Edwardsville’s George Floyd protest was peaceful because this 17-year-old made it so
After he flipped off and yelled racist obscenities at protesters gathered in downtown Edwardsville Sunday, the man in the white vintage muscle car circled the block.
Second time around, he was greeted with a volley of water bottles and red liquid before peeling off with a screech.
In many other protests sparked by the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, acts such as these might have marked the moment when a peaceful mood turned violent and police got involved.
But 17-year-old Lay’Lhany Davis and her co-organizers had no patience for that type of behavior. The roughly 250 demonstrators fell silent like a class being chided by their principal as Davis, a normally softspoken veteran of exactly zero protests before Sunday, screamed through her megaphone: “Keep this peaceful.”
“Not everyone is going to agree with this, but we have to be the bigger people and not react violently,” Davis said, “because that’s what they want us to do.”
The organizers’ intolerance for disrespect, regardless of what provokes it, explains at least in part why the event remained peaceful, even in a town where anti-racist protests are far from the norm.
In the middle of it was an incoming senior at Alton High School who wasn’t even sure how to go about getting a permit from the city.
“I’m pretty sure it was illegal,” Davis said.
But as law enforcement around the region turned to tear gas and rubber bullets to subdue violence and looting in the wake of Floyd’s death — four police officers were shot Monday night in St. Louis — Davis’ achievement was notable.
She says it was luck, and in part it was. Most people came to protest peacefully, said co-organizer Haylee Gaines, 18, of Alton.
“We came together as a family,” Gaines said.
But Davis and other organizers gained the respect of Edwardsville Police Chief Jay Keeven. Ahead of the protest, he said they discouraged online commenters who wanted to cause trouble. Davis also told everyone to leave at sundown.
No uniformed police attended the protest and though they didn’t have a permit, Keeven said demonstrators were welcome to be there.
“We share in their grief, frustration and anger over the death of Mr. Floyd,” Keeven said.
Grieving violence
As she chanted, “I can’t breathe” with other protesters, Davis held a sign that read, “They kill our dads then make fun of us for not having one.”
Davis’ dad was murdered when she was 6 years old. A man shot him 10 times in the torso and chest as he was leaving a concert in Colorado Springs, where Davis was born. He died in an ambulance on the way to the hospital.
The loss laid the foundation for her insistence on a peaceful protest last Sunday.
“After losing my dad (the way) I lost him, I stay away from violence as much as I can because I feel like there’s better ways to solve problems,” said Davis, who hopes to study law.
Her main goal was to raise awareness about the Black Lives Matter movement and to show people “what we’re for and what we’re not for,” Davis said.
The movement gained international recognition in 2014 after protesting the police shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., and the death of Eric Garner, who died after a New York City officer strangled him in a chokehold.
“We’re really fed up with seeing those harsh things being done to our people,” Davis said.
After Gaines created an event on Facebook to announce the protest, word quickly spread. When the organizers showed up, the crowd was bigger than expected, she said.
“I expected 30, maybe 40 people if we were lucky, but I never expected it to grow as it did,” Gaines said.
Peace was key to its success, she added. Protesting peacefully for the Black Lives Matter movement is important, Davis said, because “as a black woman or a black man, you’re already seen as a threat.”
More protests in southwest Illinois
Davis and co-organizers aren’t the only teenagers planning protests in the state. In Springfield, they organized a crowd of several hundred people Monday, Capitol News Illinois reported.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker said the voices of peaceful protesters should be heard and distinguished from looters.
“We cannot allow those who have taken advantage of this moment to loot and smash to also steal the voices of those peacefully expressing a need for real, meaningful change,” Pritzker said Monday at a news briefing in Chicago. “This anger doesn’t come out of nowhere — it’s born of decades and centuries of systemic racism and injustice. That’s what all of us have to recognize and that’s where our work begins.”
Davis understands anger, but she and other organizers are determined to keep future protests peaceful. They plan to hold another Black Lives Matter demonstration in Jerseyville at 4 p.m. next Tuesday. She plans to do a few things differently.
First, she wants to get a permit from the city. Second, she wants to make sure protesters know the demonstration ends at sunset.
She says she’s a little afraid of organizing a protest in Jerseyville, a rural community where she worries people might not be as accepting.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen. I’m just going to encourage peacefulness. But I’m very scared,” Davis said. “But if your dreams don’t scare you, then you’re not dreaming big enough.”
This story was originally published June 3, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
