In response to Governor Bill Lee’s extension of the stay at home order until the end of April, #FreeTN events have been scheduled for this weekend in key cities across Tennessee.
Organizer Kim Edwards, a Nashville mom of three, is perhaps an unlikely person to be in such a position, but was selected as such by her friends also concerned about the extension of the statewide stay at home order.
Edwards’ husband is a wedding DJ and they open their home for Airbnb rentals, both of which are completely shut down with the stay at home orders issued by Lee and Mayor John Cooper.
Edwards told The Tennessee Star that it’s not just their personal livelihood, but that of the Nashville area which is highly dependent on tourism and other large scale events which have been forced to be cancelled.
She told The Star that the message being received is that their entire future is no longer essential. To the contrary, Edwards points out, “Everyone is essential.”
“This whole movement” Edwards explained about #FreeTN, “is that we need to have better balance. Everyone’s life is important, and there is a way to protect people’s safety that doesn’t infringe on our constitutional rights.”
Also involved in the movement, Edwards told The Star, are libertarians, medical freedom advocates and small business owners, all of whom agree that there has been overstepping by government.
The message of the #FreeTN movement is that Tennessee is ready to reopen while, at the same time, making efforts to take care of those that are risk, utilizing measures such as special hours at grocery stores and isolation until herd immunity is developed.
Edwards strongly makes the point, “Social distancing cannot be the new way of life for Tennesseans, as Governor Lee has said, until there is a vaccine,” adding, “That just can’t happen.”
“We’re all responsible for our own well-being; you’re not responsible for my well-being,” Edwards says.
“It’s unfortunate that we’ve gotten to this place,” concludes Edwards.
#FreeTN events are scheduled for the afternoon of Sunday, April 19 and will be held at the main government building at the state’s major cities. Details for these developing Facebook events in each city can be found here:
Chattanooga
Jackson
Johnson City
Knoxville
Memphis
Nashville
Jefferson City
A statewide #FreeTN event will be held at the Tennessee State Capitol on Monday, April 27 at 10 a.m. Further details can be found here.
Another group, Liberty Ignited, says that through the stay at home orders “government has violated our inherent and constitutional rights to live as free, self governing citizens!”
Liberty Ignited has organized nationwide “freedom alliance” events at all state capitols on Saturday, April 25 at 1 p.m. for “a show of civil disobedience that we will not be caged in our homes any longer!”
As The Star reported, the #ReopenTennessee movement started Monday on Twitter, and a “Protect the 1%, and let the 99% return to work” petition to Governor Lee was started Monday by a Knoxville physician and surgeon. The petition can be signed here.
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Laura Baigert is a senior reporter at The Tennessee Star.
Photo “Protesters” by #ReopenTN.
Keep Tn closed until this disease does off. Too many people in this nation whose lives are lead by the “founding fathers” really believe themselves to be invincible. Or perhaps they just don’t give a damn and could care less if others fall because of their zeal to make money and party or lack of empathy for others. Either way, stay the hell home if you’re not a first responder, medical worker. Hell paying for meds isn’t importanat but providing it is. This whole capitalist country idea is extremely exhausting. I care about my family. Do you care about your, besides monitary issues?! Now that the idea of putting more “should have done it a long time ago” money into education and families staying at home to care for their children and inturn building society by also building healthier relationships within the households (where social development and work ethic should always start), y’all scared that momey won’t be available for your own luxury any longer. There comes a time in this world whereas (gosh i wish to use so much profanity) one needs to take a freaking seat on the couch, at the kitchen table, on the front porch or back yard patio, on the living room floor, on the bed, on the toilet, or in the bathtub (all at home) and either listen to, talk to, or with family, or simply quite everything around in order to see, hear, taste, smell or just experience in whole the world that was so obsolete without all of those open senses. Its time for usbto go back tonthe way things were meant to be. Families were actually units who worked to solve enigmatic life altering matters. Friends were rrally friends and they would talk on the phone for hours and were present whenever the ceilings fell. Companions had ample time for romance. Like none of these actions exist in Sam’s Club or Costco bulk. It’s either way over there or nonexistent due to the high flux of technological advances. We are destroying humanity as it barely exists—people (mainly men—white men) care more about money and materials than human life. They’d do more for animals than their own freaking child. Or even worse, keeping a damn business open thay sells beverages that inebriate causing the loss of more lives than the idea of not having money, is more important than securing the safety and wellbeing of those same humans who have to go back to their families of whom would all in their own ways provide a lift for the economy’s circle of life when the time for opening its doors arose. No “in due season”. Y’all want it now! And thats disgusting. Banks, property owners, developers, whomever all has the power say, lets produce viable solutions for everyone so that we can come back strong. Thats nit gonna happen in this country with far too many money hungry “mongers”. So whatever! My words are pretty much empty venting by now. Surely this will fall on deaf ears, blind eyes, turned backs, other cheeks, and closed fists.
Noticing that the local demonstrations are scheduled for Sunday, April 19, I suspect that few have noticed the ironic – or ominous – coincidence of that date. April 19, 1775 – 245 years ago – was the day of the “shot Heard ‘Round The World,” when the American Revolution began in response to the Brits – our government at the time – coming to take our guns in Concord Mass. On April 19, 1973, the federal agents burned the people of the Davidian compound – and 2 years later, on the 19th of April, that disaster was avenged, however mistakenly, by the destruction of the FBI Murrah building in Oklahoma City. 25 years ago, Sunday.
File a complaint under USC Title 18, Section 241 & 242 – as easy as a mouse click or telephone call. Name the Governor and your County Mayor as Co-Conspirators
USC Title 18, Section 241 Conspiracy Against Rights – https://www.justice.gov/crt/conspiracy-against-rights
USC Title 18, Section 242 Deprivation Of Rights Under Color Of Law – https://www.justice.gov/crt/deprivation-rights-under-color-law
Here’s where to file a complaint: https://www.justice.gov/crt/how-file-complaint