“Get Together: One-on-one Conversations Across the Color Line”
Sponsored by the Athens Anti-Discrimination Movement
Sunday, August 6
3:30 to 4:30 PM
Multipurpose Room B
Athens-Clarke County Library
Free and open to the public
For more information: patricia.priest@yahoo.com
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The Athens Anti-Discrimination Movement (AADM) is sponsoring an event called “Get Together: One-on-one Conversations Across the Color Line” to bring diverse people together to get to know one another in a fun, informal way and to get past stereotypes.
Attendees at this free, public event will cross color boundaries to pair up in turn with various people they do not know during the hour-long event. Conversation starters provided over a sound system will include prompts such as what attendees were like in high school, what their grandparents were like, who served as a role model when they were young, what should be changed about Athens, what historical period they would like to dip into, and more.
People can also suggest questions that day to be read to the crowd or submit them beforehand via the AADM’s Facebook page. Attendees can sit or stand while they chat with a new person for each question.
The conversational pairings will take place on Sunday, August 6th, from 3:30 to 4:30 PM in Multipurpose Room B at the Athens-Clarke County Library on Baxter Street.
This event was organized as a response to yet another not-guilty verdict involving a police officer who killed a black man — most recently an acquittal for the officer in Minnesota who killed a black motorist named Philando Castile. Mokah Johnson, who with her husband Knowa founded the Athens Anti-Discrimination Movement, said, “Officers are usually acquitted because juries often fear blacks and so give the police such a wide latitude in their responses that officers get away with murder. These cases generate a sense of despair and anger among many Americans.”
Pat Priest, one of the organizers of the event, said, “Mokah, Knowa and I were so disheartened by yet another travesty of justice. I think part of the problem is that many whites don’t know enough blacks or see them depicted only in crime stories on Atlanta TV stations. I especially hope that locals from all around Athens who don’t know many people of color will come to meet some of the nicest folks in town!”
For more information contact Pat Priest (patricia.priest@yahoo.com).