Massive counter-protest upstages Boston rally
BoSToN:
Thousands of demonstrators chanting anti-Nazi slogans in a public rejection of white nationalism upstaged a small group in Boston that planned a “free speech rally” a week after a violent clash rocked Virginia and reverberated across the United States.
Counter- protesters marched through the city on Saturday to historic Boston Common, where conservatives had planned to deliver a series of speeches but soon left.
Police vans later escorted the conservatives out of the area, as boisterous counter-protesters scuffled with police.
Organisers of the event, the Boston Free Speech Coalition, had publicly distanced themselves from the neo-Nazis, white supremacists and others who fomented violence in Charlottesville on Aug 12.
Opponents feared that white nationalists might show up in Boston anyway, and turned out in force, some dressed entirely in black with bandannas over their faces. Officials said the rallies – the largest of about a half dozen around the country on Saturday – drew about 40,000 people.
Counter-protesters chanted slogans, and waved signs that said: “Make Nazis Afraid Again”, “Love your neighbour”, “Resist fascism” and “Hate never made US great”. Others carried a large banner that read: “SMASH WHITE SUPREMACY.”
Chris Hood, a free speech rally attendee from Dorchester, said people were unfairly making it seem like the rally was going to be “a white supremacist Klan rally”.
“That was never the intention,” he said. “We’ve only come here to promote free speech on college campuses, free speech on social media for conservative, right-wing speakers. And we have no intention of violence.”
One of the planned speakers of the conservative activist rally said the event “fell apart”.
Congressional candidate Samson Racioppi, who was among several slated to speak, told WCVB-TV that he didn’t realise “how unplanned of an event it was going to be”.
Rockeem Robinson, a youth counsellor from Cambridge, said he joined the counter-protest to “show support for the black community and for all minority communities”.
Members of the Black Lives Matter movement held a protest on the Common, where a Confederate flag was burned and protesters pounded on the sides of a police vehicle.
Boston Commissioner William Evans said 33 arrests had been made by Saturday night – mostly for disorderly conduct while some were for assaulting police officers.
The police department tweeted Saturday afternoon that some protesters were throwing bottles, urine and rocks at them.
President Donald Trump applauded the people in Boston who he said were “speaking out” against bigotry and hate.
Trump added in a Twitter message that “Our country will soon come together as one!”
Rallies in other cities around the country, while smaller, also were forceful.
Counter- protesters marched through New Orleans, some of them carrying signs that read “White People Against White Supremacy” and “Black Lives Matter”.
And in Atlanta, a diverse crowd marched from the city’s downtown to the home of the late Rev Martin Luther King Jr.
Meredith Dub brought her two daughters, two-year-old Willow Dub and 12-year-old Rai Chin to the Atlanta rally. Dub is white and her daughters are mixed race. She said it is essential to show children at an early age that love is more powerful than hate. — AP