Oral History Interview with JD Franklin

Title

Oral History Interview with JD Franklin

Interviewee

JD Franklin

Interviewer

Lizzy Ray

Description

JD Franklin of Sewanee, Tennessee, was interviewed in person by Lizzy Ray, a Sewanee student, on October 31st, 2023. While their conversation was primarily on the Black Lives Matter Movement, other topics included the #BLM on social media and discussions on race within education. We hope that this conversation will assist scholars with a further understanding of race in the United States during the early twenty-first century. Please click on the link to see the full interview.

Transcript

0:04 Lizzy Ray: Thank you. Okay. You don't have to look at that at all. It's just... Okay. I'm going to start us out. This is Lizzy Ray from Sewanee, the University of the South. It is October 31st Tuesday and it is 2:50 PM I am with, if you could state your name and where you are currently.

0:31 JD Franklin: My name's JD Frank,
0:32 JD Franklin, and currently as in my year,

0:37 Lizzy Ray: no Sewanee.

0:38 JD Franklin: Oh

0:40 Lizzy Ray: She's also In Sewanee? We're in the same room. Okay. Awesome. jd, where are you originally from?

0:48 JD Franklin: Birmingham, Alabama.

0:49 Lizzy Ray: Did you grow up there your whole life?

0:51 JD Franklin: Yes. I grew up around Birmingham my entire life until I came here.

0:55 Lizzy Ray: Okay, awesome. Ummm... How is Sewanee different than Birmingham?

1:00 JD Franklin: How is it different, but I've never been in a private community.
1:12 Like school.

1:12 Lizzy Ray: Same.

1:12 JD Franklin: Yeah. I've always been in public, so I'd say that's the difference.

1:15 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. Where in Birmingham did you grow up?

1:21 JD Franklin: Ummm... For a while, I live in Penton.

1:23 Lizzy Ray: Okay.

1:24 JD Franklin: Then I lived in Rockville, then I moved to Fulton Mill. Now I live in Gardendale.

1:32 Lizzy Ray: Okay. My dad grew up in Birmingham. He moved around communities a lot in Birmingham, so I have no idea,
1:39 But that's good. We talk a lot about community in this class and all that stuff. Where did you find community as a child or what would you say your life

1:51 JD Franklin: Community

1:52 Lizzy Ray: When you were growing up was like?

1:54 JD Franklin: It was very online based because my mom, she was going through the divorce and so I was at my grandma's house a lot, and so it was basically around. My cousins we're online based community, like in fandoms, fanfic and stuff like that. Okay. That's cool.

2:09 Lizzy Ray: How about school? What

2:10 JD Franklin: Was your community like at school? My community, when I went to Fulldale, my community was very, because the school was small, it was actually smaller than Sewanee

2:20 Lizzy Ray: Oh, wow.

2:20 JD Franklin: As a high school, so everyone knew everyone in town, so everyone was always friends and close. We had a community tree lighting and everything.

2:26 Lizzy Ray: Oh, that's fun.

2:27 JD Franklin: Yeah, so it was very more together.

2:30 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. Where do you find Community at Sewanee?

2:36 JD Franklin: I think I found a lot of community with my friends because that's exactly where the first place I found community at with my friends. I did FYP here.

2:42 Lizzy Ray: Yeah.

2:42 JD Franklin: Yeah, and I met my roommate actually through FYP.

2:46 Lizzy Ray: Snazzy. I did pre with Juno.

2:48 JD Franklin: Juno did pre too?

2:49 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. Juno did pre. We were pre siblings. Yeah. Juno did not enjoy the whole hiking thing back in the day. Okay. Do you have a job currently?

3:04 JD Franklin: Yes. I work at the art gallery.

3:07 Lizzy Ray: Okay. What led you to working there?

3:10 JD Franklin: My FYP professor is actually Professor Wall, was actually Profess Wall, who's the head of the art gallery.

3:19 Lizzy Ray: Oh, that's awesome. Ummm... Did you participate in, oh, what was the one we went to for class? It was full of those clay stones. It was the history of slavery in the university. It was in the university art gallery that's next to Walsh Elliott.

3:46 JD Franklin: Oh, no, I didn't go there.

3:47 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. We did that for a class. It was very interesting. There was one painting that I wanted to ask the artist about. I wasn't able to go to the lunch with the artist.

