Tag Archives: Jon S. Randall Peace Page

Black History Month In Canada — Viola Desmond

Posted on by under Black History Month, education, Global Issues, History, Law and justice, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

February is Black History Month in both the U.S. and Canada.  While systemic racism was codified into law in the U.S., it was more of just an ‘understanding’ in Canada, but no less lethal.

She was a successful Black businesswoman. All she wanted to do was watch a movie in a theater.

Instead, she was told by the ticket seller that he could not sell a ticket “to you people.”

When she refused to move to the segregated section of the theater, she was confronted by the manager who then called the police to brutally drag her from the theater.

She was arrested. For Wanting. To Watch. A Movie. In A Theater.

When people read true stories such as this, they immediately think of “the bad, old, U.S.A.” But, this didn’t happen in the U.S.

This happened in Canada.

Viola Desmond is now a civil rights icon in Canada, someone who confronted the racism that Black Nova Scotians routinely faced and brought nationwide attention to the African Nova Scotian community’s struggle for equal rights.

But, when she died on February 7, 1965 at the age of 50, not many Canadians knew about her or her story.

“Her dignified stand against racism—a decade before Rosa Parks—is a curiously little-known part of Canadian history,” according to writer Shannon Proudfoot.

Viola Desmond is now known as Canada’s Rosa Parks, and her image now officially graces Canada’s $10 bill, something that Canada’s neighbor to the South still has not made official with its own $20 bill with Harriet Tubman, now scheduled to be released in 2030.

Before her arrest, Viola Desmond was a successful “entrepreneur, who achieved financial independence and became a role model to African-Canadian women through the success of her enterprises, which included skin and hair care products for Black women that had previously been unavailable to Nova Scotians,” according to Parcs Canada.

“To be a black entrepreneur was ground-breaking,” Henderson Paris, a New Glasgow town councillor and founder of the Run Against Racism, said in 2015.

“She was building her business and through this – this incident unfolded. Being the strong woman she was – she wasn’t standing for it. It was not right, and something needed to be done.”

“I didn’t realize a thing like this could happen in Nova Scotia – or in any other part of Canada,” said Viola Desmond after her arrest.

Desmond was no stranger to systemic racism, according to Amanda Coletta of The Washington Post. When she left her teaching job to launch a career as a beautician, Desmond was forced to travel out of the province for training because beauty schools in Nova Scotia barred black people from enrolling.

“Canada had no Jim Crow-like laws, but it did have policies that enforced segregation,” said Constance Backhouse, a law professor at the University of Ottawa who has written extensively on Desmond.

“Canada, like the United States, had a history of segregation. Viola Desmond herself attended segregated schools. And in the 1910s, the Canadian government considered banning Black immigration completely. Under the Immigration Act of 1910, Canada could prohibit ‘immigrants belonging to any race deemed unsuited to the climate or requirements of Canada.’”

The policies were “just as bad as Jim Crow,” Backhouse said, but they were written in a way that “masked” their racist intent.

“I was under the impression — when it came to education — that racism and that slavery stuff didn’t happen here in Canada,” says Tony Ince, the minister for African Nova Scotian Affairs.

According to Backhouse:

“We pride ourselves: We’re not like the bad old U.S.A. where they had segregation, whites-only fountains and washrooms and hotels. We think we were the capital of the Underground Railroad, we were the place to where the slaves escaped, we were a much better country. But in fact, some of the black people in Canada at the time said, ‘You know, it’s actually much easier in the United States because you know which hotels, restaurants, theatres won’t let you in because the signs are there. In Canada, you never know.’

