AJC reporters fanned out across metro Atlanta on Friday to get a sense of the conversations people are having about the deadly shooting in Charleston. Their comments have been edited for clarity and space.
Olivia Shellman, 24
Education outreach coordinator at Georgia Tech
Candler Park, Atlanta
I first got news of the shooting while I was in bed checking my Twitter feed the morning after. Tim Wise, an anti-racist author and speaker I follow, posted what had happened. I immediately pushed out the article on my Twitter and Facebook with the caption, “THIS is TERRORISM,” because I feared (and was unfortunately correct) that our media would hesitate to equate this event to what it so obviously was: an act of racist terrorism.
I was very distracted that day at work, constantly turning to my social media feeds for updates. Once the picture of the crime came into clearer focus, specifically about the shooter spending an hour in the church before the attack, and the things he said to his victims, my frustrations and sadness peaked, and I’m not sure when they will come back down. They are propelling me now.
— Bill Rankin
Amjad Taufique, 56
West Cobb
Owns a home-repair management company
Yesterday I was at work, looking at my computer, and this news flash popped up. At that time, this person was on the loose. I was really shocked to hear what had happened. I really felt bad about it and all the families being affected. It was just awful.
The people who I’ve talked to are all in shock. They say, “Why would somebody do this, who had no justification for such a senseless, terroristic act?” I said to one of my daughters last night, “I don’t know what else terrorism is, if this is not. This person calculated, did what he did, and really harmed his community.”
One of the comments that I heard at the mosque last night was, “We’re glad that nobody is really blaming his religion or his race or anything of that sort for his actions.” Because that’s such a ridiculous thing to happen. Because once somebody does a stupid act like this, and claiming to be of our faith, then all of a sudden we all have to share that blame because somehow we may approve of that stupidity or that heinous act.
So don’t blame his race. Don’t blame his religion. You cannot generalize like that. Is this true of all white people? No, that’s not the case. There are people who have prejudice and racism, but we need to keep it to them and not just swipe everyone with the same brush.
-Johnny Edwards
Rev. Drew Stockstill, 29
Atlanta
Associate pastor at Morningside Presbyterian Church
Stockstill is a member of Outcry, an interfaith group of clergy seeking to end gun violence in Georgia
I was at home the evening of the shooting. I was by myself. My wife had just gone to bed and I had started checking Twitter. I noticed first just a lot of communication about it on social media, but it had just happened. I turned on local media but there were still few details. So I immediately began to pray. I know Charleston well – I went to a Presbyterian college a few hours away and went [to Charleston] often. I’m a pastor. I know what it is to gather together in a sanctuary. I know what it is to gather around in prayer. The farthest thing in my mind would be violence.
We always preach peace and hope and love, even in the face of evidence to the contrary. We as Christians in particular, we are not like those without hope. We encourage people not to give in to the fear. First turn to God and prayer. Then begin to seek healing. Always hope this is not the way the world will remain.
I think eventually people will see this as just another in a long line of desperation and terror because of our culture’s obsession with death and guns.
— Kristina Torres
Charles A. Black, 74
Atlanta
Actor
Black is a longtime civil rights activist who worked to register blacks to vote and to desegregate lunch counters and movie theaters in Atlanta.
I was watching TV and heard about it approximate to the time it was occurring on the news. “Oh, my God, here we go again,” was the way I felt. I felt a kind of a cold helplessness about the whole matter — that these things seem to be occurring all too frequently and there doesn’t seem to be anything that stops it. And, of course, as the president has mentioned on many occasions, the runaway gun possession thing is just crazy. Why anybody would think more guns would kill fewer people is just beyond me. That is not good math. It is that kind of thing that was going through my mind. I still feel we have to at some point admit to what the problems really are. And I think they are deep and far-reaching through our society.
