Hundreds Rally in Williamstown to Stand With Charlottesville
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The rally was put together in a day.
The gathering swiftly organized by Greylock Together was one of nearly 800 known rallies against racism across the nation, including one at Park Square in Pittsfield by the Four Freedoms Coalition.
"A lot of people wanted to get to together and show support for our country against white nationalism, against domestic terrorism," Geraldine Shen said as a cacophony of horns blared in support as drivers entered the rotary. "I think people in our group are very action oriented and this was a good way to say this is an action that we could do."
Charlottesville was riven by protests as hundreds of neo-Nazis and white nationalist groups descended on the town over the weekend purportedly to protest the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee. There were small breakouts of violence between them and anti-racists and leftist groups; on Saturday, a 32-year-old woman was killed and more than two dozen injured when a car driven by an alleged white supremacist rammed through a march on a side street.
"We're just terrified at the state of the world right now," Christopher Thomas of North Adams, holding a Black Lives Matter sign, said.
He said the president hadn't seemed too concerned when David Duke, a member of the Ku Klux Klan, had endorsed him. Maybe that was just political ignorance at the time, Thomas said, but now someone has died and he felt the president had not taken a strong stand against racists but instead was talking about "many sides."
As 5 p.m. neared, the rally had dwindled to a few dozen people holding signs ranging from a simple "Love" to rainbows to "Change the system, save the world."
The local Greylock Together group formed in the wake of the last election to advocate for issues important to the community such as the environment, civil rights, health care and voting.
The group meets every other week and Sunday happened to be its regular meeting time.
"It was a natural extension to do something about what we saw happening in Virginia," Shen said. A notice and a Facebook post went out late Saturday afternoon, resulting in the high turnout on Sunday.
"It's important for people to feel like there is something they can physically do," she said. "Obviously this isn't solving the problem but it shows that our community is strong in our resolve."
Thomas was more direct in why he felt important to show up.
"I'm furious and I'm really mad and I don't know what to do and I'm trying to be peaceful," he said. "But I want to show I'm mad and I want to support the people who feel scared."
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