Disclaimer: All views in this article are those held by the author and may or may not represent the views of Her Campus Nationals or of Her Campus JHU.
The inspiration for this article stared at me as I walked up North Charles Street towards my dorm this Friday afternoon. From a distance, I only saw a singular strand of black. As I approached, I recognized the striking white letters reading “Black Lives Matter” on the chests of nearly 400 people. The demonstrators latched hand-in-hand with each other, expressionless and silent while facing passing cars.
The Office of Multicultural Affairs General Assembly—along with the Centers for Community, Diversity, and Inclusion—sponsored what Director Joseph Colón notes as a “solidarity demonstration” to spread awareness regarding the myriad events in our country involving violence against Black lives. The OMA provided the 397 demonstrators with Black Lives Matters shirts, a number signifying the years since the first documented African slave arrived in the Americas. Demonstrators stood for 397 seconds in pure silence, hoping to “engage in direct support to the Black Lives Matter message and movement across America,” as Colón says.
The silence did not signal unrest or fear, but pride: pride to stand, physically and mentally unified, for a cause rupturing our families, our friends, our peers, and our country.
The most powerful moment of the demonstration—from the few minutes I witnessed—was when two pre-K-aged black boys pressed their hands up to the window in the backseat of their car. Their eyes swelled with curiosity as their (presumable) dad slowed the car at the stop light, pointing to the demonstrators. How do you explain such a historically embedded and dangerous topic to children who may not even know how to read yet?
Both the immediate college community and the greater Johns Hopkins community received the event with zeal. Freshman demonstrator Nate Smith observed that students and professors on campus “were always complimenting my shirt and smiling at me when I would walk by.” Onlookers during the demonstration recorded videos on their phones, flashed a thumb’s up, or honked in approval.
Looking towards the future, the question stands of how to involve more of our community on and off campus in the quest for racial justice. More demonstrations, media involvement, or cultural workshops? For now, the OMA and demonstrators should applaud themselves for executing a peaceful demonstration that heightened the community’s racial consciences—and reminding us that silence is sometimes the loudest voice of all.