Reberta A. Dury was 32. She moved to Buffalo about a decade ago to care for her brother

who was recovering from a bone marrow transplant. Margus D. Morrison was 52, a father of six

who worked as a bus aide for Buffalo Public Schools. Andre McNeil was 53 and he was picking

up a birthday cake for his young son. Aaron Salter was 55, a retired Buffalo police

officer and security guard who folks say was a bridge in the community. Geraldine Talley

was 62 and engaged to be married. Celesteine Cheney was 65, a grandmother of six. She survived

breast cancer and a brain aneurysm. Hayward Patterson was 67. He was a deacon at his church.

Catherine Massey was 72, a long time civil rights activist, a hometown legend who spent

much of her life advocating for the black community. Pearl Young was 77, a dedicated substitute

teacher for the Buffalo School District. And Ruth Whitfield was 86, a dutiful wife

who made daily visits to her husband in his nursing home. She was also the mother of

a former Buffalo Fire Commissioner. Mrs. Whitfield was the eldest of 10 victims, allegedly killed

by a teenage white supremacist in a grocery store in Buffalo, New York over the weekend.

Three others were wounded. But so many more of us felt the familiar hurt of gun violence

in America. And more so, we felt the specific kind of pain that comes when that violence

is fueled by racism and hate, both as American as apple pie, but still so bitter with every single

bite. It's been a rough few days and I know that so many of you have gone through the

same range of emotions that I have since the killings. Anger at the coward whose name

I don't even want to say and every single person who helped create the monster inside

of him. Grief at the loss of so much innocent life, a gunman driving over 200 miles to snatch

the lives of our elders, our sisters and brothers, and resignation, that thirsty hate for

black people in this country has never been quenched. That has been passed down from one

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