“We hide our racism. We just go on about our lives—may I say, white Canadians go on about their lives. African-Canadians understand racism, Indigenous Canadians understand racism: they see it all the time, they live with it. But white people are so unappreciative, they don’t even acknowledge and understand what it means to be white in Canada, and all the layers of privilege that come with that. So they’re shocked when somebody says, ‘What just happened is racist,’ and they said, ‘Oh no, couldn’t possibly be.’ They see racism as people with KKK gowns and pointy hoods with eyes cut out. And we had those too.”

~~~~~

Because Desmond couldn’t be arrested because she was Black, she was instead “charged with tax evasion for failing to pay 1 cent — the price difference between the floor and balcony seats [the segregated section],” according to The Washington Post.

Let us emphasize that again:

“She was charged and convicted of tax evasion – over a single penny,” wrote The Globe and Mail.

“Her arrest and conviction on spurious charges . . . concealed racial discrimination behind the arrest,” according to Parcs Canada.

“We had no laws in Canada actually requiring segregation, like they did in the United States. But here we had people using the law—the amusements tax act—to enforce segregation, and our courts allowed them to do that,” according to Backhouse.

“Protests from Nova Scotia’s black community and an appeal to the provincial Supreme Court proved fruitless,” according to The Globe and Mail.

“Now a symbol of the struggle for equal rights, Viola Desmond’s defiance in the face of injustice became a rallying cry for Black Nova Scotians and Canadians determined to end racial discrimination,” according to Parcs Canada.

She died in 1965 without any acknowledgment of racial discrimination in her case, according to The Globe and Mail.

“It would take 63 years for Nova Scotia to issue Desmond . . . a posthumous apology and pardon,” according to Global News Canada.

Desmond’s story went largely untold for a half-century, but in recent years she has been featured on a stamp, and her name graces a Halifax harbour ferry.

“More than 53 years after her death, Desmond [also] became the first black person and the first woman other than a royal to appear on the front of a regularly circulating Canadian bank note, replacing Sir John A. Macdonald, Canada’s first prime minister, as the face of the new vertically oriented $10 bill,” according to The Washington Post.

“She was an everyday person… this tiny little woman, it’s such an example of strength and determination and education and dignity, respect that was this whole little woman,” Desmond’s sister, Wanda Robson told the Cape Breton Post ahead of the first Nova Scotia Heritage Day in 2015, which honoured Desmond. Robson is the author of “Sister to Courage: Stories from the World of Viola Desmond, Canada’s Rosa Parks.”

“She laid the foundation in regards to justice and how black people were being treated in Nova Scotia. Even though it happened in New Glasgow, similar incidents were happening all over the province,” said Crystal States, an educator with the Black Educators Association and the representative for the African Nova Scotian North Central Network told The News in 2015.

“It was a breakthrough in social justice that had predated the civil rights movement in the (United) States,” States said ahead of the first Nova Scotia Heritage Day, which honored Desmond.

“At the end of the day, we’re all just human beings,” her sister Wanda Robson said. “We’re just people. There are people with different colours, different skin shades, different hair, but at the end of the day, as I said, we are just people.”

~~~~~

Said Backhouse:

“The Nova Scotian black community always remembered Viola Desmond—they didn’t lose track of her, ever. Her memory was very much alive there, but the rest of us didn’t know anything about her.

What’s exciting, especially in the horrible times we’re living in right now, is that this feels like a moment of inspiration. It’s actually somebody (who) fought back, and she fought back in a way that can make so many of us proud. She lost, but she left a record of what she did.”

Story courtesy of the Jon S. Randall Peace Page

Black History Month — Clara Luper

Posted on by under Black History Month, education, History, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

There are so many stories of people who were heroes in their own way throughout the civil rights movement and beyond that I could write a story a day for the entire year and not run out.  Today’s efforts by some to whitewash history, to remove some of the most significant names from the history books is appalling.  I cannot do much, but throughout February, as often as I can I plan to highlight the contribution throughout our nation’s history of our Black brothers and sisters.  Some will be well known to you, others, like the one I am highlighting today, you probably never heard of.  It is important to not let these people fade into oblivion, to remember them, to say their names!

She said, “I want you to believe in the sun when the sun didn’t shine and to believe in the rain when the rain didn’t fall.”