3:55 JD Franklin: Yeah. I don't work up here. I work the one across from Courts.

3:58 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. Okay.

3:59 JD Franklin: Yeah.

4:01 Lizzy Ray: Did you do photography and all that stuff in the dark room over there?

4:05 JD Franklin: Yes. I'm taking a film class this semester, but we developed in a dark room. I literally developed for like five hours straight yesterday.

4:13 Lizzy Ray: I don't know if that is to say fun or is it?

4:16 JD Franklin: It's once you know what you're doing, it's an in and out process, but at the same time there's multiple, we have prompts for assignments, so I have to pick out the right film and then develop It. Didn't have to wait for a dry. It's a process.

4:29 Lizzy Ray: That's crazy. That seems like it takes a long time. Yeah. Awesome. Who inspires you and what makes them inspire you?

4:39 JD Franklin: A person that inspires me... I wouldn't want to say a specific person inspires me, but I do like to hang around a lot of people who have individual identities for themselves and they have certain things that, hobbies, I guess that defines them and that they do outside of knowing people.

5:09 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. Awesome. Umm... What traveling have you done?

5:16 JD Franklin: I've been to Boston, Massachusetts.

5:18 Lizzy Ray: Oh, snazzy up north.
5:20 One of my cousins went to school in Boston.

5:23 JD Franklin: It's really nice. It's cold up there. It's colder than here.
5:27 Their corner stores are really expensive though. Really? Yeah. It was like for a small garbage bag, $5.

5:35 Lizzy Ray: Wow. Okay, so the Northerners like expensive stuff.

5:40 JD Franklin: Yeah.

5:41 Lizzy Ray: Okay, ummm... With that traveling, have you experienced any other cultures in your life?

5:55 JD Franklin: Maybe the way different people live? I didn't realize, because when you grow up in a certain area in your entire life, you move outside of that. You kind of think, well, everyone knows how to do this or it just makes sense that everyone knows this and it's not true at all. Some people don't even know what you're talking about. For instance, Chama, Chama. Chama grew up with maids that had maids.

6:19 Lizzy Ray: That's crazy.

6:20 JD Franklin: That's crazy, right?

6:22 Lizzy Ray: I didn't know that was a thing.

6:24 JD Franklin: Right.

6:24 Lizzy Ray: You see that in those historic movies and stuff?

6:27 JD Franklin: Well, qctually in Africa, apparently, according to also Keena and Eleora, that it was very common for a lot of households that have maids in general. Oh, really? But Chama was rich because they had maid on maids.

6:37 Lizzy Ray: Oh, wow.

6:38 JD Franklin: So it was very common for a lot of households to just have Junior had maids.

6:41 Lizzy Ray: That's crazy.

6:43 JD Franklin: Wow.

6:44 Lizzy Ray: I didn't know that was a thing.

6:45 JD Franklin: Yeah.

6:46 Lizzy Ray: Okay. Well, I know you've gone to Boston. I don't really know what kind food, special food they have in Boston, but what's your favorite type of food, just in general?

6:58 JD Franklin: Chinese.

6:59 Lizzy Ray: Really?

7:00 JD Franklin: Yeah.

7:00 Lizzy Ray: What would you get if you ordered Chinese takeout?

7:04 JD Franklin: A lot? I like brown fried rice, a lot of noodles, a lot of vegetables mixed in. I don't like soy sauce though.

7:09 Lizzy Ray: Oh, that's interesting.

7:11 JD Franklin: I had a cholesterol problem. I don't have any more, but I had it, but it's also, I don't like the intake of salt I when I can taste it and soy sauce is very much just pure salt.

7:21 Lizzy Ray: It's literally salty.
7:22 Yeah, so I don't use soy sauce, but I like duck sauce. I put duck sauce.
7:27 I used to keep it in my fridge at home. Whenever we order to take out,

7:31 JD Franklin: That's my favorite. I go to restaurant. I'm like the person. I'm like, do you have duck sauce?

7:37 Lizzy Ray: So good. Okay. Now I'm going to get more into not necessarily nitty gritty questions, but just like the more Black Lives Matter questions. How do you receive the news? Do you read the news? Do you watch any news? Is it more of a social media news based?

7:53 JD Franklin: Social media news based? When I was at home, like I said, I grew up around a lot of old people, so they constantly had news on Same me, regardless, so growing up it was basically by the actual news, but now it's more like on my own social media based.

