Ohio activist’s suicide spotlights depression among Black Lives Matter leaders

Washington Post ^ | February 15, 2016 | Wesley Lowery and Kevin Stankiewicz

[Second Amendment First]

A solemn group stood in the shadow of the statehouse in Columbus, Ohio, forming a circle on the snow-caked sidewalk. MarShawn McCarrel, 23, a well-known Black Lives Matter activist, had taken his own life on the statehouse steps. Now his friends had come together in his memory.

As evening turned to night last week, protest organizer Rashida Davison, 25, recounted the personal toll of two years of activism: Trouble sleeping. Bouts of anxiety. Feelings of despair.

“This is really getting to us,” Davison said. “And if MarShawn’s death does not show that… I don’t know what else we need to tell or show to say that this is really going on.”

Since he died early last week, news of McCarrel’s suicide has rocked the national police protest movement, forcing a round of introspection about a reality that predates the seminal 2014 shooting of a black teenager in Ferguson, Mo.: Some of the most prominent activists and organizers are battling not only the system, but depression.

In Oakland, Calif., a prominent activist posted the phone number for a suicide prevention hotline on her Facebook page. In Cleveland, a lead organizer confessed on Facebook that he, too, had tried to take his own life. Dozens of others have shared stories of their battles with depression, anxiety and insecurity on Twitter.

“In the movement you’re just constantly engaging in black death, seeing the communal impact,” said Jonathan Butler, the University of Missouri graduate student whose hunger strike last fall led to the resignation of the school’s president. “You’re being faced with the reality that I’m more likely to be killed by the police, that I’m being discriminated against. You start to see all of the micro-aggressions.”

[SaraJohnson]

Playing with Satan...

[Some Fat Guy in L.A.]

The ol’ give-a-crap-o-meter is barely budging. Must be racism.

[BBell]

I like this one better

Nobody Knows

[BBell]

Get a real job

And a haircut

[StAnDeliver]

""Barry knew McCarrel well and said he hoped his friend's death spurs an honest conversation among top activists about the culture of the protest movement."

Even the ComPost writer gets it.