Not too many people know her name, not even in her home state.

She has been referred to as a “hidden legend.”

She was one of the most beloved teachers in her community, but when she took a group of her students to a local lunch counter, she and her students were spit at, cursed, and threatened.

She said she did it because she wanted the children to know that there was a life in which they were accepted.

When she was a child, she remembered when her brother got sick, and the local hospital wouldn’t accept him or treat him because of the color of his skin.

She also remembered her father telling her and her siblings that “someday” he would take us to dinner and to parks and zoos. And when I asked him when was someday, he would always say, “Someday will be real soon,” as tears ran down his cheeks.

She remembered her brother and her father’s words when she heard some of her students and her own daughter asking each other why they weren’t allowed to go to a lunch counter, sit down, and eat a hamburger and drink a soda.

“That’s when she decided to bring her students to a local lunch counter in Oklahoma City, where they took seats at the counter and asked for Coca-Colas,” according to the New York Times. “Denied service, they refused to leave until closing time. They returned on Saturday mornings for several weeks.”

Her name was Clara Luper.

“Her name does not resonate like that of Rosa Parks, and she did not garner the kind of national attention that other sit-ins did . . . But Clara Luper was a seminal figure in the sit-ins of the civil rights movement,” according to writer Dennis Hevesi of the New York Times.

Other sit-ins received more press coverage, such as the Greensboro sit-ins Feb. 1, 1960, at Woolworth in North Carolina, but the sit-in Luper organized and led happened 17 months earlier.

“On Aug. 19, 1958, Luper and 13 kids [ages 6 to 17] walked into Katz Drug Store, sat down on stools lining the counter and asked to be served,” according to the OU Daily. “They waited quietly until closing time, even after a white woman sat on the lap of a black girl and four white youths came in waving Confederate flags.”

Luper’s daughter, [11-years-old at that time] Marilyn Luper Hildreth, remembers, “When people would spit on us our responsibility was to turn our heads and keep our cool.”

“Eventually the Katz chain agreed to integrate lunch counters at its 38 stores in Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas and Iowa,” according to the New York Times. “Over the next six years, the local N.A.A.C.P. chapter held sit-ins that led to the desegregation of almost every eating establishment in Oklahoma City.”

Her “success ignited a series of sit-ins and marches across Oklahoma, and she quickly became a notable civil rights activist.”

Ms. Luper’s activism extended beyond the sit-ins. A week after that first protest, 17 white churches in Oklahoma City let members of her youth group attend services. “At another church, a pastor asked two youngsters to leave,” The Associated Press reported at the time. “‘God did not intend Negroes and whites to worship together,’ he told them.”

Ms. Luper was a history teacher at Dunjee High School in 1957 when she agreed to become adviser to the Oklahoma City N.A.A.C.P.’s youth council, according to the Times. The youngsters asked what they could do to help the movement.

“The Oklahoma sit-ins received scant national attention. But civil rights activists across the country noticed Mrs. Luper’s success, and sit-ins became a common tool for forcing peaceful change.”

Seventeen months later, the Greensboro Four took their seats at the Woolworth lunch counter and made history.

“The actions that Ms. Luper and those youngsters took at the Katz Drug Store inspired the rank and file of the N.A.A.C.P. and activists on college campuses across the country,” said Roslyn M. Brock, the group’s national chairwoman.

Luper, who died in 2011 at 88, continued to be active in the NAACP. She took part in Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 March on Washington where he delivered the famous “I Have a Dream” speech, marched from Selma to Montgomery in 1965 on what became known as “Bloody Sunday” after police attacked the 600 activists and ran unsuccessfully for a spot in the U.S. Senate in 1972, according to the OU Daily..

She was arrested 27 times for standing up for the children.

Her efforts helped lead to the city council’s 1964 passage of an ordinance prohibiting racial discrimination at stores, swimming pools and other public accommodations.

