"Just breathing while you're black can be a health risk," he added.

Several speakers also encouraged Harvard students to become more aware of national issues like racism and crime and said that classes at the College and the Law School do not adequately address racial issues.

"We take for granted the privileges we have here, but our silence is a sign of complacency," said Adam R. Taylor, a KSG student and president of the Harvard chapter of the NAACP.

As he looked around at the buildings in the Yard, he smiled and added, "We may be disrupting some classes that are going on here, where students are talking about their 'ideal society.'"

While speakers repeatedly said that even Harvard's minority students were not immune from the prejudices that they claim caused the four police officers to think Diallo was carrying a gun, they emphasized that the discussion should be multiracial.

"This is not just about communities of color; we have to ask our white classmates to enter into this dialogue," said Marisa Castuera, a KSG student who helped organize the demonstration. "This is not just about the Diallo verdict--it's about the anger in our community."

Speakers also mentioned the more recent shooting of Sgt. Cornel Young Jr. by two fellow police officers. Young, a Providence, R.I. patrol officer, was in plainclothes and had drawn his weapon to assist the officers outside an all-night restaurant. He was shot and killed