SACRAMENTO, Calif — On May 29, after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, people across the Sacramento region went out to protest in solidarity and promote their common beliefs and community needs.
With looting and vandalism rising following peaceful demonstrations, the message for why people are protesting in Sacramento may have gotten lost.
Read a collection of reasons why people in the Sacramento region are out protesting:
George Floyd
"At what point do you stand up and say no more? At what point do you wait until it is in your household, 'til it's down the street, 'til it's at the next doorstep? Or, do you stand up now so it don't ever come to you?" Len Wash, a Modesto protestor, asked. "It's not about me. It's not about her. It's about all of us together. All lives matter. We just want to be fair. We just want to have a chance."
"I believe we brought honor to George Floyd, and I believe we set the standard in our community and we brought the community closer together," Paul Brinkley, a Stockton protest organizer, said. "All races showed up. It was all-American. It was multicultural. All races showed up. All ages showed up. And, it was everybody made it safe."
Police violence against black people
"My wife's grandfather was killed by a cop and my uncle. There are some bad cops that make some of y'all that do right look bad," Jamar Fox, a Stockton protester, said. "Just like in the hood, not everyone is a gangster or a thug, but there are some."
"I think the biggest thing we need right now, is accountability in the police force. Whenever a police officer commits a crime or does anything wrong, I don't see any kind of accountability," Curtis, a Sacramento protestor, said.
Social Justice
"What brought me out is really just changing the system. Getting in there for social justice and making our word heard. There are things that you don't see every day. There are things you don't see on a regular basis that affect whole minorities and groups of people that really need to take heed of right now. We need to be cognizant as a society and change those things we are seeing in the world." -- unnamed leader of a protest outside of Chick-Fil-A on the corner of Sierra College Boulevard and Douglas Boulevard in Roseville.
"We need police reform. We need education. We need white people to step up and call out your friends and stop being racist," Stephanie, a Sacramento protestor, said.
Helping the community heal
"We want to see healing; we want to see hope. And, so we felt for the police officers that were there. They are struggling too," Mission City Church Youth Pastor Shaylynn Castellon said.
"Display a peaceful protest, and that's it, in every sense of it," Deemar Johnson, a Stockton protest organizer, said. "And, that is what we did here today.
RELATED: African American leaders address 'unlawful use of force on peaceful protesters' in San Diego
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