8:09 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. Would you explain what social medias you use to receive the news?

8:15 JD Franklin: Okay. There's TikTok, although they're not reliable stories, but it's still how you figure out something. Then you go on your own. It actually search whether it's true or not. It's exposure to something. Instagram, Twitter, and then I even have on my phone, Apple has this thing to where, it's not on this one, but it's usually just swipe on the side and there's a news widget right here that tells you what's currently happening or you open Google Chrome. They'll have the little things at the bottom. It's like...

8:48 Lizzy Ray: Does Instagram or anything like that give you any news like TikTok does?

8:54 JD Franklin: Mostly when I see that I know or repost something that's currently happening, and so it lets me like, okay, let me read about this, see what's going on.

9:01 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. Well, we kind of dipped into your experience with social media, but other than TikTok and Instagram, do you have any other forms of social media?

9:11 JD Franklin: No. I have a Snapchat

9:17 Lizzy Ray: Currently.

9:18 JD Franklin: I don't have any of those on my phone right now, though. I deleted them.

9:22 Lizzy Ray: Have you ever had Twitter or anything like that?

9:24 JD Franklin: Yeah, Twitter, but I don't use Twitter, like most of the time on Twitter, just talking to myself type thing, and if something's actually happening, I'll go see what someone's saying. Everybody else is saying on there.

9:34 Lizzy Ray: Awesome.

9:35 JD Franklin: But it's not like I'm going to go to Twitter to see what's thinking about.

9:39 Lizzy Ray: You said you deleted TikTok and Instagram recently.
9:44 Did that have to do with anything with negatives, negative viewpoints on social media or anything like that?

9:50 JD Franklin: No. I just needed a cleanse and I wanted../

9:53 Lizzy Ray: I need to do that too.

9:54 JD Franklin: I was doing a lot of my endless scrolling and I need to stop doing that, and I caught myself. I was like, okay, let me just get rid of it. Stop ahead.

10:01 Lizzy Ray: You and Chama are both doing that. Okay, awesome. How did you first encounter the Black Lives Matter movement?

10:12 JD Franklin: I always knew it was a thing, but it wasn't until 2020 to where it was the biggest thing around for everyone, so that's when I was very thrown into it as a black person, everyone needed everyone to have a say about what was happening, what was going on.

10:31 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. When you first encountered it, you said 2020, did you know of the stuff that originated the hashtag in 2014 with like Michael Brown and Eric Garner and all that stuff?

10:48 JD Franklin: Yeah, I knew a little bit about it.

10:49 Lizzy Ray: Okay. What was your community reaction, like all of Birmingham? I know it's a very red state, but what was your community's reaction to the Black Lives Matter movement?

11:03 JD Franklin: Well, a lot of my family members were just like, they were angry about what was happening, but they weren't surprised. It wasn't really a shock to them. It was like, this is our life, type shit.

11:21 Lizzy Ray: What was your first opinion of the Black Lives Matter movement? When it became a huge thing in 2020?

11:28 JD Franklin: I feel like a lot of people... was forcing a lot of people to talk, which was important to talk about the situation, but then it became a point of people just talking just to talk out their ass and saying things just to say with, and then it was like when it was over, you could tell who really meant it and who really didn't, and it was very evident, and so while it was great for getting people to speak up, sometimes I felt like it forced wrong people to talk just to get clicks and views.

12:00 Lizzy Ray: Yeah, umm... Going back to the whole social media aspect, I remember in 2020 we were sophomores in high school, sophomores in high school, juniors in high school. That sounds about right, and I remember having mainly just Instagram and Snapchat. Actually, I don't think I even had Snapchat then, but I remember seeing everybody post about Black Lives Matter on Instagram. We were all kind of holed up in our houses at the time, not able to do much. How was your view on the whole movement impacted by social media?

12:35 JD Franklin: I think it definitely showed people that they were being watched more than ever because before then, social media wasn't this huge developed technology, so some things just people got away with and during the 2020 movement when it became this big thing, it showed people you are being watched. Things do spread. You are not just going to get away from it. People have a voice and we're going to talk about it.

12:58 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. We talked about your community's reaction. Communities are built up of a lot of different generations. What generation do you think was most affected or do you think had the most involvement in the Black Lives Matter movement?

