These were taken at a Black Lives Matter rally I attended in Moscow. I was there to support the BLM movement, but there were protesters. You can see them in a few of the photos I took. Men who came decorated with guns and American flags. There was a terrifying moment when an older lady came up to us and said "There are people up ahead with guns. Don't show them you're afraid".It baffles me still to think that these people brought guns to intimidate a peaceful, unarmed group of protesters. A group of protesters that payed them no mind. We never said anything to them, and the only thing they saw from us were our backs. I think in a lot of ways this shows the kind of hostility that follows the BLM movement. The people who appose it make no effort to understand it, and they take it as a personal attack on themselves. Or they try to make the movement meaningless by denying all existence of racism. The fact is, racism is alive and well today. While we've culturally moved past the mindset of the 20th century, our governmental system still reflects that old racist mindset. The criminal justice system is the biggest indicator of this problem. The US holds about 25% of the world's prisoners. That means that one in every three prisoners wold wide are in the USA. This is a pretty spectacular statistic coming from a country that makes up only 4.4% of the world's population. And of those prisoners, 40% are black. Again, pretty spectacular given that black people make up 16% of the US' population. Solving this problem (and on a larger scale, oppression) means more than just reforming the justice system. It means making sure education is available and equal for all children, which it's not. School funding isn't centralized, it's payed for by the local community. This means poor communities get poor schools. Education breaks the cycle of poverty, it keeps people out of prison. And currently, we have a large population of children, mostly minorities, who get a half-complete education. But all this starts with acknowledging that all these things are problems, and more importantly, problems of race. We need to understand that black lives really DO matter.
Walk out protest
So just a little bit of information about these photos here. I took these during a walk out protest organized to by Jacob Ward. Students gathered to demonstrate the despondency felt because of the election results. There were four prepared speeches given by students, then the protest was opened up to anyone who had something to say. Muslim students, those with undocumented relatives, victims of sexual violence, and members of the LGBTQ community all spoke out. Most gave messages of hope, others called for the community to pull together and support each other. One girl, a member of LGBTQ, told students to "never stop kissing", implying that no one could ever stop love in any form.