A public forum to “discuss possible community-wide responses to a planned hate group rally in May”.

As I’ve mentioned, the KKK has decided to drive two hours to come to Dayton, Ohio. Why this terrorist group is … well, not treated like a terrorist group… still mystifies me.

Regardless, last night there was a public forum to discuss possible responses.

I took my phone and live-streamed it for those who couldn’t attend, and I’ve put a (slightly) edited version up on YouTube. (See the end for a list of edits.) It’s a little potato quality because I was streaming it and, well, limitations of hardware. And I apologize for my loud breathing.

A few thoughts and impressions:

• While Mike Turner wasn’t there (AFAIK, and not surprising), his opinion that people should stay away (for “safety”) was echoed quite a bit.
• There are some good points to this: the banners and decorations celebrating diversity to be hung in the square (for example) are a great idea.
• If you just watched or read the coverage, you would have gotten the impression that there was a pretty unified voice with everyone agreeing to stay away. This is incorrect. There were several people (myself in my breakout session, or another gentleman you can see at 55’31”) who don’t think silence is enough.
• There were quite a few people who thought there should be more meetings like this for the other issues facing the city (also something I agree with).
• I got the distinct impression that the mediators (who facilitated the breakout sessions) were invested in the idea of keeping people away as well.

I’ll write more about why I think just ignoring them is a bad response, but here’s a quotation that really gets the point across:

Edits to the YouTube version:

• Cut out approximately 25 minutes of a whole lot of nothing happening before the start of the meeting and about 5 minutes of people taking seats at the end of the breakout sessions
• Cut out me walking to my breakout group session.
• The breakout group session was not broadcast or recorded at the request of some of the members of my group.

Featured image is a screenshot from the WDTN coverage. I’m center row, left side, second row.