Are hanging chairs a racial statement?

GRAND HAVEN, Mich. (WOOD) - A West Michigan couple are in some hot water after they hung two lawn chairs from a tree in their yard with signs saying, "Take back our country," referencing a speech by actor Clint Eastwood at the Republican National Convention in August, in which he spoke to an empty chair that was supposed to represent President Barack Obama.

Now, community members in Grand Haven are mad at the couple because they say those chairs make a racial statement.

Ken and Judy David, the two who hung the chairs, say their display is simply them expressing their freedom of speech and freedom of expression. But not everyone agrees with them.

Thursday night, the Lakeshore Ethnic Diversity Alliance held a community meeting to discuss the chairs and what their response as a community should be.

The Davids didn't attend the meeting, but there were people there that spoke about both sides of the issue.

"We try to separate intent from impact," said Andre Daley, associate executive director for the Lakeshore Ethnic Diversity Alliance. "And that's what we are asking folks to think about here is, how does the impact of their behavior affect others?"

"I personally think in order to get the impact that he wanted, if he would have set the chair by the tree, I don't think it would have gotten the attention," said resident Maria Veach. "I think putting in the tree, to me, you can read it however you wish to. To me it did not look like a lynching. I drove by it."

As of Thursday night, the chairs were still hanging in the tree.