"Car Rally for Black Lives Matter"
Eight days before the Vancouver, Wash. “Car Rally for Black Lives Matter,” organizers Jasmine Tolbert and Brittini Lasseigne thought they could get as many as 50 cars to participate to honor the memory of George Floyd and all Black people killed due to racism and police brutality. Participation far exceeded their expectations.
NAACP Vice President Tolbert led a communication phone call Friday, May 29, and Lasseigne joined representing YWCA Clark County. The WSU Vancouver alumnae talked about providing a COVID-19 friendly way for people to support the Black Lives Matter movement and protest peacefully against police brutality. A car rally seemed logical because it would keep people physically distanced. They gave themselves just eight days to plan.
The next Monday they issued a press release. In no time, they registered 300 cars. By the June 6 event, 1,500 cars had registered. An hour before start time, 3,000 people were in the parking lot of Town Center Plaza at 5411 E. Mill Plain Boulevard. Their cars were adorned with paint and signs that read “BLM,” “End Police Brutality” and “#saytheirnames.” Several short speeches were given before the motorcade headed west on East Mill Plain Boulevard to the Port of Vancouver Terminal 1.
“People brought food. People were laughing, crying, yelling and throwing donations out their car windows,” said Lasseigne. “And it didn’t stop there. People reached out to volunteer and to donate. People reaching out was the beauty of it.”
“I got to see support from people who look like me and people who don’t like me. People empathize with me. I am not alone in this,” said Tolbert.
"Say Their Names"
“Say Their Names” is a sound-based memorial to the thousands of Black, Asian, Hispanic and Native American people brutalized and murdered by police actions or while in police custody. The intent is to bear witness to the memories of these people and their lives cut short as we hear their names. “Say Their Names” speaks the name of each victim aloud, and displays on screen the name, age, date and place of death for 2,000 victims of police killings and/or murders identified between 2015 and the present.
“Say Their Names” is a collaborative project of Creative Media and Digital Culture faculty member John Barber; CMDC Technician Greg Philbrook; and CMDC Electronic Literature Lab Manager Holly Slocum.
“Each of us undertook different roles to bring this project together in a matter of days in response to the resounding chant heard in protests around the world, to ‘Say Their Names,’” said Barber.