Last night was the first night of the State Imposed Curfew
in the city of Ferguson. The curfew was
to run from midnight until 5:00a.m. As
stated by the Governor and others this curfew was imposed to give the citizens
of Ferguson some peace from the civil unrest that has been targeting their
community since the shooting death of Michael Brown.
I was very encouraged by the response of the citizens of
Ferguson to the curfew. The first four
interviews aired by KMOV channel 4 St. Louis were very positive. These citizens said they understood and were
grateful for the action. The intended to
abide by the request. They also said
that they would continue to peacefully protest each day up to the curfew.
I was further encouraged by the New Black Panther Party
Leader, Malik Shabazz and his efforts to encourage the protestors to disburse
by the time of the curfew. Shabazz and
others from his group went throughout the protest with bullhorns requesting the
people to disburse before the curfew deadline.
To me this showed that they want to be heard, but they also want to
honor the residents of Ferguson by not advocating violence.
But unfortunately not everyone had this same thought
process. One young man interview by KMOV
as he lead a group of protestors towards the police, stated, “They got guns. We got guns.
We are ready.” That type of
thinking is what causes problems. This
also happened after the curfew. Oh and
by the way, the young man, whom I will withhold his name (but KMOV was not as
generous) was not a resident of Ferguson.
He came from outside of the area.
It is also interesting that just 45 minutes later the police
had to respond to a report of a shooting at the site of the protests. One protestor had shot another one and
critically injured that person.
My question is this, “Why don’t people protest the shooting
of a protestor by another protestor?” It
would seem to me that if you want “justice” which is what they are chanting,
then you would want justice for the others that are being gunned down and
critically injured.
So, far this makes six protestors who have been shot by
other protestors, not by police. That is
unacceptable.
Peaceful protest is a right in our country. I applaud that right. But when it gets out of hand we need to take
a step back and ask ourselves, “What are we trying to accomplish?”
Let’s stop the violence.
Let’s begin the healing. Let’s
restore the community to a place where neighbors can live, laugh, love and
congregate together. Let’s get the flow
of groceries and necessities started back up.
To do that the senseless looting and violence need to stop.
In the meantime, please continue to pray for our communities
in North County St. Louis.
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