Excerpt from the Dayton Daily News
As protests continued across the Dayton region, Ohio and the country this past week, many people have wondered what could be done to combat the systemic racism motivating the movement.
So the Dayton Daily News asked five area experts for their recommendations on what the Dayton region and the nation could do to make a difference. Sharon Lynette Jones, WSU professor of English language and literature, made the following comments:
People can reach out to organizations. Often times, people don’t feel comfortable doing that, but there are different civil rights organizations that people could try to become a member of. My experience is a lot of organizations are very happy to have people volunteer.
There are a lot of people practicing social distancing now, as we should, because of the (COVID-19) pandemic. But there are all kinds of ways in which people could engage in social justice activism through social media and groups that are working and advocating in that particular manner.
People have to keep in mind that it’s important to hold elected officials accountable. So really do your research in terms of what their stance is related to issues of how people are treated by the police or issues that are related to social and economic justice.
It’s important to not make generalizations about other people. Certainly, there are people in law enforcement who are committed to social justice. We know there have been cases of people in law enforcement whose actions have been really counter to that. But keep in mind the importance of working with other people, and having a recognition that there are people out there who are protesting who just want everything to be better, to be equitable for everybody.
