In an era of protests and pestilence, there has been no shortage of things to cover downtown Indianapolis since March. Little did I think when I started videoing four years ago that the city would have regressed to the state it is in now with so much promising development in the works prior to Covid.
I also never thought a Save The Children group would become as widespread and controversial so quickly as it has over the last couple weeks.
Before I could even get this video edited, the backlash against the Save The Children movement was growing, but not nearly as fast as the Save The Children Indiana membership numbers on Facebook which at the time of writing this stands at 18.2K+.
Detractors of those using the hashtag #savethechildren claim misinformation and conspiracy theories are doing the children more harm than good. The Indiana organizers argue that diversity of political thought within the group is welcome and acknowledge that, while not everyone in the movement has the same political ideology, they all agree that child trafficking must end.
If the two ladies spearheading the Indianapolis movement, Jenee Michelle and Melyssa Hubbard, have their way, child sex traffickers are going to be exposed and go to jail regardless of how anyone feels about their politics.
Having covered a lot of protests in Indianapolis over the years, this had to be one of the calmest. The protesters showed up at WTHR on Meridian Street and then marched to WRTV just a few blocks down the street before heading to Monument Circle for a group photo and a lap.
On their way around the Circle, a patrol car stopped and the officer driving motioned me over to his car to let me know there was a city ordinance restricting skateboarding within the mile square of downtown. It had been 3 years and 10 months during the Standing Rock protest since I had last been warned about skateboarding downtown.
That’s a pretty good run considering the amount of time I’ve spent rolling around on the regular, often in front of the police. So far, I’ve made it a week and a few days without another warning. I’m hoping to keep it that was for at least the next 6 years or more.