Anti-violence activists are bringing Baltimore’s neighborhoods together for a third installment of the Baltimore Ceasefire movement this weekend, asking everyone to put the guns down and share some love and remember those they’ve lost.
The event began last night at midnight, and continues to 11:59 p.m. on Sunday. The motto is simple–“Nobody Kill Anybody”–but the effort is much larger and far more holistic.
“Most of us in Baltimore have lost somebody to violence,” co-organizer Erricka Bridgeford says in a video posted to the campaign’s website. “And we do live with that pain every single day. It’s stuff that we never fully recover from.”
A director of programming for Community Mediation Maryland, Bridgeford last year rallied neighborhoods to celebrate life and reject gun violence for the city’s first-ever Ceasefire event in August, and hosted a second one in November. During the first event, six people were shot, two fatally, while during the second installment, one person died and two others were wounded.
But the community vibes are far more important than just the raw stats, organizers say.
“It’s not just about not killing anybody,” Bridgeford told Baltimore Fishbowl last fall. “It’s also just about us checking our responses to conflict and our thought processes around conflict.”
Communities are chasing that goal this weekend, hosting dozens of events around the city. Here are a few:
Today:
- Students at Poly will make t-shirts with anti-violence messaging and “honor people they have lost to violence.”
- The Morgan State Graduate Student Assocation will host a free Vision Board Social to help attendees set priorities for the year, starting at 6 p.m.
- Duane “Shorty” Davis and Brian Dolge host another installment of their Dinner and a Movie series at EMP Collective downtown, starting at 7 p.m. (and running again tomorrow night).
Saturday:
- The Baltimore Neighborhood Basketball Assocation (BNBA) hosts youth league play all day, from 9 a.m.-8 p.m. at Overlea High School.
- St. James Episcopal Church in Harlem Park hosts a “peace and healing walk” from 10 a.m. to noon.
- A tailgate at Winchester and Poplar avenues in Rosemont, starting at noon.
Sunday:
- FORCE hosts a quilting workshop at noon at the Motor House “to honor friends and community members who are victims of domestic homicide in Baltimore,” letting guests add to the Monument Quilt if they so desire.
- Participants pray and form a human chain at Edmondson Avenue and Hilton Parkway, from 2-5 p.m.
- A “Souper Bowl Chili Cook-Off” at Empowerment Temple AME Church in Northwest Baltimore, from 3-6 p.m.
Click here for the full calendar of events.