13:16 JD Franklin: Definitely Gen Z. Yeah, it was definitely a Gen Z thing. It blew up on social media and that was very, especially during 2020, that was very peak Gen Z time on social media or wherever else, so it was definitely Gen Z that definitely pushed it.

13:33 Lizzy Ray: How do you think the other generations reacted? Like boomers? I'm trying to think. Millennials, how did you perceive how they reacted within your community?

13:49 JD Franklin: They talked about it a lot. I remember my mom would talk about it. My grandma would talk about it. They would watch the news constantly. They would stay up to date on it, but that's all I remember them doing, is just talking about it a lot. You know what I mean? But at least they kept themselves informed on it.

14:06 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. It's always good to keep yourself informed, especially with the older generations when they're all set in their ways and that sort of thing.

14:12 JD Franklin: Yeah.

14:17 Lizzy Ray: How did the Black Lives Matter affect how you talked with your family and friends about that movement especially or just in general?

14:31 JD Franklin: When it comes to my family, I think it helped me talk to my mom in a very more, not strict, but like I, it wasn't a strict way, but it's more like it got me to talk to my mom in a more an independent way, develop my own thoughts against her and go against hers and not just take what she said and ran with it.

15:00 Lizzy Ray: That's awesome. Yeah. Gaining your own voice essentially. Has Black Lives Matter movement changed how you interact with people of other races?

15:12 JD Franklin: I think, I don't think I changed how I interacted with people about the races, but I think it definitely makes me more self-aware of myself and how maybe I'm being perceived or come across and not in a way to where I'm watching myself. It's just in the reality of a sense of how someone may be looking at you sometimes, especially when you speak or say something in the area where they don't expect you to say that.

15:48 Lizzy Ray: Kind of going back to that question, how did it change how you interact with people of other political affiliations?
15:54 People that are outward with their opinion on political affiliations?

15:58 JD Franklin: My look on some political things is basically either you have human decency or you don't, and it is very obvious to tell the people who don't and the people who don't. I don't mess with it at all,

16:12 Lizzy Ray: Which is so valid. Awesome. I'm going to get into my whole idea of what I've been learning about this whole thing is how different states had such different teaching methods on teaching black power, the civil rights movement, and just black history in America, because America was essentially built by slaves, and so I've been asking a lot of questions about how were you taught about the Civil Rights Movement or black power in your schools? Were you taught about it outside the month of February growing up?

16:52 JD Franklin: Yeah. We were taught about it in history books, but it was like they never went into detail because a lot of history context was ripped from the textbooks because they weren't being allowed being teaching schools history, being washed away that I didn't know about until later.

17:15 Lizzy Ray: Did you grow up with your family members teaching you the history of like Black power in Birmingham or anything like that?

17:26 JD Franklin: My family never really like taught me the history of Black power in Birmingham. I don't know. Like I said, growing up a lot, my mom, she was working a lot. She was going through a divorce, so we was never really with her. It was always in front grandparents and they're old people, so they slept all day, woke up, ate a piece of cake, went back to sleep, watched their news, so it was never really taught to me unless I went to school, but as I grow up, my mom, she does have her moments of like, this is your history. You need to know it.

17:54 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. Yeah. How did Black Lives Matter, your whole education and how did it affect your last two years in high school?

18:12 JD Franklin: Well, my last few years in high school, sophomore year, I literally wasn't transferred to an all black high school. It was just based off because of my mom. We had to move somewhere else and Ask me the question one more time. I lost my train of thought.
18:29 You're good It's been a long day. How did the Black Lives Matter movement affect your education in your last few years of high school?
18:45 Well, like I said, I did go to all Black High School within my last few years at high school, so it taught me more about my history and then being around my people, actually seeing the different types of my people. I think it taught me to be actually more secure in my skin, actually, especially in the last picture of Harvard High School. Yeah, I got really secure in my skin.

19:13 Lizzy Ray: That's awesome. Did your high school participate in any movements that had to do with Black Lives Matter or any special outreaches or stuff like that?

19:37 JD Franklin: Not during the time I was there. I was there from sophomore to senior, but that was only three years, so I don't know what they did before that, but because my high school was George Washington Carver High School, so it was like a staple historic school, so they probably did something before, but I came here covid afterwards type time. It was all different and stuff.

