George Floyd didn't have to die. And George Floyd didn't deserve to die. It's too late now. He's as dead as a person gets, and we only get one crack at it on this Earth. I have no idea why fired policeman Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck until he was dead. I have no idea why the other three fired police officers didn't intervene. I heard a statement by a Minneapolis District Attorney last night say they had other evidence that showed it may not have been a homicide (paraphrasing).
Well, I would like to hear what other evidence would make me think to myself, "Oh, now it makes perfect sense why that officer knelt on his neck until he killed him." It'll take quite a tall tale, I'd say. And I'm a huge supporter of the police. So right up front, I support police and I almost always give everyone, including cops, the benefit of the doubt. But, as far as this case goes, there doesn't seem to be much doubt in my mind. If some incredible evidence comes out to convince me it wasn't murder, I'll change my tune. Until then, no.
What I'm not nearly so willing to presume is that because Chauvin is white and Floyd is black, that race was a motive, or that it was a causal factor in the murder. I am NOT saying it's not. I am just saying I'm uncomfortable that a city is on fire, and other people's lives are being ravaged by those fires because there's this seemingly unassailable certainty that that's what this was, even before we know what it was. My friend Steve last night questioned whether I understood the level of anger seething within the black community over this. My aunt explained how so many other episodes lend credibility to the presumption that race plays into it. The Minneapolis Mayor himself said 400 years of history bring us to the place where this angry outpouring (paraphrasing) can be explained and understood.
To me, what we are seeing is very real anger. It may not be a great analogy, but I think it is. Hopefully I can articulate this well enough that you do, too. The reaction to this reminds me of a bad marriage that's in crisis. Due to one partner's behavior again and again, and the other's repeated co-dependent response to it,. the two have come to a point of complete distrust and short-tempered flareups happen all too often, maybe daily. At that point, almost anything will set the co-dependent responder off. Late coming home from work? "Where the f*** have you been?!?!" Stuck in traffic and then had to fix a flat tire or some other legitimate reason disappears in the anger. Why? Because yesterday and the day before that and the days before that, too, it was drinking and infidelity. neither of which went away today just because the "excuse" was better, And in that bad marriage, as the fireworks of fighting are exploded, who is hurt the worst? The kids. The kids. The kids are the biggest victims. Growing up with no trust and all fighting, the stage is set for their lives to follow a path where dysfunction and ab-normalcy, lack of trust, infidelity, abuse, and substance abuse seem normal: that's what family life is. Well, we are seeing that on a grand scale, as the interracial marriage that is the USA is in crisis.
Well, as I already said, I am not sure this WAS racial. It COULD have been something else. Am I sure? Hell no. All I'm sure of is that it looks pretty certain that Chauvin is a murderer. What his motive may have been, remains to be seen. Why in the f*** the Minneapolis DA seems to be covering for him rather than signing an arrest warrant is beyond me, But for me, I think more facts are in order before a city is burned down to punish innocents for the sins of the guilty. I've always said that police shootings, particularly this and similarly controversial police shootings, should be investigated like an aircraft accident, to peel back the onion through all its layers to find what is really inside, why did it really happen? One Minneapolis television station reported last night that Chauvin and Floyd both worked at the same nightclub in Minneapolis for years, both of them working security for the club, one inside, the other outside. Is it possible they had some conflict related to their work? Instead of Black Guy - White Cop, could it have been Two Guys Who Hated One Another?
As to the Minneapolis Mayor, citing 400 years of history as an explanation, and to any and everyone who feel likewise, I get where you're coming from. There IS racial injustice. There IS racism. Our country has some unfortunate chapters, chapters that include slavery and racial inequality. But we also have one chapter that I don't know any other country in the world has. We had a civil war, nearly uncountable deaths. To end the scourge of slavery. That was us. Our country. Civil War to end slavery. Who else had that?
George Floyd deserved to live. Even if he was a serial axe murderer, I don't see how that would justify kneeling on his neck until he was dead. George Floyd deserves justice now. Justice based on truth and the facts, not based on assumption and presumption. Maybe it was racial. If it is shown to be that that's what it was, then so be it. Treat it as such and find a way for society to learn from it. If by some chance it turns out to have been something else, then who do the victims of the riotous destruction and looting petition to seek their justice?
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