ST LOUIS, Mo (Reuters) – Young black protesters from Ferguson, Missouri, want to keep their anger focused on the fatal police shooting of unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown as their movement takes on a national dimension that threatens to dilute it.
During a weekend of demonstrations marking the two-month anniversary since Brown, an African American, was killed by a white police officer, protesters challenged the outsiders who arrived in Ferguson pushing an array of agendas.
“The outside people don’t know the real struggle. I can’t afford to buy plane tickets and hotel rooms like all of these can. They come and cause trouble with their expensive phones and then go home to their rich neighbourhoods,” said Tory Russell, a local organiser with Hands Up United, which helped put together the weekend demonstrations dubbed Ferguson October.
In Ferguson and St Louis, young local leaders want to keep their focus on demands for the arrest and indictment of Darren Wilson, the police officer who shot Brown and triggered a national uproar over racial profiling and police brutality.
But members of the Occupy Wall Street movement, the Revolutionary Communist Party and even Palestinian activists have joined the protests.
On Saturday’s rally in downtown St Louis to kick off the weekend’s events, protesters carried signs on everything from Palestine to climate change. Socialists handed out newsletters and activists from Minneapolis told people about their drive to change police rules in their city.
