M y family patriarch was keen to wave around a pistol whenever someone threatened his inner-city neighborhood corner store. I have a clear memory of running inside and dropping to the floor of my aunt’s Baltimore rowhouse during a suspected drive by. Like most, I have spent many snack-filled nights watching crime-based TV dramas, pretending I wasn’t scared while I switched on all of the house lights. This is the extent of my firearm exposure.

In my adult life I have never seen an actual handgun that wasn’t holstered to the belt of a police officer. So when I found myself alone at the local art park watching a pre-teen pass me by, boasting to his friends that he had a gun and was about to use it to shoot someone, I was quite literally unprepared for what came next.

As the boy and his friends walked past, I wanted to assume his claims were false — that there was no gun. I was quickly proven wrong when they were about a hundred feet away and his intended target arrived with some friends, the firearm came into sight, voices were raised, and curse words flew. Through the uproar, it was clear his friends hadn’t believed he had a gun either.

In my adult life I have never seen an actual handgun that wasn’t holstered to the belt of a police officer.
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I was standing in a wide open space near a large tent under which an oblivious white man ignored his toddler in favor of his smartphone, also tuning out the confrontation that was happening just yards away. I was very aware of how not bulletproof I am and of how intensely my family needed me to make it back home. I was also aware that this man and his daughter probably had a family member like me awaiting their safe return.

I listened intently to the heated conversation of the teens. Seconds dragged like hours as I tried to decipher between the back and forth of typical youthful aggression and the very real potential for danger. More than once, I looked in my camera bag for my phone, my internal dialogue wavering. Should I call the police? Of course, there’s a group of teens with a gun in broad daylight in a public place! What if one of them gets hurt? What if they shoot someone else accidentally? What if they shoot me accidentally? What if someone dies? What if we all die? If there was ever a time to dial 911, this was it, right?

Yet, each time I reached for my phone, I faced the same overwhelming thoughts. These teens were Black — and I couldn’t stop remembering the murder of Tamir Rice.

Black People Feel Lucky To Walk Away Alive From Police Harassment

The grainy surveillance footage of 12-year-old Tamir being shot almost on sight, because he had a toy gun, played over and over in my mind. I would not be the person who put another young boy at risk of murder in the hands of police.

Sure, I could emphasize that I wasn’t sure if this gun was real, and that these were just teens — but in the case of Rice, the person who called the police used the additional descriptors of “toy gun,” “not real,” and “juvenile,” and that was not enough to spare a life. How could I possibly guarantee compassion from the cops, or even a basic confirmation of wrongdoing before the discharging of weapons?

The second thought that slowed my instinct to act was that of my two sons. I can’t fathom the thought of someone’s rush to judgment transforming me into the mother of a dead boy. Because of that, I engaged in this reach and retract pattern with my phone during the entire ordeal, never actually calling for help, but never giving up the idea that help was needed.

When My Cute Black Kid Becomes What You Fear Most

The altercation was intense but short, as many of the teens were working to calm their friend and have the gun put away. I learned their intent by stopping to listen to what they were saying, by responding with humanity instead of fear. Yes, there was one angry kid fired up at the sight of his enemy, but the others were talking him down, pleading for him to use the good sense with which he was born.

While walking further away in a futile attempt to provide my own protection, I strained against the bombardment of expletives and mayhem to find the voices of reason in the fray. Even if I were to call the cops, the teens seemed to be self-regulating and dispersing in peace. After a few minutes, they all walked away unharmed, as did everyone else at the park that day.

I did make it home safely, but not unbothered. A number of uncertainties circled in my head. I will never know if that gun was real; I gathered from the way the disagreement fizzled out that it wasn’t, but I could be wrong. I will never know if that angry, immature young boy with a gun, maybe even only 10 or 11 years old, went elsewhere and shot someone.

Or, if his actions had invited someone to shoot him in retaliation. I will never know if any of their parents had a clue what happened that evening, if their mothers were up that night dishing out consequences, if their fathers were worried sick about the path on which they were headed. Nearly two months later, I continue to question if the kids would be safe or if this was just one chapter in a novel of potentially negative life-altering choices.

