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www.themaroontiger.com September 28 - October 4,2011 TROY DAVIS The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: It Will Be Tweeted DAVIS case draws support from Atlanta University Center as students protest his execution •4 continued from front page NAACP Chairwoman Roslyn Brock. They then joined other pro testers at Towaliga County Line Baptist Church for a prayer service and strategy session. NAACP chairman Ben Jealous, Ebenezer Bap tist Church Senior Pastor Rev. Raphael Warnock and Atlanta rappers Big Boi and Killer Mike also attended and gave compelling messages of hope and ceaseless perseverance to protesters. Around 6 p.m., passionate protesters left the church and began to march towards Jack- son State Prison, adamantly chanting phrases such as “Too much doubt, let Troy out!” and “NO justice, NO peace!” Simultaneously, unbe knownst to the crowd, Davis’s attorneys made a last hour appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking to grant Davis a stay. His execution was put on hold - only temporarily. Since his execution had been delayed three times before, AUC students were highly optimistic and jubi lant about the news, hugging each other and crying tears of joy. Donning T-shirts with Davis’s face, diversity among protesters was quite evident. Students comprised a major ity of the protesters, seeming ly reminiscent of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the 1960s. “We really showed how im portant this issue was by the amount of students that came out to support Troy Davis,” Deaweh Benson, a senior at Spelman College, said. News broke around 11 p.m. that the Supreme Court had denied his request, and that Davis had been executed. The “legal lynching” of Troy Davis, as Jealous would come to describe Davis’ case, was a shock to all. Student protest ers, though heartbroken and somewhat discouraged, knew their voices and actions had not gone unseen or unheard. Thursday classes through out the AUC were filled with discussions about the execu tion and its racial implica tions and overtones, election debates and the dissolution of capital punishment. Above all else, a flame was ignited among college-aged students to stand up and fight for what they vehemently believed in. Though race, ethnicity, and most poignantly age, separat ed protesters, Troy Davis un doubtedly united them. James Williams Assoc. Opinions Editor j ames.willi@yahoo.com I have a riddle for you. What is big, black, oppressed, and marches everywhere, but gets absolutely nowhere? Us. The case of Troy Davis taught me a few things, but highlighted several more. 1) Like many of the other sys tems here in the United States, the judicial system is broken. 2) Our world will never be grey and that racism is alive and well. 3) Politics will al ways be politics. Lastly, to be black here in the United States is a criminal offense punish able by death. However, more important ly, the lesson I learned from the Troy Davis murder (yes, murder), is that we as people of color are stifled and that we as a community have yet to evolve from the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. We as a people still believe the most effective way of dis playing our displeasure is through demonstration. We want change, so we march. We decorate our pretty little picket signs and wave them around threatening nothing more than our presence. We scream. We protest. And still- --nothing gets done. Our ineffectiveness is not due to the absence of a worthy cause. Unemployment in the black community is still more than 15 percent. Education in the inner city is still a mess. We are still being slighted in the justice system. Yet, we re main complacent with the sta tus quo and fall victim to this pervasive “old guard” mental ity that the way to be given attention is by screaming the loudest despite the fact that it has been nearly 50 years since that method has been effec tive. In the midst of our protests, we allowed our communities to be eaten away at the hands of the crack epidemic of the ‘80s, empowered neighbor hood gang members to ter rorize our neighborhoods in the ‘90s and allowed the white majority to convince us that the fact our president was black somehow mitigated the racist roots the U.S. holds firmly planted in this Ameri can soil in the ‘00s. We as a community are the starving man living off of American crumbs and our only method of protest is by petition. America is built on mon etary greed and shady poli tics. The desire we have to obtain and sustain wealth as a capitalist society far out weighs our attention to any real human issues. However, even while knowing this and placing our fresh hundred- dollar bill on the counter in exchange for the latest Jordan sneakers, we have forgotten our buying power. We have forgotten that in this modern America, strength lies not in the num ber of demonstrations, but in the number of big faces. Ben jamin Franklin speaks louder than we as a collective unit ever could. To protest worthy causes, why do we not chan nel