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Black Lives Matter protests on June 6

Sources: Crowd Counting Consortium, Edwin Chow and New York Times analysis | Note: The Times partnered with Edwin Chow, an associate professor at Texas State University, to count the protesters based on available aerial images from June 6 and added those estimates to data from the Crowd Counting Consortium. Counting efforts are still ongoing, so the map is not comprehensive and totals shown are an average of high and low estimates.

The recent Black Lives Matter protests peaked on June 6, when half a million people turned out in nearly 550 places across the United States. That was a single day in more than a month of protests that still continue to today.

Four recent polls including one released this week by Civis Analytics, a data science firm that works with businesses and Democratic campaigns suggest that about 15 million to 26 million people in the United States have participated in demonstrations over the death of George Floyd and others in recent weeks.

These figures would make the recent protests the largest movement in the countrys history, according to interviews with scholars and crowd-counting experts.

Note: Surveys are of the adult population in the United States

Ive never seen self-reports of protest participation that high for a specific issue over such a short period, said Neal Caren, associate professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who studies social movements in the United States.

While its possible that more people said they protested than actually did, even if only half told the truth, the surveys suggest more than seven million people participated in recent demonstrations.

The Womens March of 2017 had a turnout of about three million to five million people on a single day, but that was a highly organized event. Collectively, the recent Black Lives Matter protests more organic in nature appear to have far surpassed those numbers, according to polls.

Really, its hard to overstate the scale of this movement, said Deva Woodly, an associate professor of politics at the New School.

Professor Woodly said that the civil rights marches in the 1960s were considerably smaller in number. If we added up all those protests during that period, were talking about hundreds of thousands of people, but not millions, she said.

Even protests to unseat government leadership or for independence typically succeed when they involve 3.5 percent of the population at their peak, according to a review of international protests by Erica Chenoweth, a professor at Harvard Kennedy School who co-directs the Crowd Counting Consortium, which collects data on crowd sizes of political protests.

Precise turnout at protests is difficult to count and has led to some famous disputes. An amalgam of estimates from organizers, the police and local news reports often make up the official total.

But tallies by teams of crowd counters are revealing numbers of extraordinary scale. On June 6, for example, at least 50,000 people turned out in Philadelphia, 20,000 in Chicagos Union Park and up to 10,000 on the Golden Gate Bridge, according to estimates by Edwin Chow, an associate professor at Texas State University, and researchers at the Crowd Counting Consortium.

Source: EarthCam

Across the United States, there have been more than 4,700 demonstrations, or an average of 140 per day, since the first protests began in Minneapolis on May 26, according to a Times analysis. Turnout has ranged from dozens to tens of thousands in about 2,500 small towns and large cities.

Protests against racism and

police violence per day

Protests against racism and

police violence per day

Protests against racism and

police violence per day

Source: Crowd Counting Consortium

The geographic spread of protest is a really important characteristic and helps signal the depth and breadth of a movements support, said Kenneth Andrews, a sociology professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

One of the reasons there have been protests in so many places in the United States is the backing of organizations like Black Lives Matter. While the group isnt necessarily directing each protest, it provides materials, guidance and a framework for new activists, Professor Woodly said. Those activists are taking to social media to quickly share protest details to a wide audience.

Black Lives Matter has been around since 2013, but theres been a big shift in public opinion about the movement as well as broader support for recent protests. A deluge of public support from organizations like the N.F.L. and NASCAR for Black Lives Matter may have also encouraged supporters who typically would sit on the sidelines to get involved.

The protests may also be benefitting from a country that is more conditioned to protesting. The adversarial stance that the Trump administration has taken on issues like guns, climate change and immigration has led to more protests than under any other presidency since the Cold War.

According to a poll from The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation, one in five Americans said that they had participated in a protest since the start of the Trump administration, and 19 percent said they were new to protesting.

More than 40 percent of counties in the United States at least 1,360 have had a protest. Unlike with past Black Lives Matter protests, nearly 95 percent of counties that had a protest recently are majority white, and nearly three-quarters of the counties are more than 75 percent white.

Percentage of population that is white

in counties that had protests

Percentage of population that is white

in counties that had protests

Percentage of population that is white

in counties that had protests

Percentage of population that is white

in counties that had protests

The New York TimesSource: 2018 Census via Social Explorer; Crowd Counting Consortium protests database; New York Times protests database

Without gainsaying the reality and significance of generalized white support for the movement in the early 1960s, the number of whites who were active in a sustained way in the struggle were comparatively few, and certainly nothing like the percentages we have seen taking part in recent weeks, said Douglas McAdam, an emeritus professor at Stanford University who studies social movements.

