Non-Violence In Action

Nov 26, 2018, 1 comments, 5 smiles In 1996, Ann Arbor, Michigan resident Keshia Thomas was one of a group of locals who gathered to protest a Ku Klux Klan rally. The protest took place in a designated area cordoned off by a fence. But when a fellow protester shouted into a megaphone that there was a “Klansman in the crowd,” a moment of chaos ensued. The man, who was wearing a Confederate flag T-shirt and had what the BBC called an “SS tattoo,” tried to run away, but protesters immediately seized him, knocking him to the ground and beginning to beat him. In a now-famous moment captured on film by photographer Marc Brunner, 18-year-old Keshia Thomas jumped between the protesters and the “Klansman,” shielding him from their blows in spite of his racist regalia. The image went viral, 1996-style, becoming one of Life magazine’s Photographs of the Year, and the young Thomas became a sought-after voice advocating ... Read Full Story