The founder of the Black Lives Matter of Columbus is moving to New York for graduate studies, but the activist organization is continuing.
Columbus native Brittany King, 29, launched the organization in July 2016, days after she organized a peaceful, public protest July 6, 2016, in downtown Columbus of the much-publicized police killings of several unarmed black men in other parts of the country. About 20 of her friends, mostly local residents in their 20s, joined her at Second and Washington streets in front of Columbus City Hall.
King said a leadership group consisting of Tosha Lafferty, Jessarae Emberton and Rick Scalf recently began guiding the organization as a team without using traditional organizational titles. Emberton has been a chapter leader since it began, and Scalf came aboard shortly afterward.
Chapter meetings, separate from the planned events, have averaged 20 to 25 people.
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“I have no anxiety in leaving,” said King, who told chapter leaders of her plans in March and will leave by Aug. 17. “I have no doubt in their capabilities to keep moving forward with the work, raising awareness and staying unapologetic about the ugly truth of (racism in) America.”
The chapter’s mission “focuses on peaceful protest to injustices to invoke necessary changes locally, and to assist with national reform to the criminal justice system,” according to its Facebook page at Black Lives Matter of Columbus IN.
In its two-year existence locally, it has organized education-oriented film presentations; Martin Luther King Day speakers; rallies to support predominantly black and suffering communities such as Flint, Michigan, and its water crisis; and panel discussions on topics such as colorism.
Most of its attendees are white. Blacks represent 2.3 percent of the estimated 2016 Bartholomew County population, compared to 88.8 percent that are white, 6.7 percent Asian and 6.5 percent Hispanic.
King has been the most visible member of the chapter, most recently delivering emotional remarks on racism and other topics before more than 300 people as part of the Martin Luther King Day Community Breakfast Jan. 15.
She is leaving Columbus to pursue a master’s degree in journalism via a cultural reporting and criticism program at New York University in New York City. She previously earned a creative writing degree from IUPUC in 2014. She said she is uncertain of where her additional education will lead, but doubts she will return to her hometown.
King added that she has been motivated partly by the work of black journalist and civil rights and women’s activist Ida B. Wells, who died in 1931.
Emberton said the community needs to understand the significance of King’s leadership, despite what some might view as hurdles to her work: being young, black and a woman, as Emberton out it.
“It was very brave of Brittany,” Emberton said of the organization’s formation and early work. “And I think it shows her amazing maturity to take such incredible scrutiny.”
The chapter will continue to press on “until there is true racial equality,” Emberton said. “There is still an undercurrent of people who don’t want us around.”
Tosha Lafferty, who joined the chapter in November 2016 and the board in April 2017, mentioned that part of local residents’ misunderstanding of the organization’s role serves as proof for its need. Lafferty said she has regularly had to remind people that the group’s leaders aren’t asking for preferential treatment for blacks in police, legal or other situations, but equal and fair treatment across the board.
“A lot people still are assuming that we are saying black lives are the only lives that matter,” Lafferty said.
Instead, group leaders have said black lives matter just as much as other lives.
Plus, Lafferty and others noticed when leaders wearing Black Lives Matter of Columbus T-shirts gathered on Saturday for a video shoot at Columbus City Hall, a passing motorist leaned out a car window and shouted a profanity at them.
Lafferty said she wants to help the organization build its profile and awareness locally, and perhaps engage in elements of community service through efforts such as working amid the local network of food pantries.
“I definitely would like to see us take on more community causes,” Lafferty said.
Throughout her leadership, King has referenced her Christian faith as being a motivating and stabilizing force in her leading Black Lives Matter of Columbus.
“There were times where I didn’t think I could continue with the work — because this work takes a huge emotional, mental and physical toll on you. But I truly know God guided me and helped me through every bit of it,” King said.
The local leader added that she will continue an issues-oriented life in New York.
“I will be an activist until the day I die,” she said.
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Here are a few significant dates in the local chapter’s history:
- July 6, 2016: Columbus native Brittany King and some friends organize a peaceful protest of police killings of unarmed black men in American cities.
- July 12, 2016: King and friends announce plans in a news story to launch a chapter of Black Lives Matter of Columbus.
- Jan. 16, 2017: Black Lives Matter draws its biggest crowd of 150 people to a Martin Luther King Jr. Day program.
- Jan. 15, 2018: Black Lives Matter draws 85 people to a Martin Luther King Jr. Day panel discussion of King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail.
- March 2018: Founder and organizer Brittany King decides to continue her college studies away from Columbus.
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When: 6 to 8 p.m. Aug. 13.
Where: The Bartholomew County Public Library, 536 Fifth St. in Columbus.
Focus: Writing letters of emotional support to two black inmates at Wabash Valley Correctional Facility in Carlisle. People need to “hear their stories,” chapter founder Brittany King said.
Information: Facebook page at Letter Writing Meet-Up (for Myron & Jimmy).
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