September 1, 2020

Rogue River Racism Emerges from the Shadows by Elizabeth V. Hallett, Executive Director, Peace House

Foreword

“The animosity, faces frozen mid-yell, held in contrast to the call for justice. I never would have imagined the state we are in.” – Sam Decker, Journalist

Rogue River Racism Emerges from the Shadows

by Elizabeth V. Hallett, Executive Director, Peace House

First, the article below is available to us because a reporter was willing to not only attend and document his experience, but to do so quickly, as if warning us of a virus. The description he provides sends the alarm that, indeed, the multi-viral combination of hatred, fear, and racism are alive and well in Southern Oregon. Many of us have been working on since the 1960’s or longer, to heal, dissolve and otherwise erase, these viruses that poison our communities and our children, who can only wonder what their future will be with adults who cannot get along. What are we setting them up for after we are gone?

Kamala Harris said it. There is no vaccine for racism. And our country is suffering enormously from this disease. In the Spring of 2019, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) reported that there were 1,020 hate groups identified, representing a 7 percent increase over the 940 identified in 2018. (see “Race Against Change, Spring, 2019: vol 166”) More recently, SPLC has reported twenty-seven hangings of black people, often uninvestigated and labeled as suicide. One suspects that at least many died by the hands of others.

The hate, fear, and division we are seeing is an explosion now threatening to overcome the work of people all across this nation who share Dr. Martin Luther King’s vision that all our children be able to be live together in harmony.

It was sixty-three years ago this week that Martin Luther King presented his vision for this kind of society at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. with his “I Have a Dream” speech, during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963, in which he called for civil and economic rights and an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the speech was a defining moment of the civil rights movement and among the most iconic speeches in American history.[2][3]

The new total of 1020 hate groups monitored by the SPLC in 2018, topped the previous high of 1,018 reached in 2011, during the height of a backlash against President Obama, the first black president. From 2011 to 2014, the number fell by nearly 25 percent, to 784. Trump has, as former U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford said, “unearthed some demons.” In 2019, the total number of hate groups tracked by SPLC dipped by about 8 percent-940 compared to the record high of 1,020 in 2018. However, this decline does not reflect a significant diminishment of the radical right or a fundamental shift in the general trend of the last several years, given the increased activity among white nationalist hate groups.

As Sam Decker writes in the enclosed article:

“The intolerance to voices demanding equal justice, and the determination to uphold a racialized-class hierarchy (to “Make America Great Again”) has, and always will, directly and indirectly, end in the cancellation of people’s lives, especially people of color.”

Sam Becker responds to the recent protest in Rogue River and the political battle playing out across our nation Becker

(return to index)

View online .

Dispatch from Rogue River, Oregon. Calls for Racial Justice Met With Trumpism.

In Rogue River, Oregon, members of the Rogue River Police Department and self-identified militia from the Rogue Valley collaborated to cancel an educational, family-friendly event seeking to facilitate dialogue about the local impacts of systemic racism.

On August 29, 2020, protestors advocating for racial justice, along with right-wing, heavily armed counter-protesters, converged outside the Rogue River City Hall. The two groups were divided by two lanes of asphalt that crawled with flag-toating vehicles armed with air-shattering engines and local and county law enforcement.

The event was organized by the Southern Oregon Coalition for Racial Equity (SOEquity), a group of community members seeking to dismantle racist systems through education. Symptomatic of the incendiary and delusional media drip-fed through cable news and Facebook, the event was naturally caught in the line of sight of far-right agitators. Antifa, the infamous boogeyman of the moment, was going to loot and destroy Rogue River. Marxists were building their insurrection here. The Black Lives Matter Movement, apparently a hotbed of terrorist activity, was coming to loot and burn the town. The counter-protesters gleefully struck fear into the hearts of sympathetic bystanders, brandishing their newly-minted rhetoric.

Threats of violence towards organizers and attendees, including death threats, accumulated in Facebook comment sections. No one was killed or seriously injured, and, unsurprising from a would-be BBQ for racial justice, no looting occurred, but the event was a harrowing reminder of the zealous, extreme grip the ruling political party has on America.

Standing in the afternoon sun, I got the sense the counter-protestors were not solely out supporting their leader, Trump, despite the flags. He was a means to an end, and he himself was not the end.

He gave them this platform. Quite literally a flag to rally around, and an ideology hollow enough – and an information sphere so far removed from reality – that delusional fantasies and far-right politics sweep in to fill the vacuous space at the heart of American politics.

Liberals are left only to respond, with little to no counter program which proposes a positive version of this society, other than being slightly more appealing than the man who presides.

