“Hundreds march in Carbondale to 'demand justice for all black lives”.

June 05, 2020 , by Brian Munoz | Southern Illinoisan

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Pictured #SIULAW JD/MSW student Jerricha Griffin (’21) speaks to the hundreds of citizens who gathered for a Black Lives Matter rally at the Carbondale City Hall and then marched to the police station on Friday, June 5th.

"Jerricha Griffin picked up this history lesson in her address to the crowd at the end of the march."

"She said the U.S., even before it was an established country, employed centuries of legal oppression of black and minority persons."

“We’re not new to this. We are true to this,” she said of black protests over their treatment at the hands of white oppressors."

"Griffin said people in the black community have a shared history of trauma rooted in oppression, and their ways of life are often shaped by this trauma. But, she was quick to point out that many are not living with post-traumatic stress. This is because the trauma is not yet over. She said she and other black Americans live with CTSD — continuous traumatic stress disorder. She said military veterans or police officers are treated for these conditions while black and brown people are not."

“We don’t get understanding. We get murdered,” Griffin said. (Jerricha Griffin, para 9-13)

To read the complete southern Illinoisan article click here