BUTTE – Racist graffiti written on the home of a Native American earlier this month prompted community groups to stand against this message.
“We just want to make a public statement that that’s not okay with us, that we want people of every race, color an creed to feel comfortable in our community,” said Ana Shaw of the Butte Area Rising Coalition.
That’s why the Butte Area Rising Coalition and the Montana Human Rights Network is sponsoring a rally at Emma Park Saturday promoting tolerance. The rally was in response to the racist messages left on this home on Sunrise Lane.
“We want her to know and we want all people of color in our community and who might be thinking of joining our community to know that there are people who will watch out for them and have their back,” said Shaw.
Ana pointed out that this issue is important to her because she’s a mother of children of color, but she also noted that the community of Butte is also bigger and better than this one incident of racism.
“In Butte everybody knows you have to be kind to your neighbor because you never know who will save your life underground the next day and for the most part we’ve found that to be true people have been great to our family and we want that to be true all the time,” she said.
The event will include guest speakers including the victim of this month’s vandalism.
The event will begin with a march started at 1:30 p.m. in front of the Imagine Butte Resource Center on Park Street and proceed down to Emma Park where speakers will begin at 2 p.m.
