By pursuing a restraining order against members of Black Lives Matter, Mall of America has just guaranteed that the eyes of the country will be watching the inevitable confrontation on the day before Christmas Eve.
Black Lives Matter, which has staged peaceful and effective demonstrations across the country, plans to have a rally on Wednesday to draw attention to the November 15 killing of Jamar Clark by police in North Minneapolis. Authorities have refused to release the video of the event.
Our right to free speech and assembly, the first right guaranteed in the Bills of Rights, is the cornerstone of our liberty. It is what set America apart at our founding. It’s what makes us free and allows us to speak freely and criticize our government.
That right has seldom been more important that it has been during the past few years. Social media has added a vibrancy and complexity to the American people’s collective voice, and we have heard that voice call for us to finish the efforts for true civil rights — work that’s been stalled for some 40 or more years.
And the message of Black Lives Matter — the idea that our society at large does not regard a black life with the same value as a white life — may very well be the most important and relevant message that Americans need to hear.
Their right to peacefully demonstrate, whether at Rockefeller Center, the United Nations or the Mall of America, should not be restrained. The fact that Wednesday is one of the biggest shopping days of the year is of no consequence compared with their right to assemble.
Mall of America’s efforts to stop this demonstration is an arcane throwback to efforts to stymie the civil rights movement, and it promises to be wholly ineffective. A similar scene unfolded a year ago when Black Lives Matters protesters chose the mall to raise awareness of the deaths of Michael Brown in Ferguson and Eric Garner in New York. This year, the demonstration promises to be more personal, as it is a hometown death.
Black Lives Matter organizer Miski Noor has said that a restraining order will not stop the group from protesting.
What the restraining order could do, however, is make a criminal of every civil rights demonstrator who attends the protest. I’m not sure the owners of Mall of America have thought through what it will look like if police in riot gear show up to their mall two days before Christmas to arrest peaceful protesters. They should have responded with open arms to those with such an important message, not with an outstretched arm holding a court order.
With all the publicity this request for a restraining order has drawn, there will likely be hundreds more protesters than there would have been otherwise. And more news crews, too.
Soon the stage will be set. Restraining order or not, on the day before Christmas Eve, protesters will assemble at the Mall of America; there will be cameras; and millions will be watching.
What happens next will tell us volumes about who we are as a society and how much further we have to go to achieve the dream of true equality.