In Cleveland, a group of young people sat in a semi-circle in a studio just west of the Republican National Convention, and spoke about the shooting’s effect on them and about the American Dream.
In Washington, D.C., women from Black Youth Project 100 and BLM DC occupied the legislative office of the National Fraternal Order of Police on Capitol Hill.
In Oakland, demonstrators chained themselves to the door of the police department headquarters, holding a sign that read “no one is free until we are all free.”
Lead organizers inside believe the movement to be squarely at an intersection: Activists can’t allow there to be a public perception that they advocate violence against police officers, while a lack of action could spell the end of the movement altogether.
In interviews with nearly 20 organizers, leaders described Thursday’s demonstrations as a method to avoid characterizing the movement broadly as anti-police — or even hostile or violent towards officers. But leaders also described exasperation at how fatal police shootings aren’t decreasing and that there has not been mass action to reduce them, saying #FreedomNow was also a way to put the weight of the movement to bear on local-, state- and federally-elected officials to do something tangible.
Leaders spoke less about tactics and more about honing in a specific message to activists leading up to #FreedomNow. The movement’s messaging experts logged long hours in the days leading up to the action, providing talking points, catching up on specific cases where a police officer had killed someone, and even posting on Medium a statement that the movement has never called for attacks on police and questioned the outcry after a police officer is killed versus when a black person is killed.
“This movement has never called for the execution of law enforcement officers. Never. Still, many want to place the blame at our feet,” the post reads.
At turns hopeful, frustrated, and professorial in his address memorializing the five fallen officers in Dallas, Obama attempted to defuse some of the tension between police officers and the movement. “But even those who dislike the phrase ‘Black Lives Matter,’ surely we should be able to hear the pain of Alton Sterling’s family,” Obama said adding that “we have to do what we can, without putting officers’ lives at risk, but do better to prevent another life like his from being lost.
“With an open heart, we can worry less about which side has been wronged, and worry more about joining sides to do right.”