19:59 Lizzy Ray: Yeah.
20:01 How did the movement impact your life as a whole?
20:04 You said you felt more comfortable within your skin. Did it make you feel anything else towards any other people, an outward perception of yourself? How did it just impact your life in general?

20:21 JD Franklin: I think a lot when you grow up as a kid, you think you don't really see the difference between you or somebody else, or you don't see the difference in building how you talk or where they may have came from, where you came from. I think with Black Lives Matter, and having had it sit on my chest for a while, a good while gave me a more realistic perception, a more realistic perception of the world growing up, especially since it was kind of in the awkward phase. When you're in high school, you're still technically a teenager, but now I'm kind of transitioning into adulthood, so it was a foundation for that transition and it transferred the way I would think. I used to think around people and about how I used to come off, because before I didn't really, I noticed people, but I never really, it was more of noticing like, oh, their favorite candies, so Patch Kid or something like that, but now it's like, oh, okay, if they say this about this, then they can't be for this, or they're not really your friend if they feel this way about this and they know that you're from, you know what I mean? It gave me a better read on the reality of people and who you choose to surround yourself with and what people may say, how it might affect you and what they may mean by what they say.

21:55 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. Well, thank you for sharing that. How do you think the Black Lives Matter movement succeeded?

22:04 JD Franklin: I think it succeeded by, it got a lot of people to realize, to acknowledge a lot of gun violence issues within America. I think for a fact, for one, good gun violence issues, it also got a lot of people to recognize, maybe not recognize, but begin to understand what was it like to be looked at differently, especially if you don't have darker skin or something like that in America, and how it can really affect the entire direction of your life and how it may go. I think you got people to talk about it, want to talk about it more and have emphasis like this or interviews like this where you want to like, okay, let's elaborate. Let's talk about it. Let's sit down. Let's have a discussion about this. I think definitely got people to be more open-minded and wanting to discuss further on these topics and have these types of conversations.

23:12 Lizzy Ray: Do you think it succeeded in any other other ways?

23:26 JD Franklin: Well, I do told that from Breonna Taylor's situation case, her officers actually got a penalty and put in jail for their crimes and stuff, so it finally, I know a lot of cops are actually, well, a good bit of them, they're not sliding past the law enforcement. They used to is calling for action in wrong places instead of just ignoring them like they were before, and they kind of be like, you hear about it two weeks later and everybody will be like, oh, yeah,

23:55 Lizzy Ray: No, I completely understand that. I think it's awesome how they're putting in new implements of training for officers and putting in social workers in police precincts to go and make those calls for people that may not be as psychologically sound, and so the cops should not be responding to those. Probably it should be somebody that's trained in talking somebody down and stuff like that, so I do think that is a way that this has succeeded as well. How do you think the Black Lives Matter movement has failed? Not necessarily failed, but what have been some negatives to come from it?

24:37:00 JD Franklin: Hype train.

24:38:00 Lizzy Ray: Okay.

24:39:00 JD Franklin: Definitely a lot of people, because I referred to in 2020, a lot of people were speaking out on social media, so then it became a deal of, okay, if you're not speaking out, then why are you not speaking out? So then people who really wouldn't actually care about the situation, they would build a platform off of it, and I remember there was this whole trend on Instagram where you would have to post a blackout.

25:07:00 Lizzy Ray: Oh my God, I talked about that with somebody the other day. It was on a Tuesday.

25:11:00 JD Franklin: Yeah, so a blackout Tuesday. Yeah, it...

25:13:00 Lizzy Ray: Was a black screen and everybody wrote Blackout Tuesday hashtag or something.

25:17:00 JD Franklin: Yeah, band... It was definitely bandwagoning, people doing it for clicks and F yeah,

25:23:00 Lizzy Ray: Some armchair activists. Do you think there's any other negatives that have been pulled from Black Lives Matter? Not necessarily if they were negatives with the movement, but maybe the news showed the negative side of something.

25:43:00 JD Franklin: I remember when they was doing a lot of peacefulp rotesting on streets. A lot of people were getting maced and thrown bombs at by the police, actually, so that was another thing.

25:54:00 Lizzy Ray: They were being very peaceful and the police were not.

25:56:00 JD Franklin: Yeah. Yes.

26:00:00 Lizzy Ray: Do you remember anything else with failure of the movement?
26:19:00 You're all good thought.