our spending? We have forgotten that in this modern America, change can be initiated at every level of political system. Holding your city and state represen tation accountable through voting for the issues in your community has a far more immediate effect on the qual ity of your life than holding mass demonstrations for the federal and state government. To create the change we want to see, why do we not become actively in involved in the di rection of our own lives? We are not puppets. In order for there to be change in our current soci ety, we have to modernize our thinking. We are the technol ogy generation. We are ex perts with social media. We blog and journal every detail of our lives. Why are we not using the current resources we have to further our own agenda? Instead of allowing the media to exploit us for profit, we need to learn how to exploit the media for change. Racism, oppression and un equal treatment among the races in the hands of our ju dicial system will go nowhere without our metaphorical foot on the neck of the pow ers that be. That can only be done through our consistent involvement in every step of the political system; from our local and state governments to our federal government. President Obama and Con gress should be held no less responsible than the official who put the needle in Troy Davis’ arm. Our revolution will begin at home, not in a mass dem onstration. It will begin in the way we raise our children, in the way we teach our lessons and in the way we utilize what we have been taught. Some times change does not start with the first foot forward, but rather the first idea tweet ed and the first dollar spent. Sometimes change starts with the first idea to do what has yet to be done through means which have yet to be thought of. Our revolution will not be televised—-it will be tweeted. NOW TRENDING Social media becomes inundated with posts about Davis during final hours J. Taylor Jones Staff Writer jtaylor.jones92@gmail.com F or the non-business ma jor, I think it’s fair to say that most students finish their week around 2 p.m. or 3 p.m. on Friday. There is an imagi nary wave that washes over you as you take your first steps out of your last class for the day. Your smile gets brighter and your backpack gets light er. I made it! Immediately minds skip to the first activity that should kick off the ever-deserved weekend whether it be Mar ket Friday, Atlantic Station, Lenox Mall, a workout, nap, and, for very few, the library. In a sense, we willingly and purposefully throw off the metaphoric burdens that oc cur during the week. For some, activities and responsibilities increase as the weekend hits, but, for most, the weekend is a temporary vacuum of respon sibility and cares. In light of all the noise that was created by the Troy Davis case, I wondered what differ ence, if any, would occur this weekend after his execution. I do not believe we should live in the past, nor do I think it is wise to cling on to moments and continuously live through them. But when so much emotion, tension and anxiety culminate into one event, I am shocked that there is no emo tional residue, no thoughtful aftermath that would reflect such passion that was exhib ited before. In the era of Twitter activ ists and Facebook philoso phers, I am afraid our genera tion’s passion has gotten lost among the incessant chang ing of statuses and causes. Take Troy Davis for example. Twitter timelines and Face- book walls were decorated with #TooMuchDoubt in the weeks leading up to the fate ful Wednesday, Sept. 21 night, but just days after the sting of such a heinous injustice the cause could hardly be felt on campus or in social media. In the blink of an eye and the glimpse of a flyer, our goals and our attitudes changed. The “trending topic” has lost its appeal and the “trendy top ic” is all that we cling to. Our passions, desires and our am bitions seem to be on refresh mode. It seems as if our moti vation and drive to speak out, act and live for something that comes and goes as quick ly as the weekend. As young people, we lack consistency of action. My biggest fear about Troy Davis is that his legacy will be confined to the glitzy wallpaper of pop culture rath er than in the rich paintbrush of future social change. Troy Davis should never be forgotten and his legacy will be carried on in some capac ity, but I think we should ask ourselves if our attention span is even capable of processing such a moment and using it for a greater good. The era of technology has allowed for an infinite amount of informa tion to be shared but in the same vain, an infinite amount of information is also being lost. It’s pageant season boys and girls and just like that, our minds have changed. In the midst of a world of turmoil, injustice and Troy Davises, the microcosm of the AUC is more concerned with tal ents and courts. My hope, as a member of one of the most historical hotbeds of student social change, is that our pro testers do not turn to “pag- eanters” as soon as the week end comes. ^ * Recycle The Maroon Tiger