And so it's my opinion that today what we're seeing is a new generation of civil rights leaders and those who will march of civil rights leaders and those who will march and do whatever it takes for complete civil rights.

They're marching for justice today.

My generation, we did civil rights.

It was our thing to have the right to vote.

Today it's about justice and equality, which brings us on a plane with the rest of America, so.

And I think the power of social media has kind of given us a very big leverage.

We're seeing things happen faster, We're seeing things happen faster, we're seeing things happen.

Like we're able to kind of scrutinize every government decision.

We now have the ability to research every single decision that they make.

And so I think there's definitely a big opportunity here and I think it could be successful and even just awarding us more liberties and more rights, I think this could be very, very big.

And I would maybe go so far as to say that I think that it has opened up enlightenment to a lot of people, as far as just looking at various systems in our country, whether it's education or our political system judicial.

So it's a lot of people out there that are now for better words woke and ready to go out and fight the good fight to keep this country on the path of, being very fair to everyone in it.

There's so much work to be done.

Some of it has to be visual.

Some of it has to be in your face.

When it comes to the violence, I don't condone the violence by any means, but I also see things like what Dr. King had said when he had visited the young leaders, after the Watts Riots, they looked at him and said, we won.

And Dr. King looked at them confused, like, what do you mean you won?

And they told him, they heard us, they see us, and with their, and he stepped back and having to look at his life, his education, everything that allows him to say, my decision making looks this way because of my background.

He has also asked to look at those young men and say, you were also doing the best to your ability level.

You don't have a college degree.

You don't feel like your voice is empowered.

You don't feel like the system has been built for you.

So when you are burning down a building or you're doing something like that, you're controlling what you can control and saying, well, yeah, in your mindset, you did win but how do we get to a point where we can have conversations and do things so those individuals' voices are heard in a more productive way and this is where, that's something we're tasked to do because again, there's a gap and that opportunity gap has made it so now some protests look different than others, where we have a community like ours, who protest, and we have done it in a very commendable way, but it's also led by very educated individuals who use compassion and empathy.

That's not happening everywhere.

So I can't, I can't blame them for, - [Lyndsee] Amarillo has not responded well, I don't think in a lot of the cases of the protests here, we've seen counter protesters who have been very aggressive, very mean-spirited, most recently there was a teenager and she organized a Memorial, excuse me.

And when everyone showed up, it wasn't a very, very large group of people.

They just started talking about their feelings and how they were coping.

And we didn't make it through the complete circle of people that were there before she came and told us that she would like for us to leave because she felt unsafe because the counter protesters were open carrying weapons.

And it kind of just struck me I mean this teenager in particular was called a race baiter and a terrorist and she's only a teenager.

- [Karen] There've been counter protests We had, there were more people out there watching us and they were participating in the memorial itself.

We had really big trucks with flags and whatever they could find driving by, making sure that we weren't being aggressive and violent when that wasn't even the case at all.

We had people waiting at the entrance with guns and flags and Maga hats, to the point where people got so scared that they started to leave.

our school system doesn't do a great job of teaching us the proper history of especially civil rights, we get a very small portion of what actually happened, and I actually learned that in Selma, you know, seeing everything that went on there, I thought I knew, when you historically look at stuff that has happened between the Black community and the white community, you get a better sense of why things still are the way they are today.

- [Karen] What did you not know that you learned?

- [Karah] I didn't know know, during the bus boycotts, that there was a lot, that there was a lot, like, you know, we see a lot of rioting today, and people dealing with things in a violent manner.

And when the bus boycotts occurred, I didn't realize that there were white mobs doing exactly what's going on today.

It's like, it was an exact representation in pictures, you know, they were throwing these cocktail.

and years ago, I heard this and somebody said, well, you're just tearing up your neighborhood and yeah you are tearing up your neighborhood.

But how many of those people in that neighborhood have any ownership?

If they go and burn down a Walgreens, Black people don't own Walgreens.

So you're in my neighborhood and you're doing business but what have you added to my neighborhood?

And it's not the idea of give me something free 'cause I'm Black.

But if you're part of the community and you're taking my money in this community, you have to buy in, you have to buy in.

The looting is just, it's not right.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not condoning looting but it's when you have years and years of pent up anger and you get a chance to strike back, you do.

Violent protest in some eyes is warranted, in mine it's not.

I believe that these things happen a hundred times a day we would get what we needed a whole lot easier if we stood up the right way, and that goes back to voting and that goes back to talking to city officials and that goes back to talking to our police chief and seeing exactly how they intend to police us as a community, and if there's any opposition to that, just for safety's sake to actually meet with the demographic that we deem to be the most likely to be in prison and talk with them and educate them, so everybody actually needs to come together as a community and work it out.

We've talked about it for a long time.

Are we afraid?

Yeah.

No one wants to target on their back 'cause we don't know how intense this struggle can get again, especially in light of what's happening especially in light of what's happening in places like Portland and across the country.

have been and played out?

- [Patrick] What's interesting is that we had reputable news sources all confirm what we have long been stating, is that the vast majority of these protests have been peaceful.

Approximately 97% of these protests have been peaceful.

I think people just get a little afraid when they see us come together like that.

And us being the American fabric, the American citizenry, Black, white, Democrat, Republican, Christian, non-Christian, all together with one collective message and that's Black lives matter.

And people can get mad at that statement and say, "Oh, I don't agree with the movement.

I don't personally agree with every tenent of the Black Lives Matter movement as a Christian, but I'm a Black man, my family has a lot of African Americans and people that love us who are not African American, and we all agree that Black lives matter.

So, for people to get upset by a simple statement, man, it just, they're missing the point.

All we're saying is that we matter, too.

We got a lot of accomplished back in the 60's but it just seemed like people wanna take us back and we shouldn't go back.

We should be moving forward in my opinion.

And it's just a whole different level of (laughs) what's going on today compared to what was going on in the 60's.

And, if we don't get this thing right, American's not gonna be the same anymore.

And so, I pray to God that we come together and make some change.

I really do.

- [Karen] Protesting is one thing but when you,