This was clearly a premeditated, vicious and heartless act of hatred and cowardice. No plea of insanity should be seriously considered, not even for a second. The big questions for me are: What brings a human being to the point of being capable of such evil, bigoted, depraved acts? Who were direct and indirect accomplices to this massacre? Of course, someone in his personal circle of influence. But also, to my mind, every greedy, divisive politician, public official, media idiot and corporate executive who benefits from this madness has guilty blood all over their hands. Not just for this event, but for all victims of hate crimes and oppressive laws and practices in this country. They should all be prosecuted as accessories before the fact every time something like this happens.
— Jeremy Redmon
Colleen Tull, 35
Smyrna
Novelist and freelance writer
I found out about it on Facebook.
I belong to Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. So I am bombarded with these posts every single day of these tragic, senseless crimes. My first gut reaction was about the gun control and how this country is just out of control when it comes to that issue. But it just feels hopeless and impossible when you are going against the NRA and all these lobbying groups.
I had a conversation with a friend who came over this morning for coffee. I have four biracial kids and she is white with a biracial son, and it’s terrifying. I can’t imagine being black and the fear you must have in this country. What I have is a small portion of that fear for my children. It is terrifying for me to let my children go out into this world when I know there are people that would want to kill somebody for the color of their skin.
- Andria Simmons
Nupol Kiazolu, 15
Norcross
Sophomore at Meadowcreek High School
Nupol’s family moved to Norcross from Rhode Island, where she participated in protests following the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., last September.
I was at home with my brothers. We saw there was a shooting at the church, and I was beyond shocked. How could someone do that at a church building? I am so upset. Nine people were murdered. I don’t understand what’s going on these days. There needs to be justice for these people.
In the north, people are more angry, they show more reaction. I don’t see many protests. All I see is people talking about it. I’m talking to my pastor. I’m trying to organize something. Too many young and innocent lives are being lost over foolishness.
This struck a nerve. I’m Christian, I go to church. I don’t want to have to go inside my church and feel uncomfortable just because some psychopath’s killing people for no reason. I am just so dumbfounded by all of this. How can it happen in a church building, in a place of God?
This was all pre-meditated. I think he didn’t like black people, he wanted to kill them. I take that personally. It’s terrifying to know you’re not even safe in your church anymore. It’s really upsetting because I keep seeing the pattern. It’s always a black person. I feel like history’s starting to repeat itself. It’s scary, it really is scary. I worry for my brothers’ safety. You can look at me and tell I’m black. I’m going to be uneasy for a long time after this shooting. I’m hoping, I’m praying, there will be change. I want to get all my young friends together. I want to peacefully riot, get our voices heard.
- Arielle Kass
Melissa O’Brien, 48
West Cobb
Substitute teacher and freelance writer
O’Brien lives with her husband and two teenage children, and is active in the community on zoning issues. She lived in Columbia, S.C., for three years.
I found out about the shooting on my phone. It was the first thing I saw when I woke up in the morning and it horrified me. My immediate reaction was to scan for more news. Then I had a conversation with my kids.
I used to live in South Carolina for three years and South Carolina is like a large family. Everybody there knows everybody. It was discouraging to me to know that this kind of racially-motivated violence still takes place and people don’t teach their kids to love everybody of all different races, religions and ethnicities. It’s definitely a matter of race. It’s very simple. This person committed it out of hate.
So when I talked to my children about it, I said we need to do better than this, as a society. It wasn’t a tough conversation. They hear about people being killed all the time. This has unfortunately become very commonplace in our society. But the bottom line is they need to know it shouldn’t be commonplace, this should not be normal, it isn’t normal, and they should be upset about it every single time it happens. They should be outraged about it every single time it happens. That’s really the message I tried to tell them – this should make them really mad.
— Dan Klepal
Jerald Reid, 72
Fayetteville
Fruit and vegetable salesman
I heard about it on the radio and then watched it on the TV news. I thought it was probably a nut, a lunatic with a drug problem and his mind was satanic, evil. I didn’t care if [police] shot him when they apprehended him. It’s a pitiful shame.