However, what I do know is valuable.

I know that none of those boys and girls were turned into an R.I.P. hashtag that day. Each one of them went home to someone, somewhere, and had the normalcy of sleeping in their own homes, hearts beating, lungs inhaling and exhaling.

I know that none of those boys and girls were turned into an R.I.P. hashtag that day.
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None of them were threatened or intimidated or roughed up by an under-trained overzealous officer intent on taking his bad day out on some poor young “thugs.” None of them were subjected to the brutality of a police force that is statistically proven to disproportionately condemn the black children who have the misfortune to cross their path.

In recent years, the biggest disparity in arrests of white versus black juveniles in the city where I live, Charlottesville, Virginia, occurred in 2011. Although the small city is overwhelmingly white, records indicate 71% of teens arrested were black. In the past five years, black kids accounted for 75% of stop and frisk incidents. And these racial disparities don’t just exist within the city limits; Charlottesville resides in Albermarle County, where African-Americans make up 10% of the population but 30% of the arrests.

And let us not forget that the city, county, and state police forces provided security for the KKK rally and counter-protest in Charlottesville. The end result: The police used tear gas on protesters of the KKK, while the white knights remained unscathed.

How We Learn To Love ‘Good’ White Men With Guns

Choosing to check the privilege of my suburban, mostly middle-class upbringing, assessing my own media-fueled prejudices, and stopping to think about the potential consequences to these young people was the right thing to do, even if it was the wrong thing to do.

How did we, as a nation, get here, to this state of unrest in which one needs to stop and pause when faced with the seemingly mandatory task of calling the police when there is high probability of a violent crime? Or have we always been here?

As a kid, one of my white friend’s moms had to hide my sister and I in the back of her car so their town’s racist police wouldn’t see us at a checkpoint. As a young 20-something, after being pulled over because of my lapsed registration, I inched my car up just a bit to make sure I’d left the officer space to park behind me — and he responded with a commanding yell and a hand on his holster, threatening me to stop my vehicle or else.

I have my own ignorant optimism to blame for not sooner equating the threat of racist cops to the theft of black lives. There are millions of stories to tell me otherwise, but my moral barometer was still inherently leaning toward police interference as a first line of defense — until it came time to literally make the call.

Stopping to think about potential consequences was the right thing to do, even if it was the wrong thing to do.
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If my son were to find himself an angry pre-teen in this same scenario, would I want a passerby to make the fast assumption that he was carrying a real weapon? Would I want her to believe he and his friends weren’t as capable of resolving the situation as local law enforcement would be? Maybe. But, probably not. What I saw that day at the art park among a brilliant blue sky and the warmth of spring’s end shook me — causing me to question the cloudy landscape of my own values.

I don’t agree with teenagers having access to firearms and waving them around in public, and I don’t believe it was safe for them to be there navigating a very mature situation on their own. I even think I made the wrong choice by not calling the police. Yet, somehow, I’m still glad I made it.

For much of the nation, the events of the Unite the Right rally here in Charlottesville were unexpected — but our community has been preparing for it for months.

Despite President Trump’s insistence that both fascists and their counter-protesters were responsible for violence at the Unite the Right rally last Friday, reports from Charlottesville make it clear that white nationalists have been planning unspeakable harm toward the Charlottesville community for months. In response to these threats, Charlottesville’s citizens were quick to denounce white supremacy, and worked diligently to protect those threatened.

Back in May, a torch-wielding group gathered by white nationalist Richard Spencer protested removal of the General Robert E. Lee statue that looms over what was then called Lee Park, but has since been re-named Emancipation Park. On June 8, a few days after the name change became official, a North Carolina-based KKK group held a rally for the same purpose. Among locals, Facebook timelines were peppered with hashtags marking this as a summer of resisting hate, led by the outspoken, grassroots activists who planned to block white supremacy and stand up for the community.

