Ms. Josie Stanfield has had her life threatened because she’s chosen not only to speak out about her life growing up in Prineville, but to organize peaceful protests in her own community, as some in that community have asked “why Prineville?”

Apparently, her life experience there has involved some incidents of prejudice, bias and racism, which basically makes it no different than any other place in America, so “why not Prineville?”

I understand the concern by some citizens, watching a few of the protests around the country turn violent, but is that our community, is that what we endorse, is that what we embrace in Central Oregon?

I believe not, so why the counterprotest, whose counterprotesters feel the need to show up as though they’re going to war? Wannabes whose only way to express themselves is to be fully geared up, sidearms, long rifles, where’s the enemy, your neighbor? And what are you counter protesting?

It’s OK to keep your knee in the neck of a man for 8:46 while he’s pleading for his life, pleading for his dead mother, is that what you’re for? It’s OK to shoot a man twice in the back as he’s running away, that’s what you’re standing up for? Or maybe it’s the many other instances of racial violence perpetrated against people of color by the very people sworn to protect them?

We’ve seen this happen throughout our nation’s history, we’ve turned a blind eye to the people whose backs have helped build this great nation, a blind eye to the injustice served to a group of American citizens born into an inherent racial bias, grown into the fabric in which a certain group is blanketed, grown into economic disparity and hardship, due simply because their skin is not white. Ridiculous, if it were the other way around, they’d be out in the streets protesting, as well, so what are you for/against? This country moves forward, at times taking longer than it should to make needed and necessary changes for the betterment of all, and there has always been some resistant to make changes, stuck in the ways of their parents and grandparents, never able to change their mind, make their own choice. We never go backwards.

So that’s why millions around this country and around the world have taken to the streets, even in the middle of the worst pandemic in a century, to make their voices heard, to show that the people are insisting on change, not platitudes, to ways of handling these situations which seem to continue happening time and time again. We’ll get it right, but as most times, it may take a while for some minds to rethink ingrained behaviors and attitudes, and make the changes to benefit us all.

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