A large crowd of people (yes, mostly students but also remarkably diverse), gathered at 6 p.m. this evening, at Woodruff Park, to protest the shooting of two black males by a white police officer, Ryan Donald. The incident happened last night, after Andre Thompson, 24, and his stepbrother, Bryson Chaplin, 21, allegedly attempted to steal beer from a Safeway. The officer's story, as relayed by the Olympia police department, is basically this: He spotted the suspects, he confronted them, he was attacked, he shot one, both fled into the woods, and, after a moment, returned for more. He shot the other at that point.

The general opinion of those speaking out at the park, and later the police station, where the protesters marched to at around 8 pm, was that the shooting had everything to do with race. Many of the people I talked to were just appalled that so much force was used on such a petty crime; many, both black and white, felt it was the same old, same old. Some, like Talib, a black American originally from New Jersey, thought the whole thing would be forgotten by the morning. "There have been protests about this and no one showed up," he said. "But now it's in your town, people show up. You have to care about this shit all the time. Not only when it's on your town."

The police here have kept a very low profile during the protest. No riot gear, nothing; they were almost invisible. These might be the lessons learned from Ferguson. Showing your face or showing force might actually make matters worse. In fact, I saw two cops realize they were visible and flee out of sight. They were keeping track of things but not making their presence felt.