Post by cardinals on Nov 8, 2008 22:43:40 GMT -5
www.lehighvalleylive.com/warren-county/index.ssf?/base/news-0/122612075340980.xml&coll=3
Community rallies around family shocked by racist symbol
Saturday, November 08, 2008
By tom quigley
The Express-Times
HARDWICK TWP. | Eight-year-old Arianna Grewal kept waking up the night after racists burned a cross on the little girl's front lawn in the dead of night.
The people responsible wrapped the cross in the pink bed sheet Arianna picked out to serve as the canvas for a message supporting the victory of President-elect Barack Obama.
She and her mother, Alina Grewal, hand-painted the sheet and her father, Gary Grewal, hung it up Tuesday, Election Day, on the front lawn.
The racists stole the banner Tuesday night and returned with it and the cross during the early morning hours Thursday. A rainstorm apparently extinguished the fire, and the wind knocked it to the ground, Alina Grewal said.
As news of the event spread, people began visiting the Grewals at their Millbrook Road home, sending them e-mails and calling them on the telephone. Alina described it as the response of a good community.
"I've got to tell you, these people have been awesome," Alina Grewal said. "It's like someone said: We're dealing with people with low IQs."
She added, "These trolls are hiding in our community."
"I don't want anybody to think they can intimidate us or dictate to our family how to live and how to think," she added.
Alina Grewal said her daughter is doing better.
"She's feeling safe," Alina Grewal said. "I told her there are people in this world who are not smart enough to control their anger
Page 2 of 2
Gary Grewal said he didn't want to expose his daughter to the hatred in the world by explaining the meaning of the cross-burning.
He said he told his daughter some people burned wood on their property because they were angry. He told her it's like the way daddy gets when the Dallas Cowboys lose.
Melvin Warren, founder and president of the Warren-Sussex chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, called the family Thursday and invited them to attend the chapter's monthly meeting that night at Warren County Community College.
Gary and Alina accepted the invitation and told the group about their experience, Warren said.
"It gave me high blood pressure," Warren said of the cross-burning. "I couldn't believe this kind of foolishness would go on in this day and age."
He called the perpetrators the exception to the rule of most Americans.
"We're all people trying to move forward, raise our children, live prosperously," Warren said.
He said members of the NAACP want the family to know they are there to support them.
"Racism is an ugly thing and people just need to be educated," Warren said. "It's 2008, I mean, come on. Let's try to move forward so we can all enjoy and prosper."
Ethel Conry, chairwoman of the Warren County Human Relations Commission, said the incident reminded her of another time and place.
"It reminded me of when I was growing up in the South," she said.
Conry, who grew up in Mississippi in the 1960s, recalled a cross-burning that occurred outside the home of her aunt and uncle.
New Jersey State Police are continuing what a spokesman described as a vigorous investigation. No arrests had occurred as of Friday afternoon
Community rallies around family shocked by racist symbol
Saturday, November 08, 2008
By tom quigley
The Express-Times
HARDWICK TWP. | Eight-year-old Arianna Grewal kept waking up the night after racists burned a cross on the little girl's front lawn in the dead of night.
The people responsible wrapped the cross in the pink bed sheet Arianna picked out to serve as the canvas for a message supporting the victory of President-elect Barack Obama.
She and her mother, Alina Grewal, hand-painted the sheet and her father, Gary Grewal, hung it up Tuesday, Election Day, on the front lawn.
The racists stole the banner Tuesday night and returned with it and the cross during the early morning hours Thursday. A rainstorm apparently extinguished the fire, and the wind knocked it to the ground, Alina Grewal said.
As news of the event spread, people began visiting the Grewals at their Millbrook Road home, sending them e-mails and calling them on the telephone. Alina described it as the response of a good community.
"I've got to tell you, these people have been awesome," Alina Grewal said. "It's like someone said: We're dealing with people with low IQs."
She added, "These trolls are hiding in our community."
"I don't want anybody to think they can intimidate us or dictate to our family how to live and how to think," she added.
Alina Grewal said her daughter is doing better.
"She's feeling safe," Alina Grewal said. "I told her there are people in this world who are not smart enough to control their anger
Page 2 of 2
Gary Grewal said he didn't want to expose his daughter to the hatred in the world by explaining the meaning of the cross-burning.
He said he told his daughter some people burned wood on their property because they were angry. He told her it's like the way daddy gets when the Dallas Cowboys lose.
Melvin Warren, founder and president of the Warren-Sussex chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, called the family Thursday and invited them to attend the chapter's monthly meeting that night at Warren County Community College.
Gary and Alina accepted the invitation and told the group about their experience, Warren said.
"It gave me high blood pressure," Warren said of the cross-burning. "I couldn't believe this kind of foolishness would go on in this day and age."
He called the perpetrators the exception to the rule of most Americans.
"We're all people trying to move forward, raise our children, live prosperously," Warren said.
He said members of the NAACP want the family to know they are there to support them.
"Racism is an ugly thing and people just need to be educated," Warren said. "It's 2008, I mean, come on. Let's try to move forward so we can all enjoy and prosper."
Ethel Conry, chairwoman of the Warren County Human Relations Commission, said the incident reminded her of another time and place.
"It reminded me of when I was growing up in the South," she said.
Conry, who grew up in Mississippi in the 1960s, recalled a cross-burning that occurred outside the home of her aunt and uncle.
New Jersey State Police are continuing what a spokesman described as a vigorous investigation. No arrests had occurred as of Friday afternoon