Those in her state who know of her refer to her as the mother of Oklahoma’s civil rights movement.

“She advocated for human rights and racial equality until her death . . . but her contributions to the civil rights movement have rarely been credited or acknowledged,” according to Destinee Adams of NPR.

“As Rosa Parks was to the integration of buses, Clara Luper was to the sit-in movement,” UCLA psychiatrist Louis Jolyon West, who co-authored a 1966 study of the psychology of children who had participated in sit-ins, wrote in the New York Times in 1990. “Regrettably, her leadership never received the recognition it deserved.”

“Her late-night demanding phone calls, emphasis on excellence and love of young people, made her a beloved educator and community figure who was responsible not only for her civil rights movement contributions, but also for the achievements of a generation she challenged and inspired to greatness,” according to OU Daily.

According to NPR, “She would say all the time, ‘I want you to believe in the sun when the sun didn’t shine and to believe in the rain when the rain didn’t fall and to believe in the God that we’ve never seen,'” she said. “That’s the way that she would want to be remembered.”

“I knew I was right,” she told the Daily Oklahoman years later. “Somewhere I read, in the 14th Amendment, that I was a citizen and I had rights, and I had the right to eat.”

This weekend, Oklahoma City remembers Luper for her work to end segregation. The celebration marks 64 years since Clara Luper and her 13 students sat in at Katz Diner.

“Her name is a staple,” artist and activist Jabee Williams said. “But there are still some people here who have never heard of her. A lot of these people are still here today and they can still tell those stories and we need to hear those stories and hear firsthand. We also have 13 students who will represent that first 13, and it’s really impactful and it gets kind of emotional. It’s powerful.”

Photo and story courtesy of the Jon S. Randall Peace Page

The Day That Lives On — December 7, 1941

Posted on by under Global Issues, Tributes

Today is the 81st anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbour, a day that, in the words of then-president Franklin D. Roosevelt, “will live in infamy.”  I posted this on this day in 2019, but it bears repeating.  Annie G. Fox was a true hero on that day and should be remembered for all that she gave.

On this day in 1941, at 7:55 a.m. Hawaii time, a Japanese dive bomber bearing the red symbol of the Rising Sun of Japan on its wings appeared out of the clouds above the island of Oahu. A swarm of 360 Japanese warplanes followed, descending on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor in a ferocious assault. The surprise attack struck a critical blow against the U.S. Pacific fleet and drew the United States irrevocably into World War II.

Today, I came across a piece on the Jon S. Randall Peace Page about one of the heroines of that day, and I thought it a good thing to share with you …

On December 7, 1941, Japanese dive-bombers and Zero fighters screamed overhead at Pearl Harbor and Army hospitals on the island were overwhelmed with burn victims. At Hickam Air Field Station Hospital, amid the noise and confusion, dealing with shortages of supplies and even beds, one woman stood out, working ceaselessly and calmly despite the enormous loss of life around her.

First Lieutenant Annie G. Fox, Chief Nurse at the hospital, assisted in surgical procedures, administered pain medicine to the injured and prepped some for travel to nearby hospitals when the 30-bed facility was overwhelmed.

She was one of many recognized for their exemplary service on that tragic day in American history, and she would become the first US service woman to receive the Purple Heart, which she received for her actions during the attack.

Even though she was not wounded, at that time, the US military awarded Purple Hearts for “singularly meritorious act of extraordinary fidelity or essential service.”

But, two years after being awarded the Purple Heart, the criteria was changed to only those who received wounds by enemy action. Her Purple Heart was rescinded, and she was instead awarded the Bronze Star medal on October 6th, 1944, using the same citation for the Purple Heart originally awarded to her.

Fox was born on August 4, 1893 in Pubnico, Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia.