There is so much happening you can’t hardly keep up with it. There is a lot of violence going on, which is bad. It was awful, terrible. I believe in guns, I believe every citizen needs to have a right to have a gun. It ain’t the gun that killed those people, it was a boy, a young boy with mental problems. It’s a lack of parental guidance on these young kids now-a-days. They don’t have parents teaching them nothing and they are turned loose on society.
It’s bad enough that this happened anywhere, but especially in the church. The last of any place it should have happened is a church, but now there’s hardly any place safe anymore.
-James Salzer
Katrina Edmondson, 52
Decatur area
Small business owner
The TV was on in the bedroom Wednesday night, so I heard it in my sleep and I woke up to hear about a massacre.
I talked with my husband about it in the morning. I believe this boy was taught this. Who are his friends? Who are his family? That kind of racism is taught. He might be a lone wolf, but I just don’t believe he didn’t tell anybody about this.
[Her voice wavers, and she pauses.] I am a black person from Mississippi, and I get this stuff. I thought about my mom and my dad. Church is a way of life for them. That could have been anybody I know. I was really — and still am — deeply hurt and moved.
Black America is truly under attack. They (police) did the naked man running in DeKalb County (he was shot and killed). The broken spine (Baltimore police). It escalated to pushing a teenaged girl’s face into the pavement (cop at a Texas pool party). And now we have six dead women.
Nobody is coming to save us but us. We have one of the strongest weapons available to us and that’s the dollar. When George Zimmerman was acquitted [in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin two years ago], my daughter was on the swimming team and they were supposed to go to Florida. I just said, “we can’t go.” I didn’t ask for my money back or anything. I wanted my daughter [she’s in high school] and son [he’s in college] to know you have to make a stand. And that’s the problem with black America: we’re not willing to make a sacrifice to stop the killing. We can pray about it. We can cry about it. But it seems you have to go to extreme means to get people to say, “OK, this is wrong. Let’s fix this.”
-Ty Tagami
Brenda Nelson, 56
Summerville, S.C.
Director of community outreach, Charleston County Schools
A broken air-conditioner may have saved Brenda Nelson’s life.
Nelson is an ordained minister in the Baptist church but joined Emanuel AME in downtown Charleston last August.
She has taught in the same Bible study class in which nine people were shot to death Wednesday evening, including her good friend DePayne Middleton-Doctor, whose daughter Haley is her godchild.
Nelson was at Emanuel Wednesday afternoon, meeting with Rev. Clementa Pinckney, who was also killed, but left before bible study that evening to check on an air-conditioning problem at her Summerville home.
She tried ignoring her telephone when it started ringing that night, but finally answered a call from staff members at the Charleston County Schools, where she is director of community outreach.
“They wanted to make sure I was safe,” she said. “I almost felt like I was going to collapse… I started calling my girlfriend’s number, hoping that she was not in there, and everything went into the voice mailbox.”
The next day Nelson had to quell rumors that she was among the dead, and she also had to visit with Haley, 13, who was staying at Middleton-Doctor’s parents’ house.
“The hardest thing yesterday for me was waking up yesterday morning and no longer being able to be in denial,” she said Friday. “When the sun rose I had to accept and deal with reality, I could no longer be in denial that these lives were lost.”
-Bo Emerson
Jonathan Troutman, 25
Atlanta
Restaurant cook
Spoke as he waited for a bus near the Marietta square.
I heard it on the news. When I saw it, it really gave me a scare. We talk about terrorists, ISIS. What about terrorists in our country? What scared me [was] this man actually sat with the church people for an hour before he killed them. I wonder what his thought process was. And why does this keep happening, and happening to African-Americans.
Other people say, `Everything happens for a reason.’ But what was the reason behind this? Nothing good can come out of it. He [Roof] is going to die.
-Danny Robbins
Robert L. Hawkins, 65
Atlanta
Business executive
As somebody who is involved in the church myself that is supposed to be the place to go for safety and for someone to go in and shoot innocent people in a situation like that, it couldn’t get any worse. You couldn’t get any more evil than that…The church is to most people, not just African Americans, but to most people is the center, where you go when something bad happens. You don’t expect bad things to happen.
