Last Wednesday, when news broke out that Darren Wilson, 29 year old Ferguson police officer, would not be indicted after fatally shooting 18 year old Michael Brown, local students and residents of Waterloo took to the streets of downtown Kitchener to condemn the decision.
Whether it was at the SLC, in the lecture halls, or through social media, word got out immediately about the Black Lives Matter: KW Protest. Despite approaching due dates of assignments, upcoming final examinations, and commitments that come along with the semester wrapping up, the demonstration had a great turnout and sparked a lot of discussion within the community.
Student activist groups such as UWaterloo Students for Palestinian Rights (SFPR), Waterloo Public Interests and Research Group (WPRIG), WLU Association of Black Students and others all stood in solidarity to protest the injustice that took place The protest began at Kitchener City Hall and ended at the Waterloo Court House.
Everyone had their own reasons for being there. Cheyenne Gold, who photographed the event, stated, “‘The system isn’t broken, it was built that way’. As an adamant believer in this statement and as a person of colour, I felt it was only necessary to join the collective of K-W citizens who marched in solidarity for those being oppressed and denied justice by both the American and Canadian law-enforcement systems. Time does not heal all, because history repeats itself. The demands for black North-Americans’ right to life continues. Black lives matter.”
People of all ethnicities were present at the event to show their support. Waterloo student, Lena Tibeh, spoke on behalf of SFPR with a powerful speech. ”The Palestinian people in the occupied territories and in Israel live through Ferguson everyday!” She said. “We know how it feels! We feel the humiliation and the discrimination that anyone of ethnic minority experiences and we stand in solidarity with anyone that is fighting for their fundamental equal rights!”
Jama Hagi-Yusuf, on the other hand, described ”l let out a lot of frustration at the protest, but I did feel tokenized, there weren’t that many black people. I thought it would be more of a solidarity march but it felt more like a KW police brutality protest. While I did enjoy letting out a lot of frustration I had at the situation, the motivation wasn’t clear at this protest.”
The protest went on to be a peaceful event and even consisted of a die-in where participants laid down in solidarity as if to demonstrate being dead. It is an act practiced by social activists groups in means of making a statement.
The feelings on this protest, however, were not all unanimous. A political science student, who has requested to stay anonymous stated his distaste towards the protest because he felt the purpose behind it was lost.
”They did a die-in in front of the Waterloo Court House for 4 minutes. I found that insulting. What do they have to do with anything that’s going on in Ferguson? They’re literally hijacking the slogans being chanted across the States and protesting something that doesn’t pertain to the Kitchener Waterloo area. We have essentially missed an excellent opportunity to discuss systematic racism and police brutality in Canada.”
The trial may have ended , but Waterloo students will not forget what happened to Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Jermaine Carby, Trayvon Martin, Oscar Grant or any other unarmed, Black men that have also been victims of discriminatory brutality and institutional racism. They will forever be remembered.
“Brown was killed in the afternoon of Aug. 9, in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, following a confrontation in the street . His death sparked outrage in the city and across the world, with many denouncing this act of violence as the last straw in a long string of cases of racial injustice and fatal profiling by people in positions of power and privilege.”
Photo Credits: Cheyenne Gold & Malcolm Klimowicz