26:21:00 JD Franklin: No, I'm trying to think. I'm pretty sure there's another something else I stirred, but I can't have it. I can't think of right now, but I'll...

26:35:00 Lizzy Ray: All good, babe. What do you think the state of race relations in the United States is right now?

26:57:00 JD Franklin: Can you rephrase that?

27:01:00 Lizzy Ray: How do you think in the United States in general, we'll probably get into more outside of the US in a little bit, but how do you think the different races react to each other now after this whole movement, after a bunch of them kind of came together to do all these peaceful protests and then a lot of them were not peaceful towards the peaceful protesters, but how do you think they're interacting now when the movement is slowly dying down?

27:35:00 JD Franklin: I'd say I think it depends where you're at, because I know for instance, my mom's ex-boyfriend, even though he was a black man, he was still very racist. Really? Yeah, he was very racist and I hated, that's another one reason why I hated him. Not the prime reason, but it was definitely one reason why I hated him. We lived across the street from these Latin Americans and they were throw party sometimes. I remember he would mock them sometimes with their accent, and it was just like, whoa, what are you doing? You know what I mean? But then I come here in Sewanee and then you see sometimes you see a collision, a mixture. Well, also even then sometimes I wanted just insistence a friend they got called the N word, just walking outside the dorm. It was a quick moment too. It was... So I think race relations definitely depends on where you're at because some people after the fallout, the movement, it became this joke or like, oh, we have to act a certain way, because it became a joke to them. They kind of took the moment and they took it as a joke, and then other people, they were like, okay, well, I've seen how this group of people can be treated and also seeing how this other group of people can be treated and why should we act that way toward each other. We should come together while we're still respecting each individual heritage and culture and where you came from stuff. I've seen that both sides really, so I wouldn't say it's just one way or another.

29:16:00 Lizzy Ray: Perfect. Going into the whole global aspect of race relations, how do you think if the war in Palestine and Israel, with all that conflict going on between two sides, do you think tt could evolve into being brought over to the US and stir up another race relation conflict in the US?

29:41:00 JD Franklin: Yeah, a hundred percent.

29:43:00 Lizzy Ray: How do you think that would turn out with our current government standing?

29:55:00 JD Franklin: Well, the scaring race, if you look at our economy is already failing in the sense of what to a lot of people cannot live comfortable, affordable, affordable lives in America based off of one job like they used to. So on top of that, if you bringing race into it and it's like, okay, suddenly the conversation, I remember, COVID it was a question of who would get the jobs because a lot of people were losing their jobs and stuff like that. So I think definitely, I guess potentially another 2020 happening where it's this big protest, everyone's protest streets everything because not only because back in 2020 it was a gun violence issue, while we still have gun violation issues every day. I think there's 1.9...

30:52:00 Lizzy Ray: Mass shootings a day.

30:53:00 JD Franklin: Yeah, there's a lot of mass shooting today and plus on top of a failing economy is bound to turn out bad. There's definitely going to be a huge turning point because 2022 was already a turning point, but it's like, okay, from 2020, 22, 2020 is then okay down. There's got to be a complete bottom bottom, and then it'll go where they go.

31:23:00 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. Now we kind of touched into what you thought of the future of Black Lives Matter by talking about if another movement came over here, but in general, what do you hope is the future of the Black Lives Matter movement?

31:54:00 JD Franklin: I don't if I have any indefinite helps for Black Lives Matter, but I do know I wish a lot of people to return home safely to their families.

32:04:00 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. What do you think the future of Black Lives Matters is?

32:12:00 JD Franklin: I think because attention has already been called to it in 2020, and obviously it was one before 2020, but because such huge social media teacher has been called to it in 2020 and we still live in a society where social media just grows and grows and grows, grows. I don't think I would see it period. I think it has potential to grow stronger actually...

32:42:00 Lizzy Ray: As we haven't heard as much about it in recent news, mainly because of the war that's going on in Palestine and Israel and just the other occasional news that seem to be just not as focused on black lives and all that stuff. Do you think for the movement to get a jumpstart again, another murder would have to happen? That is my hope. That would not happen ever. But with the kind of news dying down about that, do you think to get the coverage again, another person would have to be murdered or something like that, or like something bad would have to happen within our country for the hashtag to be relived again?

