‘I have a voice.’ Teens play prominent role in Black Lives Matter protests across US

Across the country, teenagers are raising their voices in support of the black community after the death of George Floyd.

Nupol Kiazolu, 19, is president of Black Lives Matter of Greater New York and has been working to organize protests and other resistance efforts in Minneapolis, where Floyd died after a police officer kneeled on his neck for several minutes, Teen Vogue reported.

“At the end of the day, whether I sit at home or I’m on the front lines, I could be killed just for the color of my skin,” Nupol told the magazine. “If anything were to happen to me, I would want it to be for a righteous cause.”

She is one of a number of teenagers who’ve taken to the streets to decry racism and police brutality against black people since Floyd’s May 25 death.

While parents support the cause, they have also expressed concern for their children’s safety.

Sandy Asirvatham told the New York Times she was worried about letting her 17-year-old son, Miles Donovan, attend a protest near their home in Baltimore, according to the newspaper.

“I started fearing overzealous policing in the neighborhood and that Miles might get caught up in something even if he’s not a part of a group being violent,” she told the Times, adding that she also had concerns about him contracting or spreading the coronavirus.

Ultimately, she let him attend, making him promise to wear a mask and leave if he felt anything taking a dangerous turn, the Times reported. She told the newspaper it was worth the risk.

“I’m almost certain that this will be a signal event in his life,” she told the Times. Donovan agreed, telling the newspaper that “It was amazing.”

Here are stories of teens across the country who marched in support of Black Lives Matter and George Floyd:

Connecticut

In Wilton, about 50 young people — mostly high school students — marched down a street with signs in support of Black Lives Matter before taking a seat in the road across from the police department, the Wilton Bulletin reported.

Police cruisers blocked the road from traffic as Police Chief John Lynch addressed the crowd, according to the Bulletin. A number of young people asked Lynch how he planned to “make people of color feel safe in this town.”

“If I’m driving and get pulled over, I want to feel safe,” a high school student, who is black, asked Lynch, the Bulletin reported.

Another student told Lynch “I’ve never wanted to go to parties … I was always nervous about getting blamed for something I didn’t do,” according to the newspaper.

When Lynch responded that officers wear body cameras and “try to be fair” when pulling over cars, one girl shouted: “Trying is not good enough!”

Nebraska

The Black Leaders Movement, a group of young people between the ages of 15 and 24, assembled outside the state Capitol in Lincoln to light candles in remembrance of people who had been killed by police, the Lincoln Journal Star reported.

Leon Berks, 19, was in attendance and told the Journal Star that he’d once been followed and pulled over by Lincoln police, who called him by a different name. He said officers believed he was a man for whom they had an arrest warrant, even after Berks showed them his identification, according to the newspaper. They ultimately let him go without explaining why he’d been pulled over, the Star reported.

He told the newspaper that no one should be comfortable with injustice.

“They know it is wrong,” he told the Star. “So if they know it is wrong, why are you allowing it?”

Alexandre Benamon, 15, is the youngest member of the Black Leaders Movement and joined the group because he knows the power of speaking up, the Star reported.

“I have a voice,” he told the newspaper. “I have things that I want to say, and I would feel wrong if I didn’t put my part into this.”

Dario Rossin, 17, called himself the movement’s “hype-man,” often leading chants and rousing the crowd before speeches, the Star reported.

He said the movement is about “spreading joy through the pain that people are feeling as they fight for justice,” according to the newspaper.

Washington

In Tacoma, 15-year-old Olivia Borcherding and 17-year-old Kennedy Wilcox organized a protest against police brutality at the city’s Wright Park, KENS5 reported.

The demonstration included a march, speeches and a number of “die-ins” in which protesters laid down to block sidewalks and intersections to bring awareness to the death of George Floyd, according to the outlet.

“The turnout was way better than I would’ve imagined, and it kind of turned into the people’s protest,” Borcherding told KENS5.

Borcherding and Wilcox both chose to remain anonymous leading up to the protest in an effort to keep attention on the message and not themselves, they told the outlet.

“Seeing that many people really opened my eyes and showed me how much people cared,” Wilcox said, according to KENS5. She told the outlet she plans to run for president of her school’s Black Student Union.

Borcherding said she plans to organize other protests with the help of “grassroots community activists,” KENS5 reported.

Missouri

In Monett, a group of high school students used a private Facebook page to organize a march through town, the Monette Times reported.

“We felt a need to help spread awareness,” co-organizer Veronikka Kew told the newspaper. “All lives matter regardless of skin color, but specifically black lives because of the injustices they face.”

Protesters waved signs and chanted “I can’t breathe,” “black lives matter” and “no justice, no peace” as they marched through the streets of Monett with police officers hemming them in, the newspaper reported. The march stopped at City Hall, where the group briefly spoke with city administrator Dennis Pyle, according to the Times

“We’re all about safety for everybody,” police Lt. Dennis Camp told the newspaper. “We want this group, [the teens on Wednesday], to be able to accomplish their goal and not have anyone perpetuate their own agenda against them.”

Tennessee

In Nashville, a group of teens led a group of nearly 10,000 protesters through the city to the state Capitol, the Nashville Scene reported.

The protest was organized by six teen girls, according to the outlet.

“As teens, we are tired of waking up and seeing another innocent person being slain in broad daylight,” co-organizer Zee Thomas told the Scene. “As teens, we are desensitized to death because we see videos of black people being killed in broad daylight circulating on social media platforms. As teens, we feel like we cannot make a difference in this world, but we must.”

The group carried a large Black Lives Matter banner as they marched through town, occasionally kneeling, chanting and rallying throughout, the Scene reported.

Police in riot gear were stationed outside bars and restaurants on the route, according to the outlet. After a black police officer refused to kneel with the group, another spoke with protesters and ended up taking a knee along with several other officers, the Scene reported.

“We wanted to create something that would be even more of an inspiration especially for teens because it shows other teens that you can do anything,” 15-year-old co-organizer Jade Fuller told WSMV.

“It’s your brothers and sisters. It’s people in your community, people you know who are feeling oppressed,” Emma Smith, another organizer, told the outlet. “Their moms and dads are getting killed because of their skin color, because people are afraid of them.”

This story was originally published June 7, 2020 at 11:18 AM with the headline "‘I have a voice.’ Teens play prominent role in Black Lives Matter protests across US."