“46!” I yelled as I pulled my scarf closer around my neck. The street lamps cast a soft, humming glow while the sky darkened overhead.
“47!” a woman in a baseball cap hooted, punching her fist in the air.
“48!” a teenager shouted in front of me. Video cameras swiveled amongst the crowd.
“49!” someone yelled from the back. Cheers began to erupt like popcorn.
“50!” we all screamed in unison before walking forward.
The march, which had been organized by the October 22nd Coalition to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation, had almost been stopped before it even began. At least fifty protesters were needed in order to proceed legally, police officers argued.
One of the marchers, David Israel Sandler, walked on my right side. His backpack was covered in pins and patches declaring his opinions and beliefs. He told me he had been marching in various protests since 1968 when Nixon visited his hometown. “It's just not how I think people should be treated in a democracy,” he said, pointing the sign he was carrying.
“WE ARE MALIKA CALHOUN! WE ARE CHRIS HARRIS!” the sign declared above two pictures of a young man and a young woman. Calhoun is a teenage girl from King County who, after being arrested for auto theft, was thrown to the ground and beaten by a police officer in her jail cell. Harris, a twenty-nine-year-old man, has been in a coma since May 10, 2009 when police officers mistook him for the culprit of a nearby burglary and pushed him against a brick wall.
Although Sandler did not know Calhoun or Harris, he felt needed to participate in the march to be “one more person”. One step at a time, one person at a time, one march at a time is all it takes to raise awareness about an issue.
A tall, broad-shouldered man in a leather jacket walked to my left. The man, whose name was Tallib Sankota, had first heard about the march from a friend. At the end of the day, he was hoping to raise awareness about police brutality in the area and the nation. Stolen Lives reports that more than 2,000 civilians have been killed by police since 1990. As I wrapped up asking Sankota questions, he stopped walking and said, “Wait, get this down. We want justice for the Prisoners of Conscience Committee in the San Francisco Bay Area.” To Sankota, I was one more person who needed to know about these issues.
The group stopped in front of a movie theater at the corner of 4th Ave. and Lenora St. A man in a mohawk spoke through a loudspeaker, asking for a moment of silence to honor Chris Harris, who had been pushed by a police officer at the same intersection. Everyone bowed their heads, eyes looking down at the dark gray road mottled with red leaves. Police officers in cars, on motorcycle and even on foot blocked off the streets surrounding them, their vehicles casting flashing red lights upon storefronts and sidewalks.
The march came to an end a few blocks away. As individuals were returning their picket signs and posters, I noticed a woman still exclaiming off to the side. The woman, who goes by the name Suga, had been marching since she was a young girl so that she could “speak for [her] history, [her] ancestors and [her] modern world”. Suga's family included African American slaves and Native Americans who walked the Trail of Tears. “People are dying everyday, we have to start somewhere to get our voices heard,” she said.
I thanked Suga for her time as a man walked timidly around the edge of the mass of people. He heard the noise from the public library and saw the protesters walk by, he explained. Though unsure of whether he would become involved in the future, the man, whose name was Medow, believed they “should march again and again for the good of the people, for our rights”.
I thought back to the beginning of the march when everyone counted off to fifty. Each number shouted in a puff of steam through the cold air was an individual. And each of those individuals became involved with the issue in their own ways, whether through a friend, seeing a flier on the street or by chance like Medow had. The involvement of each one, whether as a marcher, a bystander or a journalist, provided a setting for analytical thought-- to question what they have always known in order to develop their own answers. Though each number seems insignificant on its own, when they are all counted together they have the potential to draw attention, to stop traffic and to make a difference. One step at a time.