33:24:00 JD Franklin: Again, with the way the world works, something bad always have to happen for a hashtag to be really trending unless it's pop culture, media, whereas unless it's like Ariana Grande coming out with a new song or some shit like that, but definitely something bad has to happen for something to get trending that has to do with people and how they live. And so... sorry, I losing my train of thought. Say the question one more time.

34:03:00 Lizzy Ray: Do you think another brutal murder would have to happen for the hashtag to get rejumped or come back up in social media or in the news?

34:15:00 JD Franklin: I don't think another brutal murder would have to happen, but I definitely think another brutal murder would happen. Yeah, I definitely think not. I wouldn't say it has to happen because murder does not have to happen, but guaranteed there probably, definitely a hundred percent will be another one, and that's why people still will get back to talking about it if we're looking at the reality of the situation. Yeah,

34:41:00 Lizzy Ray: It's absolutely terrible. Thank you for answering all my questions. Do you have anything to add or anything else you would like to add to this?

34:55:00 JD Franklin: So what's exactly the project on and about? Obviously you're interviewing me, but...

35:04:00 Lizzy Ray: Where are my notes? So this whole project is kind a database that my class is creating on Sewanee's money. Woohoo. To interview a whole bunch of people about how Black Lives Matter has influenced their lives and all that stuff. I've interviewed three people so far. You're my fourth. I have somebody that I'm interviewing this coming Sunday who works for United Nations and she lived in my hometown. She lived through the Civil Rights Movement in my hometown and all that stuff, and I'm really looking forward to getting her input on maybe the global impact of Black Lives Matter because a lot of what I learned, especially in 2020 when all the protests were happening, they were also happening in England and stuff, which was really cool because England was recognizing their past imperial power and tearing down the statues of evil white men just like we were doing here, and they were taking control of their history just like we were doing here, which I found was really interesting. So I'm looking forward to getting more input from her.
36:28:00 The other two people, one's my mom's generation gen, I think they're both Gen X, both the two people I did before. One lives in Maryland and one lives in a tiny little town in North Carolina, and it just kind of gave different viewpoints on how they've experienced life. One had the KKK come up to her house when she was a kid because schools were being integrated and I guess she was a boomer then. She's a boomer... and just doing all that stuff. I'm just getting stories from people. I interviewed one of my classmates this past Saturday. She's from Nashville, and so I kind of got her viewpoints on the whole Tennessee aspect of it and how she was a senior. That sounds right, because I think she's a senior, now on the whole thing. And so the whole point of this is just kind of get people's stories and to see how it has impacted people all over the place.
37:33:00 I would love to interview more people than just five people because I find this is very interesting to see all these different aspects, what's going on

37:45:00 JD Franklin: And different approaches to the situation because everyone wasn't living at the same place at the same time.

37:53:00 Lizzy Ray: The person who lives in the tiny town in North Carolina, she told me about the one march her tiny town did. It was like less than a hundred people on Main Street and people would come out of their stores and just look at the crowd and look at the march going on and all that stuff, and she talked about how she's really scared for her nephews and stuff growing up in the world and all that stuff, and she's also terrified of them going to protest by themselves. And she told stories about teaching them what to do growing up, and I'm learning more about stuff that I've never learned about because I have white privilege. So I just find it very interesting that I'm learning all this stuff, but thank you for letting me interview you.

38:47:00 JD Franklin: It's a Tuesday's. Okay.

38:49:00 Lizzy Ray: It feels like we should be later in the week.

38:51:00 JD Franklin: Yeah, I think it's technically a holiday.

38:54:00 Lizzy Ray: Yeah. We should...

38:56:00 JD Franklin: Just not how we celebrate here.

38:58:00 Lizzy Ray: Do kids in school get out for Halloween? I can't remember. I don't ever remember

39:03:00 JD Franklin: Us, but schools, they would decorate the hallways. They would have it to where you'd come in, your costume teachers would give out candy, so even if you weren't out, you could

39:13:00 Lizzy Ray: Still celebr celebrate. My gosh, were tiny little children wandering around campus when I came out of Fitwell this morning in their tiny little costumes. It was adorable.

39:23:00 JD Franklin: Yeah.

39:24:00 Lizzy Ray: Well, you have anything you would like to add to the rest of this interview?

39:30:00 JD Franklin: Nothing at the moment.

39:31:00 Lizzy Ray: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for letting me do this.

39:35:00 JD Franklin: Of course.

39:36:00 Lizzy Ray: I appreciate it.