So You Want To Fight White Supremacy
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According to multiple sources, Charlottesville activist organizations spent weeks presenting local authorities with blog posts, messages, and other evidence that pointed toward the white nationalists’ plans to bring violence during the weekend of August 12. This evidence included proof that this group was distributing activists’ personal information and was threatening to meet them in person.

One local activist, whose name is withheld for privacy, tells me, “We told the city for months and provided evidence all of the threats. The evidence we presented to city council is on Solidarity Cville. We hand-fed information to show them how violent these people are. [An associate] provided this to the humanitarian board and urged them to put a stop to it.” She also mentions specific threats toward members of the city council (such as Vice Mayor Wes Bellamy) and the Chief of Police, Al S. Thomas Jr., that were received independent of the evidence provided by community members.

White nationalist blogger and Unite the Right rally organizer Jason Kessler’s right to free speech was cited as leaving the city vulnerable to potential lawsuits. If they denied the rally permit, the city could end up with a mess of legal fees. So, the threats were essentially ignored, and the rally scheduled as planned.

The community-at-large seemed to disagree with the decision. Rachel Zaslow, who acted as a street medic during the protests, believes that free speech has its limits. She tells The Establishment, “Speech is powerful and performative. When speech turns into or incites violence and harms other people, then we have a responsibility to stop it. The city, the government, has a right to stop it.”

But Charlottesville officials were not planning to stop it.

‘When speech turns into or incites violence and harms other people, then we have a responsibility to stop it.’
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In the meantime, the local social justice community was motivated to try other tactics to shut down Kessler, including confronting him at restaurants with anti-racist chants. They also continued to show up to city council meetings and speak out against the string of hate-based events being permitted to happen in the city. Activists of all races wanted it to be clear: Jason Kessler and his supporters are not welcome here.

A Friday Surprise

Most Charlottesville residents didn’t expect the Friday night tiki-torch march that overtook Nameless Field at UVA, preceding Saturday’s rally. But sources say law enforcement and local activist groups received an advanced tip that the rally was going to happen. However, without confirmation of a location, plans for police protection were inexplicably absent, and counter-protests were difficult to arrange.

When word traveled through campus, a group of about 20 UVA students organized and bravely stood up against about 200 angry white supremacists with tiki torches.

The severely outnumbered students were chanting “Black Lives Matter” in response to the supremacists’ Nazi-esque “Blood, not Soil” and “Jews will not replace us” refrain. When face-to-face with the alt-right, the students suffered through being pepper sprayed, having torch gas thrown at them, and being thrown to the ground.

The KKK Rally In Charlottesville Proves Why #NoConfederate Is Needed
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A member of multiple local activist groups tells us that a number of antiracist activists were nearby attending an interfaith church service. They were willing and wanting to help the students. Instead they were on lockdown, stuck inside the church. There were many requests to bend the rules of the lockdown, but with the nature of threats outside unknown, security at the church refused to let the students in for protection or let the antifa groups out to help.

Civil rights activist and Harvard professor Cornel West was among those locked in the church. In a Democracy Now interview, West stated that, “For the most part the police pulled back… Just allowing fellow citizens to go at each other.”

In the interview video, West, who has maintained his position on the front lines of democratic freedom and justice for decades, also proclaims: “I’ve never seen that kind of hatred in my life.”

A Call-to-Action

When continued attempts to get either Kessler or the City to cancel the event didn’t work, it was clear that intense organization and rallying of the antifa community was needed. White nationalist blogs showed they were getting hyped up and ready for a battle, explicitly stating “this is war.”

A local anarchist collective, unnamed to respect their privacy, put out a national call for additional counter-protesters and anti-fascist support. Black Lives Matter representatives from places like Baltimore and New York showed up to support our local activists. Medics from other states drove in to provide support in case there were assaults.

Many hands were at work in the organization of an effective counter protest, such as the UVA professor who arranged for all day permits at two other downtown parks to provide safe spaces and medic tents for counter protesters. More than one interviewee names the atypically powerful and efficient combination of social justice networks in Charlottesville as masters in tackling the overall job of providing training, resources, and safety in numbers to those who came to protest the invasion of Nazi ideology. Like the city, Charlottesville’s organizations are small but clearly mighty.

