Hoodies on the Hill, a candlelight vigil, brought out citizens from all over Macon. Event organizers, Danny Glover, Doug Scott and Thaddeus Smith, say they believe the vigil is important to bring people together to remember Trayvon Martin, and a reminder of the necessity of unity and justice.
Throughout the United States, citizens from all over have gathered in honor and memoriam of Trayvon Martin, a teenager who was shot in Sanford, Florida.
George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer, says he killed Martin in self-defense after the teen punched him and slammed his head on the sidewalk, according to an Orlando Sentinel report that was later confirmed by Sanford police. One of the responding officers saw a wound on the back of Zimmerman’s head and a bloody nose, and noted that his back was wet, indicating he had been lying in the grass, according to the police report.
It is this account that is under direct scrutiny. Several people believe that Zimmerman did not act in self defense and pursued Martin out of his own free will. It is these discrepancies that have lead to people throughout the United States demanding justice in the death of Trayvon Martin. Many believe that Zimmerman should be tried in a court of law.
In Macon, Danny Glover, one of the event organizers said, “So you have a community of individuals that from all racial backgrounds, all religious backgrounds, forgetting themselves and thinking about the bigger picture.”
Another event organizer Doug Jones had this to say. “Everybody looks the same in a hoodie,” said Jones, “but everybody is not the same.
“We are here tonight because we want to heal,” said Chris Horne who ran for city council last year. “We want to reconcile. We are here because we can no longer abide by injustice and we are no longer willing to live in a world that is so divided that it thinks there are only white problems and black problems but not our problems.”
Drew Christian told NewsCentral, “We all need to support this movement that is going on and what happened. It’s a real tragedy what happened and that we don’t have the racial trust needed today between the minorities and the majority of the races.”
Drew Christian is just 14 years old, but felt strong enough to support the matter at hand.
Mothers and their children were gathered at Coleman Hill, alongside local politicians, and hooded people of all ages.
Drew’s Mother thinks Trayvon and Drew are comparable. She believes this situation could have involved her own son walking home from the local convenience store. She reflects on how it might feel to lose her child.
Dawn Christian, mother of 14 year-old Drew, spoke to NewsCentral “I cried, so I can’t even imagine what they feel, I don’t think there are words to express what they feel. There has got to be great pain, great tragedy, every emotion they can feel they are going through tight now, especially anger.”
In the closing prayer, Councilman and Rabbi Schlesinger, acknowledged that there has to be a greater plan brought about by God.”We know that you have a greater plan, and plans for us all,” said Rabbi Laurence Schlesinger.
