NO MORE SILENCE

Black Lives Matter co-founder calls for action, change

Opal Tometi, co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement and executive director of the Black Alliance for Just Immigration, challenged East Carolina University students to make a difference during the N.C. Civility Summit on Saturday.

“We can’t continue to sit on our hands and sit idly by as people are being brutalized, disenfranchised and left out of the system,” she said.

Tometi was the keynote speaker for the event at Mendenhall Student Center. The summit was aimed at promoting dialogue and positive change both on campus and beyond, and featured breakout sessions on topics such as race, gender, religion, class divisions and human trafficking.

Quoting Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Tometi said, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

Opal Tometi

She explained that the Black Lives Matter movement was founded out of love and support for all people. “Civility is the recognition that all people have dignity that’s inherent to their person, no matter their religion, race, gender, sexuality or ability,” Tometi said.

It has grown from a hashtag started on social media platforms to become an international organization with more than 30 chapters worldwide, she said. “We are committed to acknowledging, respecting and celebrating difference.”

Regarding the N.C. Civility Summit and events she has attended on other university campuses, Tometi said, “I’m encouraged that this summit is not just one speech … that there are other sessions with different topics. We don’t just have one issue that we’re concerned about. Let’s dig into that a little bit more and tease out the ways that our lives are more complex than that and more vibrant than that.”

More than 300 people registered for the summit, said Mark Matulewicz, president of the Student Government Association, which co-sponsored the event along with the Black Student Union, Student Activities Board, LGBT Resource Office and Student Involvement and Leadership.

Freshman Sonya Valdman said she was interested in hearing other people’s opinions on the discussion topics, while sophomore Jessie Jefferys, SGA senator, noted that such events serve as a starting point for creating solutions.

“ECU is a school that’s noted for creating solutions on campus and not just talking about them,” Jefferys said.

Students traveled from other campuses to attend, including Timothy Johnson, who came with a group from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.

“One thing that we’re pushing right now is voter engagement, so we’re just trying to get students more involved in terms of the cultural aspects of why it’s important to vote and also to be aware of your surroundings,” said Johnson, a graduate assistant with the UNCW Office of Student Leadership and Engagement.

The N.C. Civility Summit speaks to an important part of ECU’s mission, said Dr. Virginia Hardy, vice chancellor for student affairs.

“We seek to instill in our students respect for the process by which we seek truth, and for those who engage in that process,” she said. “We’re going to talk about some subjects about which there is going to be some disagreement, and that’s OK. What we want you to do is be able to express yourself openly and honestly, but also to be able to listen to the other person, and to respect that other person.”

Attendees at the NC Civility Summit listen as Tometi talks about the importance of civil dialogue and the necessity for taking action.