And how could you respond, really? The only reality of Trumpism is that it exists in its own universe.

Early in the protest, a white counter-protester asked me why I was carrying a sign that read, “BLACK LIVES MATTER.” “In America,” I said, “we live in a society in which Black people have and continue to be treated poorly because of the color of their skin. Until Black lives matter just as much as white lives, I will be advocating for Black lives.” He wasn’t sold and proceeded to go on a rant about the importance of patriotism and military service – how it related, I am still unsure.

The psychological and rhetorical untangling required to reach a point of common understanding takes much longer than a few sentences. It takes relationships. And even then, the notion that reaching across the aisle is a plausible solution feels a long shot. I found myself questioning its efficacy.

I arrived at 10:15 am. By then, engines, an exceptional symbol of industrial power, already drowned out the voices calling for racial equity. It was an anxious, unfiltered noise born from the ignition of fossil fuels.

The air was thick with exhaust, and it felt apropos; the pollution of profit, extraction, and industrialization framed the counter-protestors, whose party green-lights similar political projects with reckless abandon.

An unmasked Jackson County Sheriff officer’s bald head glimmered in the hot sun.

Over 100 people gathered on each side. Those of us protesting the layers of systemic racism baked into our county and country gathered peacefully to listen to people of color share their stories about its psychological and physical consequences. A counter-protester on the other side of the street routinely made a revving motion with her hand to the fleet of motorcycles stationed on her side of the street. More noise and exhaust.

The gun-toting counter-protesters joined Rogue River Chief of Police Curtis Whipple, along with a number of Jackson County Sheriff officers in not masking. “It’s my choice,” Whipple told me as he wove his way between opposing sides. The COVID-19 fallout is yet to be determined.

Various renditions of Trump 2020 flags, along with the Blue Lives Matter, American, Don’t Tread On Me, and Confederate flags, were held erect by counter-protestors. They mirrored those billowing from trucks and motorcycles, whose drivers yelled obscenities, flashed white power symbols, and held out middle fingers.

I immediately felt them leveraging the negative externalities of American capitalism: white power, in the form of police-militia collaboration, patriarchy, in the growling anger of middle-aged men, and pollution, as vehicles discharged exhaust into the afternoon. At protests for racial equality across the country, including Rogue River, male-dominated police and militia have each others’ back, a performance to maintain control amidst a world that is increasingly disgusted by their power.

On our side of the street, those talking through a megaphone were patient, waiting for the industrial din to die down. We listened and we chanted; we held space for voices oppressed by the ideology displayed on the other side of the street.

April Ehrlich @AprilEhrlich

They condemn cancel culture, which, to them, is an affront to the First Amendment. But, from the police-militia collaboration to cancel the event, along with the use of noise pollution to drown out organizers, they use it liberally. A deeper, more vile form of repression exists though. The intolerance to voices demanding equal justice, and the determination to uphold a radicalized-class hierarchy (to “Make America Great Again”) has, and always will, directly and indirectly, ended in the cancellation of people’s lives, especially people of color.

Volleys of yelling crossed the two lanes of the street. People touted their home-ownership as a means of justifying their presence at the event. People swore at each other. At the slightest sign of a potential altercation, attention was diverted; heads turned and people were drawn into the no man’s land only to be broken up by law enforcement.

I replayed the events of the day that night at 2:00 am. The animosity, faces frozen mid-yell, held in contrast to the call for justice. I never would have imagined the state we are in.

Sam Becker is an organizer from Talent and an editor with Counterbound. Twitter: @samhbecker This article was written with editorial support from Theo Whitcomb, a writer from Ashland and an editor with Counterbound. Twitter: @theo_whitcomb The visual art was created by Trevor Warren, a multimedia artist from Tacoma who designs, publishes, and edits visual art for Counterbound. Instagram: @trevorpwarren

PUBLIC STATEMENT FROM SOUTHERN OREGON COALITION FOR RACIAL EQUITY & event at Rogue River City Hall at 10:00 am on Saturday, August 29, 2020: state

Being Black and promoting equality should not be controversial
(return to index)

View online

Earlier this month, the Southern Oregon Coalition for Racial Equity (hereby referred to as SOEquity) announced we would be holding a community event and march in Rogue River, Oregon on Saturday, August 29, 2020 titled You Are Enough. The goal of this event was to provide a space for residents of Rogue River, especially young people of color, to share their experiences and educate the community on systemic racism. The original itinerary was to lawfully gather in front of Rogue River City Hall and collectively march to the nearby Palmerton Park, where a family-friendly barbecue would take place.