There is not a lot of information on Fox online, but according to the War Time Heritage Association, “she served during the First World War from July 8, 1918 to July 14, 1920 and in the Second World War. Throughout the 1920’s and 30’s she served in New York, Fort Sam Houston in Texas, Fort Mason in San Diego, California, and Camp John Hay in Benguet and Manila in the Philippines. After sometime back in the Continental US, she was assigned to Honolulu, Hawaii in May of 1940. She was granted an examination for the promotion to Chief Nurse on August 1, 1941, promoted to 1st Lieutenant and transferred to Hickam field in November of 1941.”

After Pearl Harbor, Fox was awarded the Purple Heart on October 26, 1942 for her “outstanding performance of duty.”

The citation read:

“During the attack, Lieutenant Fox in an exemplary manner, performed her duties as head nurse of the Station Hospital . . . [She] worked ceaselessly with coolness and efficiency and her fine example of calmness, courage, and leadership was of great benefit to the morale of all with whom she came in contact.”

Although her Purple Heart was replaced with the Bronze Star, “the United States Armed Forces still recognizes Lt. Annie G. Fox as the first woman to ever have been awarded the Purple Heart medal,” according to the Purple Heart Foundation.

The Foundation states, “At 47 years old, Lt. Fox was for the first time placed in the middle of battle. There was gunfire, bombs detonating, and the sound of airplanes whipping over the hospital. It was not long after the attack began that the Japanese pilots turned their attention near Hickam Field and Station Hospital. While the “hellfire” rained down outside the hospital, Lt. Fox cleared her mind and jumped into action. She assembled her nurses and sought after volunteers from the base community to help her look after the wounded that started to arrive.”

Fox, according to the Wartime Heritage Association, “went on to be promoted to the rank of Captain [on] May 26, 1943 after transferring to Letterman General Hospital in San Francisco, California. Annie Fox had a number of posts in the Army Nurse Corps serving as Assistant to the Principal Chief Nurse at Camp Phillips, Kansas. She served at Camp Kansas from 1943 to 1944. While there she was promoted to the rank of Major. Prior to her retirement from active duty December 15, 1945 she also served at Fort Francis E Warren in Wyoming. She eventually settled in San Diego, California where two of her sisters resided. She never married.”

She died on January 20, 1987 in San Francisco, California at the age of 93.

In March 2017, Hawaii Magazine ranked her among a list of the most influential women in Hawaiian history.

According to the Wartime Heritage Association, “regardless of the [Purple Heart’s] evolution over time or what it was decided would be awarded based on the circumstances, it is clear Fox acted with great heroism, courage and service to her fellow servicemen and women.”Annie-Fox

The Day That Lives On — December 7, 1941

Posted on by under Global Issues, Tributes

On this day in 1941, at 7:55 a.m. Hawaii time, a Japanese dive bomber bearing the red symbol of the Rising Sun of Japan on its wings appeared out of the clouds above the island of Oahu. A swarm of 360 Japanese warplanes followed, descending on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor in a ferocious assault. The surprise attack struck a critical blow against the U.S. Pacific fleet and drew the United States irrevocably into World War II.

Today, I came across a piece on the Jon S. Randall Peace Page about one of the heroines of that day, and I thought it a good thing to share with you …

On December 7, 1941, Japanese dive-bombers and Zero fighters screamed overhead at Pearl Harbor and Army hospitals on the island were overwhelmed with burn victims. At Hickam Air Field Station Hospital, amid the noise and confusion, dealing with shortages of supplies and even beds, one woman stood out, working ceaselessly and calmly despite the enormous loss of life around her.

First Lieutenant Annie G. Fox, Chief Nurse at the hospital, assisted in surgical procedures, administered pain medicine to the injured and prepped some for travel to nearby hospitals when the 30-bed facility was overwhelmed.

She was one of many recognized for their exemplary service on that tragic day in American history, and she would become the first US service woman to receive the Purple Heart, which she received for her actions during the attack.

Even though she was not wounded, at that time, the US military awarded Purple Hearts for “singularly meritorious act of extraordinary fidelity or essential service.”

