Thursday, August 13, 2020

Englewood pushes back against BLM protestors from outside of the neighborhood

[VIDEO] I've been saying this on our twitter account since I found out about it. Englewood residents led by Darryl Smith of the Englewood Political Task Force stepped out to disrupt a planned Black Lives Matter protest outside of the Englewood police district HQ at 63rd and Loomis Streets. As you see in the dramatic footage from ABC 7, we saw it did get tense.

Check out this Tribune write-up:
A planned protest outside the Englewood police station Tuesday evening over a recent police-involved shooting devolved into shouting matches among demonstrators, with threats and insults hurled back and forth, after a group of older residents derided the event as “a party” and demanded that outsiders leave.

Eventually tempers cooled somewhat after several small confrontations, and people started talking. In the end, a much smaller group of demonstrators marched through Englewood while a large number of protesters headed home.

The event was billed as a car caravan to the South Side police station and a protest march in the neighborhood, organized by groups including Black Lives Matter Chicago, Southsiders Organized for Unity and Liberation and Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression.

It was in response to the recent shooting of Latrell Allen, who was wounded by police Sunday afternoon after he allegedly pulled a gun and fired at officers near Moran Park. The cadre of organizations support initiatives to defund police departments, remove officers from public schools and increase social services, among many other aims.
...
On Tuesday, about 10 minutes before the 6 p.m. event was to begin at 63rd Street and Loomis Boulevard, a small group of Englewood men, some of them residents of the neighborhood for decades, began to loudly deride the demonstration and demanded the group go home.

Things got heated.

“Get the (expletive) out of here!” one man yelled at the demonstrators.

The men are aligned with various Englewood groups that often work with police to ease tensions. They consider themselves community elders and said they didn’t appreciate a protest in their neighborhood during such a tense time. Some of them say they helped calm things after objects were thrown at officers on Aberdeen Street on Sunday.

“They (protest organizers) didn’t let the community know,” said Duane Kidd. “They didn’t put flyers on the door. They got the streets shut down. What about the elders that have to get up and down 63rd Street? Now they got to take the side routes.

“Coming into our community for just one day and then run out,” Kidd said. “Everyday. If they got something to say about the police, we got to deal with it tomorrow. The community. Not them. They’ll be somewhere sipping sangria.”
I got news for you, the loudest ones talking about defund police or abolish police are probably the ones who has the least issues with the police. They may not have experienced first hand police brutality. They may also be very well off and have attached themselves to this cause.

I can support BLM in principle especially on issues of police brutality. What I don't support is defunding or abolishing police. And I'm glad in Englewood, the men stood up and said you're not going to mess up things in our community. We're going to take care of our business, you outsiders will mess it all up!

Also with spokespeople like this young woman Ariel Atkins of BLM who believes looting is a form of reparations, it's a good thing the Englewood community doesn't want to be associated with this now. [VIDEO]
 

We need cool heads out there. We have another month of summer left and we still have a pandemic going on. Let's come out of this stronger. We don't need people out there justifying this lawlessness. Also as opposed to antagonizing police, let's work with them to make the city safer.

1 comment:

  1. Englewood residents have a point. They reside there. ��⊙.☉

    ReplyDelete

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