Photos From Ferguson And 1960s Protests Side By Side Make It Clear How Little Has Changed

A young black man in sunglasses holds a sign with bold print in full view of the camera: “I AM A MAN.”

The word “am” is underlined. He’s not just stressing the word, he’s insisting on it. Around him, there are others with similar signs, black ink on white paper. Some look into the camera lens, some stare ahead, defiant.

For years, this description would have fit the iconic Builder Levy photograph captured during the 1968 wildcat sanitation strike in Memphis, Tennessee, shortly after Martin Luther King Jr. was killed. But as of a few days ago, people are finding a second photograph far too similar.

Michael Brown, 18, was walking in his grandmother’s neighborhood in Ferguson, Missouri, on Aug. 9 when he was fatally shot by a police officer.

A crowd gathered around the site, as did a flock of police cars. Tensions grew. The“militarized” police response to the protests that followed set armored vehicles, tear gas and rubber bullets against civilians.

For many, the scene in Ferguson looks like something out of the 1960s, when such responses were far too common.

Internet users across the country soon began uploading photos of the police response to civil rights protests and photos from Ferguson and comparing them side by side. The similarities are striking, as are the questions they raise.

 

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