Both actions do not require permits and are protected by the First Amendment right to peacefully assemble. The City of Rogue River reached out to SOEquity requesting that we apply for permits for this event regardless. As our primary goal is education and we have no desire to provoke conflict, we agreed to fill out the permits and pay the corresponding fees. Despite this good faith effort, the City of Rogue River denied our park reservation request and parade permit stating that the Palmerton Park Pavilion had already been reserved and that they did not have the manpower to allow for us to march in the streets. They requested that we stay on the sidewalks and added that we were still welcome to gather in another area of Palmerton Park. We agreed to abide by these requests.

On Wednesday, August 26, 2020, we learned that a group known as the “Rogue River Patriots” had reserved the Palmerton Park Pavilion. Based on screenshots from their Facebook group, they did so with the express intent of disrupting the You Are Enough event and silencing the voices of their fellow residents. The screenshots shared with SOEquity also state that the Rogue River Patriots were working directly with the Rogue River Police Department.

Specifically, one post by a group admin says:

RR POLICE DEPARTMENT: REQUESTED WE “HANG BACK” AND FOLLOW THEIR LEAD. DO NOT PROVOKE PROTESTORS – THEY’LL BE WATCHING FOR PROVOCATIONS FROM THE PROTESTORS AND ACTING ON OUR BEHALF

Based on this knowledge and screenshots of violent threats from other Rogue River residents, SOEquity looked for an alternative location to protect the integrity of the event and the safety of its participants. Two of our organizers reached out to a Board Member of the Evans Valley Community Center as we believed their values aligned with those of our event and they had previously hosted events with a similar structure of community dialogue, food and music. Their website states: “Evans Valley Community Association is a community-focused organization dedicated to fostering participation in education, arts, agriculture, recreation, civic and social activities for all ages.”

As the You Are Enough event was educational in nature and promoted civic engagement, the Evans Valley Community Association agreed to host the event. One of our organizers went to the Community Center to pay the rental fee and sign the Facilities Use Agreement on August 27, 2020.

On the morning of August 28, 2020, SOEquity Vice President, Dominique Toyer received an unsolicited phone call from Rogue River Police Chief Whipple asking about the details of the You Are Enough event. Ms. Toyer explained that the event had been moved to a private event space for security reasons.

After confirming we were permitted to use the Evans Valley Community Center, we announced the change in location later in the day on August 28, 2020. Just a few hours after this announcement, one of our organizers received a message from an Evans Valley Community Association Board Member that the Board had voted to revoke SOEquity’s rental agreement. The statement announced the event as cancelled (which the Evans Valley Community Association never confirmed with SOEquity) stating that “this event is not a good fit for the Rogue River/Wimer community.”

With this timeline and the multiple attempts to prevent a community barbecue from happening, the City of Rogue River, its community members and its leaders have sent a clear message: supporting people of color is not permitted in Rogue River.

Since these events, SOEquity organizers have received screenshots of further threats of violence and attempts to publicly identify our leaders to opposition groups for intimidation purposes. All of these screenshots are included in this statement.

The Southern Oregon Coalition for Racial Equity is not a hate group. We are an organization of community members working to improve and educate our community and remove racist systems that allow for discrimination and oppression of community members of color to occur. The fact that we want to engage in a discussion around race is apparently so radical to the residents of Rogue River that they have effectively prevented a family-friendly barbecue from occurring. Make no mistake. The only threats of violence and calls for escalation and unsafe actions were from community members who oppose the very existence of a group dedicated to promoting racial equity. That is racism.

While the community barbecue portion of our You Are Enough event has been postponed, we are still calling on our members and the residents of Rogue River who believe that equality will prevail over hate to gather lawfully and nonviolently in front of Rogue River City Hall at 10:00 am on Saturday, August 29, 2020. We will stand with a clear message: being Black and promoting equality should not be controversial.

Questions can be sent to Kayla Wade, Founder and President of the Southern Oregon Coalition for Racial Equity at southernoregonequity@gmail.com.

A song by David Rovics about a few of those murdered by criminal police song

(return to index)

LEARN/TAKE ACTION ON PEACE ISSUES (on Peace House webs

PEACE HOUSE

Rogue River Racism Emerges from the Shadows by Elizabeth V. Hallett, Executive Director, Peace House

Read more on Clear Actions

10 ways to be prepared and grounded now that Trump has won

Support Peace House

Sign Up for the Newsletter

Share the News

Upcoming Events

Clan Dyken Beauty Way Tour Concert

Election 2024: What does it mean for climate action?

Contact Us

Follow us

Calendar

Clan Dyken Beauty Way Tour Concert

Election 2024: What does it mean for climate action?

About Us

Our Work

Get Involved

Sign Up for Clear Actions Newsletter