- Sometimes there are really no words
that can tell a story better than a picture.
The image is powerful enough on it's own,
I don't need to describe it.
Here it is, take a look.
That's a woman at a peaceful protest in Montana,
standing resolute and silent,
while a man aggressively spews obscenities at her.
The picture is the inspiration behind
a new segment we're actually starting called
Behind the Photo.
(upbeat music)
So we have the woman featured in the photo
on the line right now.
Hello Samantha, how're you doing?
- Hi, I'm doing great.
How are you?
- I am so good,
and I am in love with your earrings and want to steal them.
(laughs)
I guess I want you to take us back to the day
when that happened and what led to
the moment in that picture,
how did it, did it just get there all of a sudden,
or was there something leading up to it?
- [Samantha] That was my second day out
protesting peacefully,
a group of teenagers from Whitefish
had actually already been out there two days prior,
up until that moment, we'd had people yell at us,
or there'd be people who had walked by
and said negative things,
but overall, we were received pretty welcomly.
You know, there's a lot of love,
a lot of positive support,
people were pulling over and
getting out of their cars to join us,
- Good!
- Lots of thumbs up, palms, peace signs,
it was really cool.
And then that day, we had about
thirty or forty people out there at the time,
and that gentleman had been driving around
yelling at us from his truck.
It was the first one, so it didn't seem like
anything at the time, and then you know,
as the protest went on, all of a sudden
there was a commotion behind us, and again,
being one of the older people out there,
I turned around to kind of assert myself
into the situation,
and that's when Jay was yelling,
and so I turned around and kind of just
stood my ground,
and that's when he came up to-
as soon as he saw me, we locked eyes, he came right over,
so then that's when it started and I had no idea
that my life was going to change after that,
the way that it did.
- [Kelly] It's an incredibly sad thing that
it had to happen in that moment,
but what courage is shown in the photo,
and restraint, you know,
you probably knew in the back of your head
like, me fighting this kind of hate with hate,
that's not gonna get me anywhere.
I mean, where did that courage come from?
Have you always been like that,
since you were a kid?
- Yeah, I wanna say that I've always been like that,
I hope that I've always been that person,
but I grew up in Whitefish, Montana,
it's 90% Caucasian people, you know,
and my family moved us up here when I was two,
my father is a single, white male
with three black babies.
He grew up in Chicago, and was around diversity
his whole life, but he knew bringing us out here
that we were gonna have challenges.
One of the things that he always used to tell us as kids
was that no matter who or what the threat is,
make sure that they look you in the eye
so they have to acknowledge that you're human.
In that moment, that's all I felt.
My father passed away sixteen years ago this month,
so in that moment, it was really powerful,
so I felt that and pushed up my sunglasses,
and I made him look at me.
- Me too, that is the most powerful thing he taught you,
what an amazing father to teach you so much
with one sentence.
That's an amazing thing to say to make sure
someone looks you in the eye,
and knows-
(laughs)
- [Samantha] Oh my gosh.
- Woo, that can be applied in several areas.
So Samantha, the man in the photo was arrested,
and the next day you gave his wife a gift basket.
I think I know the answer to this question,
but why did you feel the need to do that?
- So my friend Marcela and I you know, the next day,
all of this happened so quickly,
I saw a screenshot of that photo and was like
"Wow, that's a really powerful image."
And then it was like, oh my gosh,
that's me.
And I was like "Oof, what is going to happen?"
Because it had started to spread like wildfire,
and I was getting so much love,
and so much hate,
and then I saw that his name was on the internet,
and I knew that he was getting attacked,
people were all over it.
And then we found out that his wife was
getting some hate as well,
so we were like "We need to do something as women,
we do need to stand together."
You know, and so we just got some bath stuff,
some wine, coffee card, flowers, you know,
and we talked to a friend of a friend that knew her,
so we didn't like, ambush her at work,
but we wanted her to know that we saw her as well.
I'm asking people to see me,
I wanted her to know that I saw her too,
and that I know that she's not her husband,
again, I've had many men treat me like that
throughout my life.
He's not the first white man to yell at me like that,
and I knew from what I've heard about her experiences
you know, she's been in a tough spot,
so we just really wanted her to feel some love,
and let her know that we didn't see her
in any kind of way.
- Yeah, you're such a great human,
I'm just sitting over here crying, it's fine.
Because it's so touching, and it's powerful,
like every move is so powerful,
and every one of the things you've talked about
has such a beautiful impact,
and I thank you so much for being a part of the show,
and coming on here,
and I know it is scary to be in a spotlight,
I get that part,
(laughs)
Everything you say is twisted,
or you get love and hate for both ways,
and I just implore that you just be you,
and you have such a good heart,
and you have such a great head on your shoulders,
it seems that like, no matter what people say
either way, you just do you,
and that's all you can do
and that's all you can control.
- Thank you.
- Well thank you so much Samantha,
just helping to spark important conversations
that we all need to have more of,
and you're right, it's okay that
we get uncomfortable,
growth comes from being uncomfortable,
so let's get uncomfortable.