the marijuana, and an argument ensued, Contreras said. In an attempt to defuse the argument, the victim went inside the house, but Waltdell Davis followed him in with a gun, Contreras said.

The two began to struggle, and the gun went off, hitting the victim in the mouth, Contreras said. He ran to a friend’s house for help, and the paramedics who treated him told investigators that the small-caliber bullet apparently bounced off the victim’s gold tooth, leaving only some gum damage from the impact and a cut to his upper lip from the ricochet, Contreras said.

The victim told police in the hospital that he had been shot by his brother, Contreras said. His mouth was filled with gauze from his medical treatment, however, and it was initially difficult to ascertain whether he was identifying Waltdell Davis or a second similarly-named brother, Waldell Davis, Contreras said. Investigators were able to subsequently confirm from other witnesses that Waltdell Davis was the shooter and that Waldell Davis was uninvolved in the incident, and Waltdell Davis was arrested Feb. 9 on charges of aggravated battery, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and parole violation.

Waltdell or Waldell? Who knows, it could have been his other, similarly named brother Waldo. Where is he again?

A video on Grillz can be found here describing the process of putting them on your teeth.

It is our sincere hope that the government – in an effort to stem the tide of rampant gunshot victims in the Black community – institutes Project Gold Tooth. Imagine the lives saved if every person in the Black community has grillz adorning their bicuspids, not to mention the monumental redistribution of wealth this project would provide.

The tragic shooting death of the Black gentleman at the IHOP in Sacramento and the subsequent events that followed (his family attacking a news crew) would have been avoided were the impenetrable grillz attached to his teeth.

Project Gold Tooth: Saved by the Grillz. We encourage local governments to take control of a winnable situation and adopt this plan.  Gun violence in Black communities and dangerous neighborhoods can be halved if they take the steps necessary to implement Project Gold Tooth.

Even better, the high rates of Black people affixing these government-issued grillz to their teeth might somehow spark interest in the Black community in dentistry:

As the American Dental Association reinforced its commitment to  diversity, it apologized for discriminatory membership practices of the past. Dr. Raymond Gist, the group's first African-American president, made the apology in an open letter.

In a historic move, the American Dental Association has apologized for not taking a stand against discriminatory membership practices.

In an open letter, Dr. Raymond Gist, who became the ADA's first African-American president in October, said the dentist group should have done a better job in making sure minorities could join affiliated state and local organizations before the mid-1960s.
"[I]n looking forward, we must also look back," Gist wrote. "Along with acknowledging past mistakes and to build a stronger, collaborative platform for future accomplishments, the ADA apologizes to dentists for not strongly enforcing non-discriminatory membership practices prior to 1965."

Peterson says no data available show whether there was a surge of minority member applications after 1965. But he says of the 185,000 practicing dentists in the U.S. in 2009, about 3 1/2 percent are African American and about 44 percent of those dentists belong to the ADA.

Two years ago, the American Medical Association issued a similar apology.  Dr. Ronald Davis, the immediate past president of the AMA at the time, said that the apology followed an AMA study about the history of medicine's racial divide.

"We knew that there had been problems in the past and after all of the detail was collected, we felt horrible about what had been uncovered, even more so than the anecdotal stories that we had heard previously," Davis told NPR's Michel Martin. "And we felt that we wanted to issue a very public, very official apology on behalf of the entire organization to African-American physicians and the organizations that represent them."

Peterson says that the ADA has established programs to promote diversity, including the Institute for Diversity in Leadership, which aims to help equip minority dentists for leadership roles.

A lack of Black people in any vocation or in any endeavor is always blamed on discrimination. Conversely, a lot Black people in jail is blamed on the same thing. 

Where is the Black dentist? We need them desperately to be part of Project Gold Tooth. The number of Black dentists remained static up until 1991record numbers of Asians and Hispanics are enrolling at higher numbers. 

A staggering 70 percent of Black dentists earned their degrees from HBCUs. Knowing what transpires at HBCUs, this isn’t an indicator of great hope for the future of Black dentistry. This is the same percentage of Black veterinarians that have come from Tuskegee University.

To hinder future Black-on-Black murder rates let us all join together and work to promote Project Gold Tooth.

Thanks to Walter’s wearing of grillz, he survived a gunshot wound to the face. The evidence from this story shows that Project Gold Tooth could save hundreds of life. Perhaps thousands, if not more.

What are you waiting for Congress? Make it happen.

We have no idea how to augment the number of Black people entering dental school, but like most other institutions of higher learning facing this problem the answer is probably found in lowering the standards and academic qualifications required for entrance.