SPEAKING UP
Groups hope to grow as discussions over race issues come to the forefront
In the days and weeks following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis at the hands of police, a nationwide movement has grown as the black community works to combat systemic racism.
Starkville is no exception, with several local grassroots groups hoping to bring awareness to issues facing the black community, while also bolstering conversations on topics facing locals.
Friday saw Moncrief Park play host to Liberate with Love — an event attended by roughly two dozen people and put on by several local groups.
Vashaun Ferguson, a Starkville business owner and commander of the local chapter of the New Black Panther Party for Self-defense, along with other organizers, led the event and spoke on a wide range of issues facing the black community. The topics ranged from holding local youth accountable to keeping them from falling victim to the prison system to practicing Second Amendment rights.
When reflecting on the recent march, though, Ferguson said his hope was to continue to promote exposure for African-americans and the issues facing them locally.
“That was my whole thing with taking the march down Main Street,” he said. “I didn't want it on the west side. I didn't want it hid. I wanted more of the black community to come out and it just didn't happen. Hopefully, this [event] will catch on and hopefully, we'll grow.”
Fellow organizer Eric Chandler also spoke to the group gathered in the shade, as members of the New Black Panther Party and the Huey P. Newton Gun Club watched the perimeter as the event's security.
Chandler echoed Ferguson's concerns about the recent march and hopes to see the movement become more refined, moving away from political opportunism by some, in favor of giving the black community the true voice in the movement.
“I think doing it the way we did this one [event on Friday], where we didn't include politicians, ministers or preachers, we didn't want to make it about that,”
Chandler said. “I think that is a form that will bring divisions. We want to come together as one people. I don't want to exclude them, but I don't think they need to be included in this part of the movement. It's easy to hijack it and I feel like that's what happened with that march, it got hijacked and became something totally different and became politicized.”
Economic development and entrepreneurship are also consistent talking points apart from the issues mentioned to the crowd. The organizers on Friday hope to see fortunes improve, as well.
“It's going to be that we have to get out there and push it,” Ferguson said. “Any way we can get out there and get involved in events that they have, we just have to try to get out there. Me and Blair [Edwards] did a couple of things together to set up our businesses and that's going to be the biggest thing. Just to get out there to make it happen.”
Chandler also mentioned the black business community and said the movement would work to foster more opportunities on the city's west side and for the black community at large.
“We need to educate a little more as far as trade,” he said. “I think we need some kind of trade school to be offered because they aren't too much about going to college these days, but to teach skills you can make money on and that will open the door for more black businesses.”
Ferguson then said it will take both increase representation on Main Street and a proactive effort on the part of the black community to effect true change from an economic development standpoint.
“It's going to take both,” he said. “It's hard in this town to get anything off the ground without going through the mayor and the Board of Aldermen, so it's going to be a challenge.”
The movement, however, is in need of numbers, with organizers pointing to the importance of inclusion for young people and outreach to get the next generation involved.
Chandler lamented the low turnout for the first event, which could be due in part to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and lack of students in Starkville, but said it was still early and there will always be time for growth.
“We need to do more of this, more community gatherings,” he said. “Just getting us together is a task, but if we can get us together and start discussing some of these topics amongst each other. It's hard to come up with a plan forward without participation, so we need to. talk about the stuff and come up with a plan of action to move forward.”
One of the young people
in attendance was Zack Horsley, who has helped start another grassroots group named Loving Our Community Sufficiently (LOCS), which hopes to prove an effective means of attracting younger participants.
The nonprofit group is brand new, according to Horsley, who said they have already been receiving interest.
“We started this for the people of the community and want to try to spread love, fix things that need to be fixed,” he said. “I tell people all the time and when I post on Facebook, because young people now live by social media and I try to post as much as I can on social media. You never know somebody might see if, I gave them info.”
In addition to the programming and groups speaking, voter registration was also available, as were opportunities to apply for local activism groups, including the Huey P. Newton Gun Club, the local chapter of which is based in Weir.
The club, named after the cofounder of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense who promoted programs to empower African-americans to protect themselves, has a similar goal, calling for an immediate end to police brutality, black-on-black violence and to encourage the constitutional rights of African-americans to responsibly own firearms.
Representing the club at the meeting was Commander Marcus Hunt, who coordinated security at the event and could be seen walking the perimeter in all black with numerous guns visible on his person.
Hunt said the added safety promotes an environment where anyone from any walk of life can feel comfortable to express themselves in front of others without the threat of outside violence or suppression.
“Our main platform is the Black Panther platform, but what we want to do is have every black person in America armed,” Hunt said. “We want to advise them of their Second Amendment rights and we believe through patrolling our own people, that will keep down racial injustice from the police by brutality. That's all I'm doing here is security. We work the perimeters and make sure people feel safe.”
Despite not having quite the turnout they wanted to see, Ferguson expressed optimism for the future and the potential to raise awareness of these issues to build a better future for African-americans.
“Just like these events, we're trying to get [young people and others] to come out,” Ferguson said. “We tried to get all of the organizations we can to come out, but at the same time, this is the first event, so hopefully on down the line we will have a couple more. And more and more people can come out, so we're looking forward and going to try to do it once and twice.”