“Everybody keeps asking me what we can do for change,” said Dyshell Palmer to the crowd before the march. “And I just tell them the same thing I’m telling my friends. Education. You guys need to get educated on history, so we can have a better future for our next generation, for our generation now.“

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Between 500 and 750 people marched from Colt State Park to Independence Park in Bristol, Rhode Island Saturday morning as part of a Black Lives Matter protest organized by Warren resident Dyshell Palmer.

The protest was entirely peaceful, but met with a large police presence, who guided the march by motorcycle and guarded the road to downtown Bristol. Signs on the way into the town declared the downtown closed.

Here’s video of some of the march and eight minutes and 46 seconds of silence held to commemorate George Floyd, who was murdered in Minneapolis by a police officer who knelt on his neck, even as Floyd begged to be able to breathe and called out for his mother.

But this did not dim the enthusiasm and positivity of the event, which was enjoyed by families with young children as well as older adults and teens.

“Everybody keeps asking me what we can do for change,” said Palmer to the crowd before the march. “And I just tell them the same thing I’m telling my friends. Education. You guys need to get educated on history, so we can have a better future for our next generation, for our generation now.

“If we teach them hate, what’s that going to do? They’re going to grow up with hate.”

Palmer described herself as “a normal person trying to make change,” adding that she organized the protest in Bristol because this is where she lives. “There’re people here who support Black Lives Matter, so why not?”

She feels supported by the community. The turnout was “more than I expected. I thought there would only be a few hundred. This is perfect.”

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