According to the Civis Analytics poll, the movement appears to have attracted protesters who are younger and wealthier. The age group with the largest share of protesters was people under 35 and the income group with the largest share of protesters was those earning more than $150,000.

Half of those who said they protested said that this was their first time getting involved with a form of activism or demonstration. A majority said that they watched a video of police violence toward protesters or the Black community within the last year. And of those people, half said that it made them more supportive of the Black Lives Matter movement.

The protests are colliding with another watershed moment: the countrys most devastating pandemic in modern history.

With being home and not being able to do as much, that might be amplifying something that is already sort of critical, something thats already a powerful catalyst, and that is the video, said Daniel Q. Gillion, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania who has written several books on protests and politics.

If you arent moved by the George Floyd video, you have nothing in you, he said. And that catalyst can now be amplified by the fact that individuals probably have more time to engage in protest activity.

Besides the spike in demonstrations on Juneteenth, the number of protests has fallen considerably over the last two weeks according to the Crowd Counting Consortium.

But the amount of change that the protests have been able to produce in such a short period of time is significant. In Minneapolis, the City Council pledged to dismantle its police department. In New York, lawmakers repealed a law that kept police disciplinary records secret. Cities and states across the country passed new laws banning chokeholds. Mississippi lawmakers voted to retire their state flag, which prominently includes a Confederate battle emblem.

It looks, for all the world, like these protests are achieving what very few do: setting in motion a period of significant, sustained, and widespread social, political change, Professor McAdam said. We appear to be experiencing a social change tipping point that is as rare in society as it is potentially consequential.

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Black Lives Matter May Be the Largest Movement in U.S. History

The deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Rayshard Brooks have not only served to reignite the Black Lives Matter movement, but also the furor at its most common rebuttal: "all lives matter."

The back and forth has been going on for seven years, and just last week, when pressed repeatedly on his refusal to say "Black lives matter," Vice President Mike Pence echoed those words on "Face The Nation": "I really believe all lives matter."

While some purposely say "all lives matter" to provoke conflict, others see it as a harmless, even inclusive remark. But that isn't the way most Black people experience it.

"My life matters," said Jason Reynolds, author of "All American Boys." "And if you say, 'No, all lives matter,' what I would say is I believe that you believe all lives matter. But because I live the life that I live, I am certain that in this country, all lives [don't] matter. I know for a fact that, based on the numbers, my life hasn't mattered; that black women's lives definitely haven't mattered, that black trans people's lives haven't mattered, that black gay people's lives haven't mattered... that immigrants' lives don't matter, that Muslims' lives don't matter. The Indigenous people of this country's lives have never mattered. I mean, we could go on and on and on. So, when we say 'all lives,' are we talking about White lives? And if so, then let's just say that. 'Cause it's coded language."

Some members of the Black community emphasized to CBS News that the phrase "Black Lives Matter" does not mean "Black lives matter more." It means, "Black lives matter, as well." And some of the hurtful confusion could very well stem from a fundamental misunderstanding of that.

For lifestyle blogger Ayana Lage, whether the phrase is posted with ill intentions or good ones, the effect is the same. It derails the conversation.

"It's the same as when people bring up 'black-on-black crime' when you are discussing police brutality, or say 'well, why don't you care about Chicago?' Literally anytime that I mention anything about Black Lives Matter or police reform, I get comments about 'well, what about the looters.' And I'm kind of like, well that's not what we're talking about," she told CBS News. "The talking points are almost all the same when you're having conversations with people: black-on-black crime, Chicago, I don't see color, you want to be a victim, all lives matter. I mean, you just hear the same things from people and you just start to think, 'Man, maybe some people are committed to misunderstanding what we're trying to do here.'"

"No one's saying that your life doesn't matter," Lage continued. "What we're saying is all lives can't matter until black lives matter."

"When [all lives matter] first became a hashtag, it felt like such a knee-jerk response to something that was not understood. It almost heightened the Black Lives Matter movement in a way because it was like, so you really don't get it," said fitness influencer Bryce Michael Wood, who hosts the Zoom series, "For Your Discomfort." "Like, how is that your response to me saying 'Black Lives Matter?' Because before Black Lives Matter, before that movement, no one was saying 'all lives matter.' No one felt the need to position themselves that way."

Sonya Renee Taylor, author and founder of "The Body Is Not an Apology," likens it to your wife asking you if she's pretty and you responding "all people are pretty."

