Day 819: 5 Minute Freewrite: Friday - Prompt: vertical antenna

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James Varick IV wrote a brief but pungent editorial for the triple edition of the Lofton County Free Voice, on the day the heart of everyone in Lofton County who had a heart would have that heart break.

“We have devoted this edition of the Free Voice to the counting and recognizing of the 12,000 victims of the Ridgeline Fire – 12,000 more Black and Latino victims of White domestic terrorism – who were uncounted by the police force and mainstream media of Big Loft and Lofton County, VA. We do this with this commentary: those who oppose this recognition of these 12,000 lives should imagine the sight of 12,000 vertical antennas, rising and broadcasting truth, along with 41 percent of Lofton County also doing the same.

“Every voice from James Madison in the Federalist Paper no. 10 and the original, un-amended Constitution right down to today's local media has spoken with one voice for 400 years: only the lives of male landowners of Anglo-Saxon descent count. Only such men were counted in the initial 120 reported as lost in the Ridgeline Fire. Only their families' anguish and grief were shared in order that everyone commiserate both emotionally and with the county's resources.

“No more, Lofton County. No more will there be one voice speaking only for the smallest segment of society, and damning all the rest to invisibility and insignificance. There is a FREE voice now in Lofton County, and you may expect it to become louder and louder, and to be joined by Una Voz Libre in the very near future. We are all here, Lofton County. You will hear us. Everything you wish to do will be drowned out until we are heard – and we will be heard.”

Photo by Nikola Stojković on Unsplash