Milwaukee often makes the list of most segregated cities in the U.S. with the city being majority minority and suburban areas largely white.
Earlier this month an 18-year-old black teen shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.
After weeks of protests and riots, things are now calm, but the incident has sparked renewed conversations about race relations across the country.
Last week, WUWM’s LaToya Dennis assembled a roundtable discussion to talk race relations and how the greater Milwaukee area should move forward.
Tracy Johnson
"I don’t like to envision an island, but I feel like we need to start looking at some of these communities as a little more—as their own territory. And they need to kind of say these are the rules, these are the boundaries that we’re going to set and who we’re going to take responsibility for, and it takes a community."
Ken Harris
“The problem that continues to occur is that I think your solution is wrong and mine is right. Instead, we should be thinking you have a different solution then mine. So why don’t you do yours and I’ll do mine, but we don’t do that. And it’s the same thing with race, well you’re different than me so there must be something wrong with you.”
Angela Walker
“I appreciate rebellion, it has its place. People have the right to, when they are pushed you are supposed to be angry. You are supposed to get mad, you are supposed to occupy space and move people out of the way and get in the way and do what you have to do to make your point.”
Keith Stanley
“To sit there and protest and loot and then get shot and get arrested, I ain’t doing that. I ain’t getting bit by no dog, I ain’t getting no water hose on me, I got no…my parents did that, my grandparents, it’s a new day. I got too much access to resources, education and opportunity to have someone beat me so I can make them love me. That just makes no sense to me.”
Amante Gray
“Majority of people want to do it lawfully. Majority of people want to do it the right way, that’s what they want to do. And sometimes you get frustrated, not saying that it’s right, but sometimes you get frustrated being in the state that you in and you not seeing no growth at all...People are just frustrated. They frustrated by police brutality, they frustrated by socioeconomic disadvantages.”
Listen to the entire conversation:
