Jena Six

“They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”

--Andy Warhol--

“Change has a considerable psychological impact on the human mind. To the fearful it is threatening because it means that things may get worse. To the hopeful it is encouraging because things may get better. To the confident it is inspiring because the challenge exists to make things better.”

--King Whitney Jr.--

Reflections on Jena
By
Juan R. Thomas

On Wednesday, September 19th, I board a chartered bus along with several other Chicago area residents to travel to Jena, LA to express our mutual discontent with an American criminal justice system that administers justice unfairly based upon race, class, and one’s ability to retain competent legal counsel.

This overnight trip was uncomfortable. I sat in front of a lady who asked me not to lean my seat back because she wanted more leg-room. I had numerous client calls to make and became frustrated that there was no way to charge my phone when the battery was low.
I missed an important conference call that afternoon because my cell phone battery died. 40 passengers on this bus had to share a small single-unit bathroom for more than 14 hours. We stopped in Jackson, Mississippi at 3:00am at a local church that served breakfast and we only had one hour to eat and cleanse ourselves before we had to arrive in Jena by 6:00am.

When we arrived in Jena, the town was disserted except for the tens of thousands of people that had traveled there in protest. The day was hot and muggy as we walked through downtown, to the courthouse, to the school yard, to the area where a tree once stood for “white students only.” All this made me uncomfortable.

However, as I reflect on those two days and the events that precipitated our arrival, my discomfort gives way to a sense of gratitude. My discomfort having to sit upright on a bus was nothing compared to the physical pain and agony my ancestors had to endure as they traveled to these shores in chains stacked on one another like sardines during the Middle Passage. My inconvenience being unable to use my cell phone when the battery died, is meaningless when compared to the reality that Thurgood Marshall traveled across the south without a phone, with his life in danger, searching for evidence of racial discrimination that he would later use in many of his arguments before the Supreme Court . The fact that I had to share a bathroom for a few hours on a bus pales in comparison to the fact that many African-American were denied the use of public bathrooms due to “white only” signs in the south.

When I marched with my brother and sisters in solidarity, it was hot and muggy. Unlike the marches that Dr. King and others participated in from Selma to Montgomery or here in Chicago, no one called me the “N-word”; no dogs chased me, there were no signs of hatred in the streets, no water hoses were sprayed on me by racist police officers. We marched in peace with no arrested, no fights, and no deaths.

As I reflect on Jena, I am forever thankful to those who marched, walked, fought, argued, and died for me. Because of their sacrifice, our society is not what it had been, but I am reminded that by the mere fact that we had to travel to Jena, that our society is not what it should be either.