-Brad Schrade
The Right Rev. Robert C. Wright, Bishop
Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta
I think the first thing we want to say is our condolences. We pray for God’s mercy and comfort in that place.
The second thing we should pay attention to: This is racial hatred. This is yet another incident of gun violence. He was very calculated in targeting a community. How many people did he drive past to get to Mother Emanuel? He intended to do this. To sit there for an hour, in fellowship, before doing this, is evil and we need to call it that.
While I very much appreciate Gov. Haley’s heartfelt sentiments about the loss, I want to notice that the Confederate flag yet hangs over the state Capitol. Where else in the world does the symbol of a defeated army fly over the state Capitol?
This is lunacy and yet I think that these are bits and pieces that contribute to the justification for racial hatred.
We have got a gun problem. I just refuse to absolve the rabid gun culture of any culpability. I reject that.
My great hope is that innocent blood will somehow be a pivot point for us and that somehow this innocent blood and facing this evil will somehow wake us up and we can take action.
-Carrie Teegardin
Amitha Panikkar, 25
Medical student in clinical rotation at DeKalb Medical Center
Panikkar was born in India but moved to the United States as a child. She grew up in Arizona, with its freewheeling gun laws, and believes there is little hope the country will reverse course on guns.
It’s a horrible thing, but I feel like I’ve become desensitized because it happens all the time now.
Nothing ever changes. I think the – is it the NRA? — they won’t let any kind of gun reform happen. I don’t think anything will change.
-Chris Joyner
Robert James, 43
Tucker
District Attorney for DeKalb County
What a tragedy. People in church. Worshipping God. And praying. Terrible. [My dad] explained to me that even though I had [white] friends and they played with me I needed to be careful. Not everyone will want to accept me. … What he wanted to impress on me was ‘don’t let your naïveté get you hurt.’ It’s a hate crime and it’s a terrorist act. My hope is something like this doesn’t divide us as a nation, doesn’t divide us as a people. … We have to figure out a way to work through our differences and deal with this as one. My heart aches for those people. I cannot imagine my wife going to Bible study and somebody giving the call and telling me now she’s been killed.
- Rhonda Cook
Wesley Wyatt, 31
Atlanta
Construction worker
Wesley Wyatt is left only with questions after learning about the shooting in Charleston on his phone early Thursday morning.
That’s crazy. Why did all this happen all of a sudden? That’s what people wanted to know. Gun crazy, I guess.
I’m 31, and I had never heard of anything similar. Not at a church.
Everybody wants to know: What is the connection? How did all that happen?
What is the motive? Did he pick this church or was he sent there?
-Kelly Yamanouchi
Michael Lewis, 32
Norcross
Ga. State University student
Michael Lewis is a business graduate student at Georgia State University.
I first found out about the shooting at home. I was with some family doing things in the house. It caught my attention on the TV, so I stopped to listen. It was startling for this time and age.
I wouldn’t expect to hear something like that – for someone to go and shoot up a church. I didn’t honestly believe it at first. I thought it was a mistake, but then as more of the news came out, it was apparent that some did shoot up a church. It was a sad feeling that someone would shoot up a church out of all things.
It was scary and strange, and it was true.
It would make you concerned now as to what the safety levels would be in these places. How safe they would be now is a question that comes to mind. You wouldn’t think that they would shoot up a church or even inside of a church. Now, you might think they would shoot up anywhere.
It should be a surprise to many people that these things are still happening like this – these terroristic attacks. These terroristic attacks are becoming more personal. And the more they become personal, the more effective people will be behind them because they will be coming closer to home. You should be concerned about it if these kinds of attacks are becoming more personal.
— Kendall Trammell
Lana Hooks, 53
Decatur
Office assistant
Hooks hold bachelors and masters degree in African-American studies. Her comments have been edited for clarity and space.