But, two years after being awarded the Purple Heart, the criteria was changed to only those who received wounds by enemy action. Her Purple Heart was rescinded, and she was instead awarded the Bronze Star medal on October 6th, 1944, using the same citation for the Purple Heart originally awarded to her.

Fox was born on August 4, 1893 in Pubnico, Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia.

There is not a lot of information on Fox online, but according to the War Time Heritage Association, “she served during the First World War from July 8, 1918 to July 14, 1920 and in the Second World War. Throughout the 1920’s and 30’s she served in New York, Fort Sam Houston in Texas, Fort Mason in San Diego, California, and Camp John Hay in Benguet and Manila in the Philippines. After sometime back in the Continental US, she was assigned to Honolulu, Hawaii in May of 1940. She was granted an examination for the promotion to Chief Nurse on August 1, 1941, promoted to 1st Lieutenant and transferred to Hickam field in November of 1941.”

After Pearl Harbor, Fox was awarded the Purple Heart on October 26, 1942 for her “outstanding performance of duty.”

The citation read:

“During the attack, Lieutenant Fox in an exemplary manner, performed her duties as head nurse of the Station Hospital . . . [She] worked ceaselessly with coolness and efficiency and her fine example of calmness, courage, and leadership was of great benefit to the morale of all with whom she came in contact.”

Although her Purple Heart was replaced with the Bronze Star, “the United States Armed Forces still recognizes Lt. Annie G. Fox as the first woman to ever have been awarded the Purple Heart medal,” according to the Purple Heart Foundation.

The Foundation states, “At 47 years old, Lt. Fox was for the first time placed in the middle of battle. There was gunfire, bombs detonating, and the sound of airplanes whipping over the hospital. It was not long after the attack began that the Japanese pilots turned their attention near Hickam Field and Station Hospital. While the “hellfire” rained down outside the hospital, Lt. Fox cleared her mind and jumped into action. She assembled her nurses and sought after volunteers from the base community to help her look after the wounded that started to arrive.”

Fox, according to the Wartime Heritage Association, “went on to be promoted to the rank of Captain [on] May 26, 1943 after transferring to Letterman General Hospital in San Francisco, California. Annie Fox had a number of posts in the Army Nurse Corps serving as Assistant to the Principal Chief Nurse at Camp Phillips, Kansas. She served at Camp Kansas from 1943 to 1944. While there she was promoted to the rank of Major. Prior to her retirement from active duty December 15, 1945 she also served at Fort Francis E Warren in Wyoming. She eventually settled in San Diego, California where two of her sisters resided. She never married.”

She died on January 20, 1987 in San Francisco, California at the age of 93.

In March 2017, Hawaii Magazine ranked her among a list of the most influential women in Hawaiian history.

According to the Wartime Heritage Association, “regardless of the [Purple Heart’s] evolution over time or what it was decided would be awarded based on the circumstances, it is clear Fox acted with great heroism, courage and service to her fellow servicemen and women.”Annie-Fox

Free Hugs, Anyone?

Posted on by under Global Issues, Social commentary

I don’t spend much time on Facebook these days … it mostly annoys me and I haven’t time to waste anyway.  But, I pop in a time or two a day, and one of the pages I typically check out is the Jon S. Randall Peace Page.  I was working on a post for this afternoon at the time, my usual political fare, but when I saw this, I just had to share.

FREE HUGS for anyone who may need it.

There are “Free Hugs” campaigns all over the world now.

His name is “Juan Mann”. He supposedly started it all in 2004, or at least made it more popular.

He had been feeling depressed, going through some tough times, some personal difficulties. He didn’t think anyone cared…until one night a total stranger, perhaps sensing his plight, hugged him. Juan Mann felt like a different person, so he wanted to do the same, to see if one man can make a difference in people’s lives.

Just for the heck of it, he went out, made up a sign that said “Free Hugs”, and stood in a busy section of the city. He said he was “scared absolutely sh*tless.”

free-hugsAt first, of course, a lot of people just stared at him, some making fun of him. Many people were hesitant, understandably distrustful of a man offering a hug.

