Sunday, August 2, Mayor Nancy Vaughan and Councilmember Sharon Hightower participated in a discussion with A.J. Morgan, who was an organizer of the protests in Greensboro on May 30 and May 31 that ended in vandalism, fires and looting as well as protests at Friendly Shopping Center, Battleground Avenue and Wendover Avenue in June.

The discussion was hosted by Zithobile Nxumalo, also known as Dr. Z, and held by Onyx Urban Radio.

Morgan, who is credited with organizing the protests on May 30 and May 31, has said that he left before those protests became violent.

Vaughan talked about how frustrated she was with the response of the white people in Greensboro to those protests and riots and the fact that they were “inconvenienced.”

Vaughan prefaced her remarks by saying that when she said we, she meant “white people.”

Vaughan said, “I’ve been frustrated by the response to the protests and the riots that happened after George Floyd and I think when people think of the sit-ins we have a tendency to romanticize it. That it was only for one day and four good looking African-American guys that sat at the lunch counter and it like happened in a day and the people downtown weren’t inconvenienced.”

She said, “It was a big deal and it was a big inconvenience.”

She added, “We had people complaining about being stuck in traffic and being inconvenienced for a little while and they are missing the bigger picture.”

Vaughan said she read a post that, “”Our jewel of Friendly Center was shut down” and that was just the epitome of white privilege. It was like missing the whole message.”

Vaughan said that she thought white people were afraid they were going to have to give something up and afraid of having to pay higher taxes. She said, “Ultimately it is a pocketbook issue that they are going to have to give some money up.”

The video can be viewed here: 

 http://y2u.be/1EDHPD66Zz4