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Hundreds march Saturday in uptown to push for change

CHARLOTTE — Some of Charlotte’s youngest voices led a peaceful march early Saturday night in uptown with a message of racial quality and police reform after the death of George Floyd. Hours later, hundreds continued to march through the Queen City.

“I’m a young black king, not a young black statistic,” said Shawn Turner, a student organizer. “There’s more than just the color of my skin, the pigment of my skin.”

Eryn Smith joined area protests several times in the last week.

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“Because we can’t stop talking about it,” Smith said. “Things sort of help and then they go back to what they were, back to normal. We can’t stop talking about it, because we can’t go back to normal. It needs to change.”

Leaders Saturday night attacked negative perceptions on what it means to be a black man.

“We felt it was important for us to come out in suits because kind of like, he saying about the image that is often times portrayed to African American males especially, also females, how we’re thugs, they think that we’re not as good as we really are,” said Bryce Teixeira, a student organizer.