Where Were The Police?

With civil rights activists so well-prepared and organized, it begs the question: How did the police prepare? While we do know that local and state law enforcement were on the ground at the rally, there appears to be very little evidence that they intervened throughout the many altercations that occurred.

I asked each person I interviewed that exact question. Although they were all at the protest at different times, for different reasons and in vastly different locations, every individual initially replied with a light chuckle and the words “I don’t know.”

Zaslow, the volunteer street medic, says she reached Emancipation Park at about 8:30 in the morning, along with the clergy of Congregation C’ville and Cornel West. The police in riot gear were nowhere to be found on the street outside the park. Instead, they were met with a small army of what she believed to be white nationalist militia — fully armed with machine guns, ammunition, and a hefty dose of intimidation.

When ‘Free Speech’ Kills
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Eventually, Zaslow noticed a handful of police officers behind the large fences that had been erected to block off the park. The officers had little visibility to see what was going on beyond the fence.

Zaslow and the interfaith clergy she was accompanying were verbally assaulted in the most vile of manners by Nazis as the rally-goers entered the park. She tells me the white supremacists came in like a planned parade, each group carrying their flags or banners as they entered in intervals. Some groups were particularly rowdy and abrasive, such as the League of the South. “They had clear shields, sticks, clubs, and baseball bats. The antifa group tried to form a wall so they could not pass. Anyone who got in [League of the South’s] way, they pepper sprayed.”

Charlottesville-based documentary photographer Ézé Amos was also a part of that scene. He was physically assaulted when a man from one of the fascist groups punched his camera into his face. Amos tells The Establishment that he was continuously threatened. When he got caught in the pepper spray crossfire and no law enforcement intervened, true fear set in.

“It made me really scared. That’s when I realized there is no protection.”

Still, Amos continued the heavy work of documenting the results after the rally was declared unlawful — and as opposing groups took to the streets with little direction, protection, or plan for what was to happen next.

‘That’s when I realized there is no protection.’
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A member of the press, Amos followed the white supremacist rally leaders to McIntire Park, the location to which, earlier in the week, city officials attempted to relocate the rally permit. He watched, and photographed, as white supremacists gave their planned speeches.

Again, since Amos was now away from downtown, I asked: “Where were the police?” His response: “Nowhere.”

Without a law enforcement background, it seems reasonable that at least a handful of officers would have been at this second location. The city considered McIntire park the best place for the rally. For days, there was some confusion over whether the rally would take place at McIntire or Emancipation Park, making it likely that even just a few stragglers would end up at McIntire.

One counter-protester, who declined to be named due to safety concerns, only saw the police in riot gear as she marched with the Black Lives Matter group on the Downtown Mall (a block over from Emancipation Park). Officers were methodically sweeping the mall and clearing people out, and staying in close proximity to the primarily black group in the earlier part of the day. The next time she noticed a significant police presence was about 20 minutes after the car attack that killed one person and wounded many others, her friends among them.

Why Punching Nazis Is Not Only Ethical, But Imperative
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Having attended the rally in July, she says this is a “stark contrast” to last month’s KKK rally, where the cops seemed to be all over.

“You could not turn around without seeing one. Riot cops were quick to be out there and quick to push you around, whether you were doing anything or just standing. They were just pushing people out of the way. This time, I barely saw them. Even when we walked near Emancipation Park.”

“I don’t know where they were, but they weren’t protecting the community.”

Another man interviewed saw police on top of buildings near the Downtown Mall, but few on the ground where he was, just steps from both the site of the car attack and the now viral assault of 20-year-old Deandre Harris.

One woman, Dana Wheeles, stated that there were “Lots of fights breaking out…Time and again, wherever I was, the police were nowhere to be seen. They set it up for all of the fascists to be fighting in the streets.”

Everyone I spoke to agreed. The police were inactive and, in most cases, invisible.

