Black Lives Matter in Rural America (Part VI): Five stories out of "small towns"

Ok, so none of these five stories is based in a place that is "rural" by the U.S. Census Bureau's miserly definition:  a population cluster of fewer than 2,500 or living in "open territory."  These are from places I would characterize as small cities, mostly in micropolitan counties (non metro counties with a population cluster larger than 10,000 and a total population of no more than 100,000).

Catskill, New York, population 11,775,  is the dateline for the first story, "‘A Slap in the Face’: N.Y. Town Rejects Black Lives Matter Painting."  Sarah Maslin Nir reports.  Here's a short excerpt:

The street painting would stretch about three blocks, from Village Pizza II to the stoplight at the southern end of Main Street, spelling out “Black Lives Matter” on the pavement. 

The proposal didn’t seem like too much of an ask; in the weeks since George Floyd was killed by the police in Minneapolis, the phrase has been painted on streets from Washington, D.C., to Charlotte, N.C., and, on Thursday, even in front of Trump Tower in Manhattan. 

But village leaders in Catskill balked, offering several counterproposals instead, including one that would have allowed the painting, but in the Black area of town.

Next, Mike Baker reports from the other side of the country but also for the New York Times, dateline Selah, Washington, population 7,147, in Yakima County, in the central part of the state.  The headline is "Seeing ‘Black Lives Matter’ Written in Chalk, One City Declares It a Crime."  The subhead sums things up: "In a small Washington town where people of color say they have faced discrimination, activists ran into trouble for drawing “Black Lives Matter” in the streets. Then their white neighbors came to their defense."  Glad to know of the "balance" there--the white neighbors on the right side of the matter.  On a related note, it's interesting how provocative the writing or painting of "Black Lives Matter" on streets has proved to be, with people from New York City to Martinez, California attempting to paint over the city-sanctioned messaging.     

The next story in the Washington Post is out of southwest Virginia, Marion, population 6,000.  The headline is "A teen led a Black Lives Matter protest in his small town. A cross was burned in his yard."  An excerpt follows:  

For more than a month, as protesters in thousands of cities and towns across America had demanded an end to police brutality and systemic racism, people in Marion had watched in admiration or anger.

As Confederate statues fell in Richmond and the rebel flag was banned from NASCAR races and stripped from the Mississippi state flag, some hoped that change would also come to this sleepy corner of Appalachia. Others dreaded it.

Now America’s culture war had arrived in the form of competing protests, held on the same July 3 afternoon, in the same town. 

And at the center of it all was Travon, who in a few short months had gone from preparing for his high school track season to leading the largest civil rights march in Marion in a generation to being targeted with an apparent hate crime.

And then there is this, also from the Washington Post, which takes us back to the Midwest.  Tim Craig and Aaron Williams write under the headline, "A New Generation Challenges the Heartland,"dateline Fort Dodge, Iowa, population 25,206.  Here's an excerpt:  

The number of young people of color living in the Midwest has surged over the past decade, as the older white population has nearly stalled. Forty percent of the nation’s counties are experiencing such demographic transformations — a phenomenon fueling the Black Lives Matter protests that have swept the country and forced racial reckonings in communities, colleges and corporations nationwide. 

A Washington Post review of census data released last month showed that minorities make up nearly half of the under-30 population nationwide compared to just 27 percent of the over-55 population, signaling that the United States is on the brink of seismic changes in culture, politics and values. 

The protests reflect demographic changes that social scientists have long predicted would hit America around 2020 as the country moves closer toward becoming majority-minority. As this young, diverse cohort enters adulthood, it’s challenging the cultural norms and political views of older white Americans, said Stefan M. Bradley, a historian and professor of African American studies at Loyola Marymount University.

* * *

These Black Lives Matter protesters don’t always prioritize defunding police departments or tearing down Confederate statues. Their goals are simpler but perhaps just as revolutionary: to force white neighbors not used to encountering so many black and brown faces in their towns to acknowledge their experiences with racism. 

The final story is back to the New York Times, where Campbell Robertson published this, dateline Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, population 20,268, in the south central part of the state. Here's a key paragraph:

But beyond any policy changes, which could be slow in coming, a significant consequence of recent weeks could be the realization for many Americans in small towns that their neighbors are more multiracial and less willing to be quiet about things than most people had assumed.

That paragraph hints at both rural and small town lack of anonymity, and like so many other stories from recent weeks, it also defies the stereotype of stasis associated with rural communities.