{"id":11674,"date":"2020-06-09T15:12:30","date_gmt":"2020-06-09T15:12:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/?p=11674"},"modified":"2020-06-16T21:45:58","modified_gmt":"2020-06-16T21:45:58","slug":"i-can-breath-means-i-can-write-about-love-in-a-time-of-angry-protest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/?p=11674","title":{"rendered":"“I can breathe” means I can write, about love in a time of angry protest"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A protest march, including the author, against police brutality moves through Whitefish Bay Saturday. Photo for Shepherd Express by Tea Krulos<\/em><\/p>\n

On Sunday morning, I wrote a commentary piece on the police brutality protest march I had participated in the day before.\u00a0 The march had special meaning to me because it’s the first one of the current marches I know of that penetrated Shorewood, the nearby suburb where I grew up from my adolescence, and on into Whitefish Bay, engulfing the main thoroughfares of both municipalities.<\/p>\n

What struck me first was the fact that I, in fact, could breathe — at the first protest march I’d partook of since the coronavirus, considering I’m quite at risk in my 60s and suffer from asthma. I thought the phrase\u00a0 “I can breathe,” mirroring George Floyd’s, might be a headline phrase when I decided to submit it to the Shepherd Express<\/em>, which accepted and published it yesterday in their online edition 1<\/p>\n

Express<\/em> editor David Luhrssen decided that a theme within the piece was a more striking headline, and I think he was right (I combine both ideas in my headline here). After seeing a protester wearing a red cap with the phrase, “Make America love again,” I pondered whether John Lennon’s famous notion about the power of love had potency and potential in our current crisis. I only wish I had added some lines from his great song “All You Need is Love.” So I will quote some rather profound lyrics from the song as I lead you to a link to my Shepherd Express<\/em> commentary:<\/p>\n

There is nothing you can make that can’t be made.<\/strong><\/p>\n

No one you can save that can’t be saved.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nothing you can do but you can learn<\/strong><\/p>\n

how to be you<\/em> in time.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s easy…<\/strong><\/p>\n

( my italics)<\/p>\n

Perhaps it’s not always easy. But Lennon’s simple rhetorical assertion leads to the idea off applying<\/em> love to the problem, perhaps learning to love in a Christ-like manner. Lennon’s notion that we can learn, through activism, how to be who we really are (or “praying with our legs” as Frederick Douglass put it) rather than through passive being or existence, is what strikes me.<\/p>\n

The link to my Shepherd Express commentary on the protest<\/a><\/p>\n

And thanks for reading, and for trying to be who you really are.<\/p>\n

In addition, here are the two sides of the protest sign I made and used for the March including my satirical drawing of Donald Trump:<\/p>\n

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I didn’t arrange the book titles shown beside the sign, but their titles serendipitously resonate with ideas explicit or implicit in my Shepherd Express article. The small book at top is a portion of the Bible illustrated by Marc Chagall.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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This backside of the sign at top, from a previous march protesting police violence as supported by Trump, received plenty of comments during the march. Photos by Kevin Lynch.<\/em><\/p>\n

Activism is also crucially about dialog as well as dissent. I’m also sharing images below, by Jonathan Klett, of Milwaukee Police Chief Alberto Morales. Here he’s talking, at a Veteran’s Park protest Sunday, with Nate Hamilton (in red jersey), the brother of Dontre Hamilton, who was killed by a MPD officer at Red Arrow Park a few years ago — the subject of the acclaimed documentary Blood is on the Doorstep<\/em>. I allude to Morales’ defiant comments and to the film’s title in my SE article. I was also troubled by the fact that Morales lowered his mask to speak face-to-face with Hamilton. Is this a version of Donald Trump’s macho posturing about not wearing a mask during the COVID crisis?<\/p>\n

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Nate Hamilton (left, in red jersey) speaks with MPD chief Alberto Morales. Photo by Jonathan Klett.<\/em><\/p>\n

Here is a brief video by Jonathan Klett of MPD Chief Morales being dissed away from the Veteran’s Park protest:<\/p>\n

Morales leaving protest<\/a><\/p>\n

I highly recommend Blood is at the Doorstep,<\/em> about Hamilton’s death and his family’s effort towards justice, now available for streaming or purchase. I reviewed it in this blog:<\/p>\n

Milwaukee film brilliantly embraces the family of Dontre Hamilton \u2013 a search for justice<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n