‘Time and again, wherever I was, the police were nowhere to be seen.’
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When asked to compare the police presence this Saturday to that of a Black Lives Matter protest, Zaslow gives a powerful and finite response. “It’s a false equivalency, because these people showed up to harm vulnerable communities. They want to eradicate and kill. [They are] chanting ‘blood and soil’ and ’you will not replace us’…And for the most part, they [the white supremacists] have the protection of the police. The police did not kill or hurt anyone [at this rally].”

She continues, “Black Lives Matter is in protest to direct threats to the lives of black people. Black Lives Matter is to protest white supremacy. If it gets violent, it’s because there is a threat. As we can see at Black Lives Matter protests, cops show up ready to harm. There’s no allowing violence, allowing punches to be thrown. No clubs and bats allowed. It would be shut down. It’s impossible to compare the two.”

Why White America Demonizes The #BlackLivesMatter Movement
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After the declaration of unlawful assembly was made, and the racist contingent declined to disperse willingly, police did tear gas the white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups at Emancipation Park. However, it seems cops also failed to follow any dispersal tactics, sending a river of armed, angry, aggressive fascists into a sea of those who were there to reject their message of hate.

And according to Zaslow, this declaration of unlawful assembly came more than an hour after the fascists began throwing water bottles (both disposable and not) and pepper spray bombs out beyond the park barricade, and into the crowd of counter protesters.

Supremacy On The Streets

Nazi groups relied on a plethora of different tactics to terrorize their opposers and the City of Charlottesville. Some wore full masks, which is illegal in Virginia, and tried to steal the phones of those recording them. Others can be seen on livestream videos beating anti-fascist protesters.

Wheeles tells us she saw “Nazis banding together to ram through groups of counter-protesters.”

There was a constant barrage of verbal attacks, screaming in the faces of even the peaceful protesters, and harassment of anyone who showed up to to stand up to hate. They even made it a point to march to Charlottesville’s largest housing project with the intention of starting fights with black residents. The residents of Friendship Court, the housing project, quickly chased away the racists, but not before a large group of antifa had followed behind in an effort to help protect the neighborhood. It was on the return walk to the Downtown Mall from Friendship Court that the now infamous car assault and murder occurred.

She Persisted

Days later, at 4:30 in the afternoon, Charlottesville’s downtown mall has confounding energy. There’s the familiar feeling of walking the mall with the normal sights of parents chasing children as they zig-zag happily along the brick paths and a street musician playing for tips. And there are few indications of the weekend’s events, which is both jarring and unacceptable.

Looking down Fourth Street, small groups of mourners gather near reporters and their camera people preparing for the evening news. The roadway is covered in chalked condolences, prayers, and proclamations that love will always overcome. A stunning number of flowers surrounds the entire street, along with speckles of melted candles that have left tear-like drips behind. The stop sign has been refashioned to read: “Stop Hate.” A photograph of Heather Heyer, looking young and vibrant, is propped up in the middle of it all. Not too far away someone has just chalked in, “And nevertheless, she persisted.”

The stop sign has been refashioned to read: ‘Stop Hate.’
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This small street carries the rawest of emotions, directly contrasting the everyday mood of the rest of Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall. Here, nearly everyone is crying or choking back tears. Here, nearly everyone is speechless in a way that makes the air heavy with sorrow. Here, you are humbled by the guttural magnitude of loss.

Here, for at least a moment, the questions about this weekend’s events become singularly focused.

Further down the street, closer to the Mall, the sidewalk is overwhelmed with bouquets along with small notes and cards. Personal effects unwillingly abandoned by those who were forced to leave the protests by ambulance lean up against a brick wall. Chalk hearts and messages border the smaller memorial. Most notably, there’s a yellow chalk writing near the curb which reads: “Heather Heyer-A HERO.”

Rarely a day goes by when my sons, ages 4 and 18 months, don’t get complimented on how good-looking they are. My oldest, who has a light skin tone and dirty blonde hair, was once called beautiful by a young, white filmmaker we met at the park. Thinking my son was biracial, she exclaimed that she wanted to find a black man so she could have “Malcolm X babies just like him.” She then rubbed his hair. Another time, an older white woman walked up to the same son and exclaimed, “He’s GOLDEN! His hair is golden! His skin is golden! He’s just golden!”