When is it going to stop, it’s got to stop. I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t know what the sickness is emotionally, mentally. This has really got to stop against black children, against black sons, black people. What are they really angry at? Why are they lashing out like this? It makes no sense to me and I’m just really tired. I’m tired of it.
What is it going to take for us to have dialogue and do what we need to do to take care of our own, because it seems that there is nothing being really efficiently done to understand what’s going on – on both sides. Whether you’re white or black, what is going on that we need to address.
What is the real, underlying motive of the killings?
I believe it’s going to have to start in pockets. I don’t think it’s going to be a quote on quote “national thing”, I think it’s going to be in pockets of all these different cities getting together and deciding what’s best for your town, your city, your area. Because everybody’s area is different, but the killing is the same – it doesn’t matter on that. The way you go about it is going to be what determines the outcome that we all want.
— Erica A. Hernandez
Charles Sills, 20
Atlanta
Georgia State University Student
Sills saw the news of the deadly church shooting on television soon after it happened on Wednesday night as he was out at a bar with a friend. His comments have been edited for clarity and space.
It happens so often these days, in this country. It isn’t too shocking anymore, unfortunately. Mass shootings are just a fact of life; it seems like when you have guns proliferating so far into every corner of our country.
A sort of reassessment of where we are as a country in terms of race relations, and gun violence.
We definitely have to reconcile a lot more with our differences. Racial inequality is definitely still a very real problem in this country. Especially in terms of how certain people are treated in the eyes of the law. And I think that applies to some of the media coverage about the shooter as well and how he’s been portrayed.
— Erica A. Hernandez
Terrence Lewis, 41
Marietta
Construction worker
It was just messed up. The type of guy that would do that. He had some kind of issue or something. We talked about it [at work]. [Everyone] basically said the same thing: ‘He’s crazy. He needs to be locked up. He needs to be in the electric chair, to shoot those nine folks for no reason, in church.’ “
—Russell Grantham
Anita Cooper, 65
East Point
Retired airline manager and teacher
My first thought was just horror that someone would shoot inside a church. As more and more news [emerged], I became more horrified that someone would spend an hour with the people before shooting them. Of course, it was about race. His roommate said so. He told the FBI he did it. It’s a combination of racism and insanity but I also think he has some mental problems. I don’t think racism is a mental illness. I don’t think anything’s going to change until we change our gun laws and have some honest dialogue about racism and do something to help our mentally ill. We have to recognize that we are all - regardless of race - one family and I don’t think we do.”
- Tammy Joyner
Jasmine Johnson, 24
Dunwoody
Georgia State University Student
Johnson, a native Bahamian, heard the news of the South Carolina church shooting on her way to class Thursday morning. Her comments have been edited for clarity and space.
At first I didn’t exactly understand what the panic was. I was listening to the Ryan Cameron Morning Show and I just kept hearing how sad they were and how it all has to stop. It wasn’t until I got to the train station that I heard there had been a shooting and it was at a church. As the story progressed, it was just another devastating thing to take in.
In my opinion, it just keeps getting worse; it goes from shootings in the street to shootings in the store to now shootings in the church.
The conversation this time was a little bit different. Instead of “well this is what needs to be done in terms of authority” it was more or less “what is it that we are going to do in terms of safety reasons.” It was a tad bit of a dreary conversation. It was almost a hopeless conversation.
— Erica A. Hernandez
The Rev. Kevin Murriel, 29
Associate pastor, Cascade United Methodist Church
Murriel was born and raised in Jackson, Miss. He attended Emory University, studying at the Candler School of Theology, before obtaining his doctorate from Duke University.
People are saying that we live in a postracial society, that we have a black president, that we probably have as many or more congressional officials who are minorities now as we’ve had in our history, that our educational institutions are desegregated. But still the most segregated hour in America is 11 a.m. on Sunday. Our worship communities don’t reflect the diversity of our schools, or the diversity of our communities, and I really don’t think they reflect the diversity of thought in America today.
