Mr. Mayor and Common Council Officials
Love the mural on lower Warren St.! Would love to compliment [sic] it with a "Back The Blue" mural. What are the steps we need to take to make this happen? Would like your, the Common Council's input on placement of the aforementioned "Back The Blue" street art. Is there a maximum size and specific paint to use? Any helpful information in regard to this matter would be greatly appreciated.
We respect our neighbors right to express themselves freely. We only ask that we too are afforded the same opportunity to express ourselves freely.
Sincerely,
Back The Blue ConstituentsThere is no indication of who the "Back The Blue Constituents" making this request actually are. Are they Hudson residents? Or do they live elsewhere in the county?
It will be remembered that, in June, Back the Blue demonstrators engaged in a shouting match with Black Lives Matter protesters in the village square in Kinderhook. Lance Wheeler's video of that altercation can be viewed on YouTube. The image below is a screen capture from that video.
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| Screen capture: Lance Wheeler|YouTube |
The Register-Star article back in June about the opposing rallies in Kinderhook shares this information:
Rosenstrach . . . said he chose Kinderhook for the site of the rally because he wanted to keep it local, but due to the success of Thursday's rally, he is hoping to schedule more, in other areas of Columbia County in the near future.To Gossips' knowledge, there hasn't been another Back the Blue rally in Columbia County, but there was one on Sunday in Cairo across the river.
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No no no. False equivalence.
ReplyDeleteThere's no legitimate argument for not permitting it if the requestor is a resident. That's how the First Amendment works -- it cuts both ways.
ReplyDeleteI don't see how BLM and Back the Blue are mutually exclusive - one should support the other. There are bad actors on each side, certainly. Why not have the two murals intersect in some way to show solidarity? If CoVid has taught us anything it is the need for us all to build each other up and create a community we can be proud of.
ReplyDeleteI strongly disagree. This whole “Back the Blue” thing is not about supporting the police, it is fundamentally anti-BLM. It’s very racist. BLM is about addressing police brutality and 400 years of slavery and systemic racism. There are no “blue” people, it’s a job. I concede that John Friedman is right, they have a constitutional right to express themselves just like the KKK has a right to hold rallies. Fine. But don’t buy into their false equivalence trap.
DeleteThe Bill of Rights cuts every which way, something it's high time we celebrate again.
ReplyDeleteThe Bill of Rights was adopted in 1791 by a group of white men who had no intention or idea that it would ever apply to the enslaved Black population of this country, who did not become even theoretically "free" until almost a century later. Maybe save the celebration until the equal protection of freedoms has become an actuality for everyone.
ReplyDelete