"It's probably not going to go over very well in your family, right?" said Taylor. "Your wife is probably going to have a problem with that. Because what she wants in that moment is specificity. You know, what's desired in that moment is to be seen in her unique experience with you. And that's what Black people are asking for right now: to be seen in our unique experience in the world. To actually be seen and valued."

Trending News

Christina Capatides is CBS News' Vice President of Social Media and Trending Content. She is also a senior producer and reporter, focusing on culture and gender equity.

Continued here:
Why saying "all lives matter" communicates to Black people that their ...

Protesters carrying a Black Lives Matter flag march inside a fountain at Veterans Memorial Park following a march from the Grand Rapids Police Department.Photo: Daniel Shular (AP)

On Monday, a lawyer for one of two brothers who have been detained since June for felonies they apparently committed during the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol said his clients actions were comparable to those who participated in Black Lives Matter protests.

Adam Jackson, and his brother Brian Scott Jackson, face a slew of charges including: committing an act of physical violence in the Capitol grounds or buildings, disorderly conduct in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon, civil disorder, resisting, assaulting or impeding officers using a dangerous weapon and physical violence.

Even though prosecutors allege that Adam Jackson threw an orange traffic cone at police guarding the entry to the building before charging at them while holding a stolen police riot shield, his lawyer Joseph McBride argued that somehow Black Lives Matter protesters were given a pass and seemingly didnt understand the difference.

How do you say youre a white supremacist without saying youre a white supremacist?

McBride stated:

No matter how you feel about Jan. 6, or no matter how anybody feels about George Floyd and that situation, there is some commonality there. Im referring to the fact that lots of people, when it came to the Black Lives Matter protests, participated in acts of violence, but they were largely given a pass. Why were the given a pass? Because society, the court system, the media recognizes that when those people left their front door, they left for political, constitutionally protected reasons.

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US District Judge Rudolph Contreras who is overseeing the case wasnt amused by McBrides comparison. The one violent Black Lives Matter protester that came to me went to prison, so some arguments are going to resonate more than others, he retorted.

However, a comparison simply cannot be made. Those who participated in storming the Capitol on January 6 took an unfathomably violent approach to desperately keep former president Donald Trumpa fascistin office. Because he glorified violence and increased militarization of homeland security agencies. Because he was instrumental in separating immigrant families by placing their children in cages. Because he relished in the belief that people of color are racially inferior.

Because he wasand isthe embodiment of white supremacy.

The people who took to the street in solidarity with BLM brought awareness to how we are the ones being shot and killed by police like clockwork (and were lucky if the officers responsible are punished for their crimes). They used their individual power to come together and try to save lives, not destroy them.

Studies have shown that in more than 93% of protests associated with Black Lives Matter over the course of 2020, those who participated were not violent or destructive. More than 2,400 locations documented peaceful protests, while fewer than 220 locations reported violent demonstrations.

In addition, 900 people have been charged in the January 6 insurrection, while 2020 BLM protests saw only around 300 people arrested. The mob who took it upon themselves to protect a second Trump presidency were heavily armed, stormed government property, attempted to detonate pipe bombs and assaulted nearly 150 officers.

They used sheer terror and quite frankly, whiteness, to be able to execute in such an abrasive and dangerous stunt. No, the insurrection is nothing like Black Lives Matter demonstrations. To entertain such an absurdly false equivalence wouldnt just make someone ignorantbut a bonafide racist as well.

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Only Racists Would Equate The Capitol Riot To Black Lives Matter Protests - The Root

I am troubled by this possibility. As an African American who has lived all over this nation, I have seen and experienced much that raises this question. At the same time, my life has been enriched by generous, affirming, justice-seeking white Americans.

Yet, the opening question often plagues me. By most, I dont mean the overwhelming majority. I do mean some number more than half. Anything more than half is most.

Former President Donald Trump lost the election but won the white vote. Depending on the source, between 55-58% of white men and women voted for him. Among white evangelicals, his support was over 75%. I, and many white Americans, opposed Trumps blatant racism, misogyny and hateful rhetoric.

Yet, apparently, his positions were acceptable to most white Americans. His policies, speeches, tweets and advisors espoused a frightening white nationalism and drew violent groups out of the shadows. I would not say everyone who voted for Trump is a racist. I would say, however, everyone who voted for him cast their ballot for racism. Abortion, taxes, or outsider status may be the reason, but the result is a vote for white supremacy.