The church must be the place where these conversations begin. At the center of most Americans’ lives is religion, their faith, what they believe in, WHO they believe in. The church should be able to lead these uncomfortable conversations on race in America. I don’t think in general they are doing that.
Mother Emanuel was doing exactly what she was supposed to be doing. That is being open and inclusive to everyone. I believe that is what all churches should do.
Because these incidents are happening in places of worship, we suddenly begin not to trust people as much, especially if they look different from us.
I would still caution members from viewing them as the other. Viewing them as not a part of the body. This was an isolated event. The one mistake we could make is that we begin to cast a shadow on anyone who’s different who comes into our churches. That’s a very hard line to walk. Because we instinctively look at people who are different from us as other than us, and they may not be. I definitely support churches having measures in place to deal with security threats, but I also caution churches not to look at people wo are different as alien, as other, as the enemy, because that can happen.
- Richard Halicks
James Reese, 51
South Fulton
Cable franchise manager for Fulton County
I got up early at 5 o’clock Wednesday morning, and started getting the entire report. And that’s when it hit me, the full breadth of what happened. I was heartbroken. It was very tragic. Disbelief, total disbelief something like that happened. It’s one of those things, you think, you go to church for salvation. It’s a place you think that’s safe to be and you would never think someone would go into a church of all places to commit a hate crime. It’s very disturbing. It’s a situation where there are people who no matter what you say or do that’s going to have hate in their heart.
As a black person in America, my father and brothers who fought [in wars]… My father fought in World War II, he and his brothers. And you’d think…this is very emotional for me (he’s tears up). When I think about my father and his brothers fighting for this country, as black men in WWII, and they’re fighting for the freedom of this country, and they weren’t even free themselves truly in this country, that’s emotional to me because I don’t know if I could do that. I don’t know if I could fight for a place that doesn’t’ care for me.
When this type of stuff happens, it brings that emotion. You don’t know who to trust, what to trust. And I have teenage kids, who have graduated high school and in college. And my oldest son, all he could keep saying to me over and over again [Thursday night] was, ‘They let him in their church. They prayed with him. And he killed them. Why would he do that?’ How do you explain that to a 19-year-old? The hatred people have. To know you’re in a country where you’re not sure if you matter to people.
-Rose French
Shawnta’ Hooks, 33
Atlanta
Owner, Posh Treats dessert and catering company
The disappointing thing is what I’ve seen from white people. You think back to Ferguson and Baltimore, and it was all about the violence. They had so much to say about a burnt down CVS, but nothing to say about nine people murdered at a church.
And how about we get back to basics and address … something that we never really get into, which is racism?
People are quick to say racism doesn’t exist or it’s irrelevant. That’s shameful. Failing to recognize our differences - what makes us special..this whole idea perpetuates it.
We need to be talking.
- Marlon Walker
Kristi York Wooten
46
Atlanta
Wooten is a music writer and consultant to non-profit organizations. Her comments have been edited for clarity and space
I am a South Carolinian by birth, born in Greenville. Went to college there, too.
I didn't find out until the morning when I saw it in my Twitter feed. And my first thought was, how can that happen again?
It reminded my husband of the bombing that killed the four little girls killed in the Birmingham church.
Birmingham was a different time, it’s true. But what this shares with that is the feeling that when evil enters the house of worship, when it takes lives there, it is harder to move on without taking action to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
As we work our way through our grief, we have to think of how can we do better? And it seems to me that racism is not something that happens only in the South. It’s not the South only, it’s America. It is for all of us, for America, to figure out how can we get over these problems together?
Time will tell if this is a change-maker moment. But the event has the potential to motivate people, and I do think many people are ready to commit to doing better. People need to realize how important it is to educate children around these issues. If you are taught to view people equally, you are more likely to live that way. I don’t say young children are color blind, but they are closer to accepting people who are different than older generations are.
Charleston has seen some brutal murders, like the shooting of Walter Scott a few months ago. My heart aches for that city. There are some good people there who want equality and who want justice.
It just gets me to ask, when are we going to do better?
- Michael Kanell
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