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Mizzou hunger striker says Ferguson protests were ‘monumental’ for him

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Hauling a laptop in his bag and wearing an expression of tired concentration, Jonathan Butler looked like another graduate student shuffling across the tiled floor of Jesse Hall.

His winter stocking cap and thick-framed glasses might as well be a disguise. Butler is no regular student. On Tuesday morning, Butler, 25, was emerging from a weeklong hunger strike and his central role in the campus drama that upended the University of Missouri this week.

“I feel uncomfortable with the attention,” Butler said as he sat in a chair in the hallway, still waiting to eat his first solid meal since Nov.