Then, an elderly woman walked up to him. She just looked at him, then she hugged him.

She told him that “it was the anniversary of her daughter’s death, and that her daughter’s dog had died that morning. She was sad because she no longer had any real link to her daughter. She came into the city looking for a sign and found me, a 22-year-old guy who had no idea what he was doing, holding a literal sign. I was just putting it out there and hoping for the best.”

That’s how the original Free Hugs campaign started.

Then the video came out, and everything went crazy after that.

It started after a member of a band decided to videotape Juan Mann one day. Juan Mann didn’t hear from him until he had fallen into another depression after his grandmother had died. He would receive a tape from the band member – it was the videotape chronicling Juan Mann’s Free Hugs campaign, simply telling his friend, don’t give up, “This is who you are.”

The tape was eventually uploaded to Youtube, and the rest is history. The video has become one of the most watched videos on the site, encouraging people to hug each other, a random act of kindness to make make someone feel better. For those of you, who may not have seen the video, it will be in the comments below.

Recently, writer Kim Corbin, who started her own campaign “Free Hugs Across America”, caught up with Juan Mann in Australia and interviewed him.

He was asked whether another viral hug campaign is needed again in today’s world, where hate and divisiveness runs rampant.

He said, “I think they can help change the world, but that’s me being ambitious. If more and more people connected with more and more strangers, locals, friends, and family, that could only be a good thing. I mean we’ve got one planet and we’ve got to share it. We need to start looking at it in that light – we have one planet to share – we don’t need to focus on the divisions between nations, on borders and disputes.”

He mentioned a few of the current free hug campaigns, such as the Global Free Hugs Day campaigns which runs every year, as well as other events in something like a hundred countries every year.

He also mentioned Ken Nwadike Jr., who started the Free Hugs Project, which started in response to the bombing of the Boston Marathon. Nwadike has made major news headlines for his peacekeeping efforts and de-escalation of violence during protests, riots, and political rallies.

The Free Hugs Project’s mission is “Continuing the nonviolent movement of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. . .. to spread love, inspire change, and raise awareness of social issues.”

Nwadike has put himself between police and protesters, hugging both, and he has recently spoken out about homelessness and mass shootings. He has been at Charlotte, North Carolina, Parkland, and he has even been at KKK rallies.

Nwadike said, “I think that starting the conversation with kindness rather than hatred will get us a lot further. Communities are divided because of fear, hatred and misunderstanding . . . many people have the same desire to connect more and show kindness to others, but are afraid to initiate it. Most people want others to take the first step so they can kindly respond. I like taking the first step and hope to inspire others to do the same.”

Juan Mann said, “He [Nwadike] inspires me. The fact that he’s willing to go into conflict zones, to get between the people and the police, to put himself at great risk to try and promote peace on the front lines is quite impressive.”

There is also the Human Hug Project, whose “mission is to raise awareness of PTSD by giving love back to humanity, one hug at a time. They travel across the country hugging at every Veterans Administration (VA) hospitals.”

There are now many free hug videos out there as well, some with individuals who are blindfolded. One blindfolded person stood in London with the sign, “Trust yourself to hug a Muslim”.

Some free hug proponents, like Juan Mann initially, also ran afoul of local laws. In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, two men were arrested by the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice for offering free hugs in a public space.

No matter what anyone says about the Free Hug campaigns, official or nonofficial, even virtual hugs online, they have made a difference to people, like the elderly woman who first hugged Juan Mann or the people who received hugs from Ken Nwadike Jr.

And, as they have proved, anyone can be “Juan Mann” and that “Juan Mann” can make a difference.

Now, don’t you just feel like going out there and hugging someone?  Well, what are you waiting for … GO!  Go hug somebody … and then somebody else … start a hugging movement in your neighborhood!