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A Black woman sat on the grass outside an L.A. church. The cold welcome she recorded speaks volumes
Link to tweet
A Black woman sat on the grass outside an L.A. church. The cold welcome she recorded speaks volumes
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-11/la-me-alex-marshall-brown-st-pauls-lutheran-church-north-hollywood
https://www.facebook.com/alexmarshallbrown/posts/10105446046106991
The story I’m about to tell you began one hot afternoon this week on the lawn of an L.A. church, where a young Black woman sought peace in the leafy shade of a tree to paint her toenails emerald green and do some laptop research on a road trip she planned to take to the Grand Canyon.
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Marshall-Brown, who has lived in the church’s neighborhood for years, had been sitting on its lush green lawn for less than 15 minutes on Tuesday, she told me, when a pair of what appeared to be bicycle cops rolled up. She noticed the yellow-shirted “safety ambassadors” from the North Hollywood Business Improvement District but at first paid them no mind — until one of them stood in front of her and the other at her side, at which point, she said, “my spidey sense is going wild.”
When one of the men told her that she was on private property, she calmly pointed out that she was outside a church, on a lawn with no fence or “No Trespassing” sign. They stayed put. She stayed put, continuing to paint her nails. Before they rode off, she asked them what would happen next, and they told her that if she did not leave, someone likely would call the police.
Marshall-Brown, wondering who had made the first call, then noticed women in the windows of the church’s preschool across the street, clearly monitoring her without looking at her directly. Then one came out and, without speaking, walked behind her to check that the church doors were locked.
Soon after, two older white men appeared on the church property, cutting across the lawn straight to her side of the tree. One held a “No Trespassing” sign and a power tool. Neither said anything to her.
Each time I watch the video, that realization hits me like a gut punch — that these people from a church were dehumanizing her by treating her as an other, to be dispensed with without so much as a “How do you do?”
On the video, it is Marshall-Brown who speaks first.
“Hello,” she says, to which the man with the sign and power tool replies, “Welcome.”
“Am I?” she asks, to which he replies, “No.”
Each time I watch, I feel queasily certain that my presence on the lawn would not have elicited any such response — simply because of the color of my skin.
Again, watch the footage for yourself. Watch the man obliquely refer to the homeless people in the neighborhood by telling Marshall-Brown that the church has “a lot of problems with people here from the park vandalizing.”
Watch him, as he screws in the sign, say, “When people aren’t nice, we’re not nice,” and answer her query about why he thinks she has “been unkind” with the words: “Ma’am. We have to treat everybody the same. All lives matter.”
“All lives matter.” Think about that. Think about the coded ways people try to couch their true meaning in words they hope will give their thoughts cover but don’t.
It’s a coding that continues to appear on the video as an older woman from the preschool appears and starts filming Marshall-Brown, talking about the need to protect the children because of people who show up on the property, and “you don’t know what they’re going to do.”
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-11/la-me-alex-marshall-brown-st-pauls-lutheran-church-north-hollywood
https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2020/07/08/north-hollywood-church-apologizes-volunteers-no-trespassing-signs-black-woman-sitting-under-tree/
North Hollywood Church Apologizes For Volunteers Who Posted ‘No Trespassing’ Signs Because Of Black Woman Sitting Under Tree
The church addressed the incident in a Facebook post, saying that the incident was not handled “in a way representative of the church or the school” and said the volunteers involved in the incident have stepped down from their positions.
“The disrespect demonstrated by the individuals does not represent the attitude of St. Paul’s First,” St. Paul’s school’s acting Principal Santiago Botero said in the statement. “I was out of town at the time of the incident, but I believe it could’ve and should’ve been handled more respectfully.”
While the church has a policy against loitering within a certain radius of the church’s school for the safety of the children in response to incidents of vandalism, Botero said Marshall-Brown was clearly not harming any person or property.
Marshall-Brown said she met with church leaders to discuss the incident on Wednesday.
“They were very contrite and willing to engage in a dialogue and acknowledge the fault of the incident, and they pointed out I was not deserving of that behavior,” she said.
35 replies
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the "Church volunteers had to step down from their positions".
Heartstrings
Maybe ask if she were hungry....or homeless....or just sit there and have a nice conversation.
FUCK YOU RACIST HYPCRITES!!
AND ANOTHER THING, DON'T POKE HOLES IN TREES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!