The death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers sent shockwaves throughout the world. Within Chapel Hill and Orange County, the Black Lives Matter movement was backed by thousands of residents willing to step up and speak out for their beliefs.
The first Black Lives Matter march in Chapel Hill on June 3 — which featured thousands of people marching on Franklin Street — began as an idea between two friends.
“This was put together by two students who just wanted to see something,” said UNC student Emile Charles. “Chapel Hill had been silent, it had been quiet and nothing was happening. And now to see over one thousand people come out is incredible.”
Like many other protests throughout the country in the wake of George Floyd’s death, the first march in Chapel Hill was advertised over social media. The event drew people from all over, including from Raleigh, Cary and even Atlanta.
Mikayla Thompson, who said she drove from Clayton to attend the June 3 march, held a sign that said ‘All Lives Cannot Matter Until Black Lives Do.’
“The more we talk about it,” she said, “the more [people] will have to think about it and talk about it, and things will have to change.”
Another march ensued on June 5 in Hillsborough — again spurred by an idea between two teenagers.
“I’ve seen a lot of people in this area wanting to post about it and be more active in it, but they didn’t have an opportunity,” said Colin Davis, one of the organizers of the June 5 protest. “Some people can’t drive to Raleigh to protest. So we figured we’d set something up here and let people speak their minds.”
A homemade Hillsborough Black Lives Matter sign is displayed in Hillsborough on Friday, June 5. (Dakota Moyer/Chapelboro.com)
Davis and fellow organizer Aidan Salmeron said they expected around a hundred people to show up, but the crowd in Hillsborough numbered several hundred.
A June 6 march sponsored by the Chapel Hill-Carrboro NAACP chapter provided a powerful moment when protesters knelt in Franklin Street for eight minutes and 46 seconds — the length of time Minneapolis Police officers knelt on the neck of Floyd. Floyd died as a result of mechanical asphyxia, or being choked.
The death of Breonna Taylor — a black woman fatally shot by Louisville police officers in March — also became a rallying point for protesters in Chapel Hill. A June 5 protest was organized on the day that would have been Taylor’s birthday, with many of the organizers and protesters dressing in purple in her honor.
Chants of “say her name” followed by “Breonna Taylor” were shouted as the demonstrators marched from the SASB Plaza on UNC’s campus to South Building, the university’s administrative building.
During the protest, speakers criticized UNC for its ties to white supremacists and condemned leadership for failure of equitably supporting African American students.
The Black Lives Matter also spread to the corporate level in Chapel Hill. Hundreds of UNC Health workers gathered outside UNC Medical Centers on June 23 for a march to raise awareness for health inequities in North Carolina and the United States amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
“We join together to show our support and our commitment to fighting health inequities,” said UNC Hospitals president Janet Hadar before the march.
UNC student-athletes, some of the most high-profile individuals in Chapel Hill, used their platform to protest for racial injustice as well. An August 29 march down Franklin Street organized by student-athletes was represented by every UNC sports program.
Daniel McArthur, who is white, said the players’ demonstration represents something more than the Carolina Family and instead represents the need for change by his race.
“White people: stand up for your fellow Black people,” said the captain for the men’s track and field team. “Because guess what? There’s no difference at all and it’s time for us to realize that as a society.”
The protest by UNC student-athletes came shortly after a police shooting in Kenosha, Wisconsin, where officers shot Jacob Blake, a Black man, in the back seven times.
The Black Lives Matter movement also sparked a conversation about systemic racism and social injustice among local elected officials. Orange County Sheriff Charles Blackwood told 97.9 The Hill in July that “there is systemic racism” within law enforcement.
“We have got to accept the fact on the law enforcement side that there is systemic racism and we’re part of that problem,” Blackwood said. “If we don’t do that, we’re never going to get anywhere. We’ve also got to accept the fact that we’ve got to change some of the practices that we have. If we don’t do that we won’t get anywhere – it’ll stay just as it is.”
The movement also led local police departments to ban chokeholds as a tactic for restraining people or self-defense. The Chapel Hill Town Council also passed a resolution asking for clear accountability for officers who violate its policies regarding its required dash and body cameras, as well as ending traffic stops for low-level violations and publishing more departmental reviews.
