Hundreds of Seattleites took to the streets on Thursday to protest police use of deadly force in memory of the recent killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile.
Hundreds of Seattleites took to the streets on Thursday to protest police use of deadly force in memory of the recent killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. Ansel Herz

Prominent Black Lives Matter Activist Arrested, Eventually Released Over the Weekend: DeRay McKesson flew to Baton Rouge, La. to protest alongside hundreds of other activists protesting police use of deadly force in the wake of the killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. According to the New York Times, booking papers stated that McKesson has ignored police orders to stay out of the street, which led to his arrest and 16-hour stay at a local prison. But McKesson doesn't buy it:

Mr. Mckesson, in a telephone interview shortly after his release, said he believed that his arrest was unlawful and that the police unfairly conducted mass arrests while people were peacefully assembled and out of the way of traffic along a highway. ...

He was released on his own recognizance. On Sunday night, he was at the Triple S convenience store, where Mr Sterling was shot a week ago, and which on this night was distinctly devoid of police officers after tense protests downtown hours earlier.

“The police want protesters to be too afraid to protest, which is why they intentionally created a context of conflict, and I’ll never be afraid to tell the truth,” he said. “What we saw in Baton Rouge was a police department that chose to provoke protesters to create, like, a context of conflict they could exploit.”


More Than 200 Other Anti-Police Brutality Protesters Were Also Arrested: 102 were arrested on Saturday alone, New York Magazine reported. Protesters claimed Baton Rouge police officers gave them unclear directions and purposefully provoked them.



Philando Castile Was Pulled Over by Police 52 Times Over 14 Years: That's more than three times per year. "Those stops translated into $6,588 in fines and fees, according to court records that shows more than half of the 86 violations marked against Castile were ultimately dismissed," Slate reported.

Seattle Reporter Marcus Green Discusses Feelings of Futility After Seattle's BLM March:

[I]t came from a cry that roared throughout the day from Seattle’s black community, a cry of hopelessness, anger and fear shared with so many nationally for so long. A cry that recognized yet another public demonstration in response to a national epidemic of police violence as nothing more than ineffective group therapy.

It was this screech that made me leave the vigil just minutes after arriving. I suffered incredulous stares of disappointment at what appeared to be my abandonment of a show of solidarity against police brutality. I couldn’t stay.

The cry was too loud. It overwhelmed the calls of “not this time” by demonstrators poised to march through the streets of downtown Seattle due to another black victim. I was certain to catch the replay whenever the 137th and 138th African American is killed under suspicious circumstances.

The cry responded with, “I’ve heard that one before.”

Go read his whole Op-Ed here.

#Asians4BlackLives: Christina Xu, an instructor at New York City's School of Visual Arts, began a draft letter to her parents about the Black Lives Matter movement. Hundreds of others added to the letter and eventually translated it into a number of languages to discuss race within Asian communities. Her organization, Letters for Black Lives, shared a story through The Seattle Globalist:

It’s true that we face discrimination for being Asian in this country. Sometimes people are rude to us about our accents, or withhold promotions because they don’t think of us as “leadership material.” Some of us are told we’re terrorists. But for the most part, nobody thinks “dangerous criminal” when we are walking down the street. The police do not gun down our children and parents for simply existing.

This is not the case for our Black friends. Many Black people were brought to America as slaves against their will. For centuries, their communities, families, and bodies were ripped apart for profit. Even after slavery, they had to build back their lives by themselves, with no institutional support — not allowed to vote or own homes, and constantly under threat of violence that continues to this day.

It's mandatory reading. Read the whole letter here and share the message.

What Is Life Like for Seattle's Black Police Officers? After a week of seeing the brutal police killings of two black men circulating online, former Seattle police officer Fabienne Brooks and corrections officer Cynthia Softli told The Seattle Times that their identities can feel at odds with each other.

Terrible Seattle Yacht-Owners Appropriate Native American Dress, Think It's NBD: UGHHHHHHHHH. Members of the Seattle Yacht Club held their annual "Potlatch" event on Bainbridge Island. They donned cheap imitations of traditional garb for the event, which supposedly as an "homage" to traditional Native feasts that were once banned by the U.S. and Canadian governments in the 19th century, Erica C. Barnett reported.

In Better News, Starbucks Baristas Around the Country Are Getting a Pay Raise: According to KOMO, employees for the coffee giant's some 7,600 stores will see pay increases of "5 percent or more" come October. "In a letter sent to workers Monday, CEO Howard Schultz said that the amount of the raise - which will occur in October- will be determined by geographic and market factors," they reported. Will fair scheduling be next on Schultz's list?

BRB, Looking for Charizards: If you went to a park over the weekend, you probably saw groups of people excitedly chattering about Eevees and grumbling about elusive Dratinis. Translation: They're talking about the new Pokémon Go app, which launched on Thursday. Unsurprisingly, the game, which allows players to catch and battle Pokémon in the real world through augmented reality, has caught like wildfire in Seattle where techies and nostalgic millennials run amok. The game map, which is an overlay of real-life Seattle, forces players to interact with the city. Want to battle fellow Pokémasters? Look no further than the Space Needle or Husky Stadium. Running low on Pokéballs? Look for city landmarks—everything from hiking trailheads in Carkeek Park and local churches to uh, this glory hole. Some dedicated Seattleites are collaborating on a map to document where certain Pokémon were caught.

Pokémon Go is already worrying government officials for fear of people trespassing or injuring themselves. In the Midwest, one PoGo-immersed teen ended up finding a dead body.


Calling All Pokégeeks: There's a PoGo meetup party this week. We have all the deets here.

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