Often, strangers ask if they can touch the hair of my younger son, who has a darker, though still relatively light, skin tone and very curly hair that’s not textured like most black hair is. He’s been called “the most beautiful baby I’ve ever seen” with a “face I could look at all day.” Recently, at a playgroup, I was asked if his dad was Asian.

My sons are so atypically good-looking in the eyes of strangers, in fact, that it is often assumed that whichever parent isn’t present is white, or any other more widely acceptable race. More than once, individuals have demanded that I detail our lineage as far back as I remember, because it defies logic that my children are black.

The implication is obvious: it’s unbelievable that such beauty could be seen in an average black person.

Does it make people uncomfortable to know that these sweet faces are the descendants of slaves? Does it not make sense that these adorable boys could be the product of our plagued and controversial race? Is it unfathomable that as the years move on, they will transform from “A face I could look at all day!” to your worst nightmare — young, black men?

Does it make people uncomfortable to know that these sweet faces are the descendants of slaves?
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I know that one day, not too far off, these eyes that strangers of all races gaze into and admire will be the same eyes whose contact they try to avoid as my sons pass them on the sidewalk. As a teenager, maybe my oldest will put his sandy blonde hair into dreadlocks — and where there once was gushing in a positive yet insulting manner over his good fortune to have escaped the dark hair of his ancestors, he will now intimidate and turn people away with his so-called ethnic hairstyle.

When my sons inevitably come face-to-face with one or some of the policemen who are bad, the shade of their black skin won’t save them from harassment and injustice, nor will the shine of their childhood smiles. While undying in the eyes of their mother and father, the beauty of my boys will be soon lost on the masses.

Those who don’t know their character will double-check the locks of their car doors when they see my sons walk by. During neighborhood watch, they will refer to my boys as suspicious and perhaps report them just for being. My sons will “fit the description” time and time again. In the future, even if they are good (and they sure as hell better be), no one will see them as such — not even those who stop us on the street to remark about them now.

We may smile and nod and thank people for their compliments. We might step outside our norm and allow our sons to model for the benefit of their financial security. We may even appreciate that as small children, their presence warms the hearts of others. However, we know that these innocent boys will one day be unjustly persecuted solely for being black men in America.

Today, my kids are deemed “golden” and “adorable” and “sweet” because they look the way society has decided children should look. In a few years, as they grow into black young adults and men, that same line of superficial reasoning will mark them as dangerous.

Parenting to this fact is a near-impossible task.

We cannot protect our children by choosing to live in a low-crime, suburban area — they will stand out more. We cannot shelter our children by sending them to private schools we can’t afford — they will never learn their heritage and the truth of what they’re up against. We cannot safeguard our dear sons by making sure they keep their pants on their waists or hoodies off their heads — they will be judged either way.

To every sweet older white woman we meet who squeezes their cheeks and makes sure to look me in the eye and tell me my sons are gorgeous, I silently plead with you to remember this when they’re teenagers, towering over us both. To every mom of my sons’ peers who tells me how cute their hair is, I beg you to recall this moment if one of my sons is who you see when you open the front door for your child’s first date. To every black person who does a double take at my pretty sons and their tired, black parents, I want to remove the blindfolds and hurt of hundreds of years of self-hatred and shame. To the police officers who smile and wave at the boys as they walk side by side with me, I would give anything for you to remember them as small, bright-eyed, and admiring — as sons of a loving mother, as humans with the right to live.

As any mother does, I worry about my children. I worry about little things like whether they’ll eat their dinner tonight and major decisions like choosing to forgo traditional schooling. I worry about the next time I dare to comb their hair or what soccer team we’ll join. Mothers worry about nothings and everything all at the same time.

As they grow, I find myself worrying more and more about the day the world will turn on them. Will they notice as they make the switch from boys to men that they’ve also transitioned from adored to alarming?