I am also troubled that the leadership of the Republican Party. Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy and others, do not condemn the violent impulses of white nationalists. Election workers are threatened, hate-filled rhetoric is rampant, and the leadership winks and nods. I mention the Republican Party because race is, and always has been, THE most important factor in our two-party system. The Republican Party began in opposition to slavery. The Democratic Party stood for the horrors of slavery. That existed for decades, until the Democratic Party came to support European immigrant workers, urban labor, and eventually civil rights for African Americans. Beginning with Franklin Roosevelt and solidified with John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, the Democratic Party was associated with labor and civil rights. Suddenly, white people, in particular the South (the former, Democratic, Solid South), flocked to the Republican Party. While the Democratic Party also reflects the nations racism, Trump has unleashed a long-smoldering and violent element. This element will flourish unless courageous whites with integrity speak out.

The murder of Ahmaud Arbery was a stark reminder of violence and silence. A jogging Black man frightens a white man so he calls his father and friend to go hunt him down. They corner him like an animal, murder him, and go home. Remarkably, they are not charged until months later, after videos and protests force law enforcement to act. Absent protests, the killers would be home barbecuing ribs and watching football. Violence, and acceptance.

George Zimmerman, later acquitted in the death of Trayvon Martin, was arrested only after mass protests. Zimmerman, an armed grown man, was accused of killing a Black teenager for the crime of walking in his neighborhood with a dangerous bag of skittles. Violence, and acceptance.

I am convinced violent whites are a small minority, otherwise Jan. 6 would have been a mob of millions. What most concerns me is not the violent minority, but the silent majority. If the majority do not stand up for whats right, our future is bleak. Bumper stickers like Lets Go Brandon or Im with Kyle, armed protests at government offices, and replacement rhetoric should be unacceptable to all people of good will.

Republican candidates who stand against Trump lose their seats, voting in Black communities is a hurdle instead of a right, Anti-CRT movements flourish. The real question is, do we want a just and multi-racial society, or one of white privilege and dominance?

And what of Black Lives Matter? Professor Treva B. Lindsey says, to even have to proclaim Black Lives Matter and know that people will dispute it, or counter with all lives matter, is a result of entrenched and learned anti-blackness. In what world would saying Black lives matter prompt a rejoinder? A fundamentally anti-Black one. I am hopeful we can create a society different than described by Professor Lindsey.

No amount of skulduggery, lies, treason or corruption deters millions of white Americans from supporting Trump. What explains that devotion? Anger? About what? Fear? Of who? As white militias grow and the internet rumbles with threats, I fear the majority is silent. I believe but a small fraction of white America is prone to racist violence. That small group, however, is dangerous if the majority does not stand up.

Believe me when I say, I dont enjoy thinking this, and frankly, I would be happy to be proven wrong.

Daryl Grigsby lives in Nevada City

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Daryl Grigsby: Need I be fearful of most white people? - The Union

Photo: Marc Pagani Photography (Shutterstock)

The dangerous heat and severe storms that have become our new normal are the unequivocal impact of climate change. And as the Biden Administration is working to push through the solutions in its climate agenda, The Movement for Black Lives is taking steps to ensure that communities of color are a part of the conversation. On August 25, the group announced the Black Hive initiative, their new plan to address climate change and its impact on the Black community.

The initiative is bringing together Black environmental leaders from over 200 organizations across the country to assess the impact of climate change on communities of color. It also plans to revive the Black Climate Mandate, which recommends investing in equitable climate solutions that center Black communities concerns.

The climate crisis is happening because of corporate greed, government negligence, the divestment of solutions and the investment into the harmful institutions like the fossil fuel industry, that are harming our people, said Valencia Gunder, national co-lead of The Black Hive. Its time for America to address the anti-Black racism that happens here.

Research has shown that communities of color are hit hardest by the impacts of climate change. Segregation has placed African Americans in the low-lying, flood-prone areas hit hardest by dangerous storms. And a 2019 study published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that African Americans breathe in 56 percent more particulate matter than they produce from their consumption, confirming racial inequities in pollution exposure.

The Biden Administration just scored a big win with the Inflation Reduction Act, which includes provisions such as consumer home energy rebate programs for low-income consumers and investments in community-led environmental justice programs.

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But according to Aleta Alston-Toure of the Parable of the Sower Intentional Community Cooperative, the Inflation Reduction Act doesnt go far enough to protect communities of color, which is why The Movement for Black Lives is stepping up. These solutions are Band-Aids, she said.Theres no solution if Black (communities) and Indigenous nations, especially the Gulf South, have to suffer in order to have Band-Aid solutions for the wider public. We want to be taken serious and know that our votes matter because this is a lynching of our communities, and we have to be heard.

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The Movement for Black Lives Is Amplifying the Climate Conversation - The Root