A protester climbed a ladder on the side of a Confederate monument outside a Durham, North Carolina, courthouse Monday evening as chants of "We, we are the revolution!" and "No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA!" rang out below.
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
Raw video showed a yellow line tossed up to her, which she secured around the statue's neck — and then the protesters below pulled the line and toppled the statue into a crumpled heap. And the crowd, not surprisingly, went wild.
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
And for good measure, protesters gave the statue extra doses of punishment.
They took turns giving it the middle finger and spitting on it.
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
And they also stomped and kicked it "Office Space"-style:
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
Durham police told WNCN-TV that they monitored the protests to make sure they were “safe” but didn't interfere with the statue toppling since it occurred on county property.
Durham County Sheriff’s deputies videotaped the statue toppling, the station added, but didn’t intervene, either.
After the statue came down, protesters began marching and blocking traffic, WNCN said.
“Today, we got a small taste of justice,” protester Jose Ramos told the station after the statue was pulled down.
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
“When I see a Confederate statue in downtown Durham, or really anywhere, it fills me with a lot of rage and frustration,” protest organizer Loan Tran said to WNCN.
Image source: WNCN-TV video screenshot
Protest leaders told the station Monday’s demonstration was in reaction to the deadly clash of protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, over the weekend and was meant to “smash white supremacy.”
“People can be mobilized and people are angry and when enough people are angry, we don’t have to look to politicians to sit around in air conditions [sic] and do nothing when we can do things ourselves,” Takiyah Thompson, a protester, added to WNCN.