As an outsider looking in on the current unrest sweeping the US due to the death in custody of an African American is becoming all too common in the Land of the Free. I dont pretend to understand the mentality of the African American people but I do know that slavery was abolished in America following the Civil War. Then came the Civil Rights protests of the 60s and reforms for A A people who now have the right to protest as free citizens. Any death is a tragedy as is that of Mr George Floyd, but why does every time it is a black person that all hell breaks loose and the American streets are turned into battle zones. Are there not deaths in custody of white Americans? There is a very real chance that a colored cop is involved in the death. Do we see this senseless violence every time an American of white skin also dies in custody? No we do not. There is little or no scrutiny that I see on my television screen such as what we see when the victim is black. These assaults are almost always by a white cop and always seem to be filmed too so a national audience witnesses it. It is this that inflames the colored population. The US is reeling all over from this virus it does not need further economic nor social pain caused by what I see from the outside as over the top violence.
The Violent Protests in many of our cities should be dealt with harshly. The Black Community has every reason to be concerned about the Floyd incident but violent protest is Criminal and does nothing but harm their image. Some Black Punks will look for ANY excuse to riot,smash, burn & loot. At one time in this country looters and rioters could be shot while in the act. IMO that is a fair way to deal with criminal action.
You're right to condemn the acts of vandalism but not correct to cite 'blacks' only Its not violent 'protest' either, its violence for the sake of it, just as it is over here - any excuse
The reason for unrest over what happened is the fact that the cop was not arrested immediately Vandalism happens everywhere at any time when there's an evident excuse If things were dealt with swiftly and a speaker came onto the media outlet to condemn the actions of wayward cops things would be a lot better.
He actually was arrested fairly quickly, @Patsy Faye . Before they can arrest a person for murder (or any crime) there has to be a reason to think that a crime has occurred, so they probably had to verify what had actually caused the man to die. Since George Floyd was a long-time criminal who had spent time in prison before, he refused to be put into the patrol car, and that is why they had to hold him down and call for an ambulance. They think that he was on drugs, and something like that could have caused him to have a stroke or heart attack, just from the fear of being held down; which would not have been murder, although still unnecessary use of force and police brutality. Once they determined that there was a cause to arrest the officer, then they arrested him right away. No matter what actually happened, they had to arrest the patrolman, even if they think the death might have been caused from something other than suffocation. Preliminary investigation showed no signs of the man dying from asphyxiation, so what killed him still has to be determined.
Thanks for the post and insight into George. Regardless of his background to put force onto his throat for 8 minutes suggests the officer was out of control. I also noticed at least 4 other officers on the ground with him. They are useless cops if they cannot control one man.
I agree that this whole arrest went down very wrong, @Patsy Faye, and I am totally against police brutality. It upsets me that we have been seeing a lot of police brutality since the “lockdown orders”, and there are pictures of elderly people being thrown to the ground, mothers with little kids being dragged off (for being outside of their home), and other examples that should have never happened. Since those occurred as part of the forced lockdown, no one seems to have cared if some poor Grandma was thrown around and had to be taken to the hospital. While most police officers are there because they want to do the right thing, and to help their town, there are also men who are part of the neo-Nazi groups, or some other group that is totally racist, and they are there just to cause trouble. This officer has had quite a few other brutality charges, it appears; so you would have thought that he would not have been allowed on the police force. It is law enforcement like this guy who makes all LEO look bad.
I had a pages-long diatribe typed up. Let's just say: >there are outside hands in most of these situations >those outside hands shall never been disclosed on your evening news >>the same strings pull both >the bad actors are a minority of people, not "The Black Community" (whatever that is) This is not an apologetic for the bad actors, but our institutions are complicit in permitting the behaviour to go unaddressed, and in some instances fan the flames. Take the frustrations we feel over recent events that have disrupted our lives (and may of us believe we are being "done to"), then imagine being born into it, of people who were born into it for generations...again, not an apologetic, but a fact that cannot fairly be ignored. Issues are never resolved because there's too much power and money harvested from those issues, human lives and souls be damned. Our Common Cause is constantly being undermined because divided we fall. We had record employment levels among all groups in this nation, and now we're in an election year we get The Reaction To COVID. I thought twice about chucking this last thing out, but what the heck... I recall when a 20% out-of-wedlock birth rate among black Americans was hard evidence of "out of control, animalistic behaviour." Well, now the rate is 30% among whites. Just a thought...
It's not just "blacks" that do crime/shootings/killings in America, but, as I've stated before.........simply take a look, online, at each weekends crime/shootings/killings and most-to-all of it is in black communities. As I stated before, Chicago is very well known for their "black-on-black" crime. Black-on-black crime is very, very high in America. We read a lot about it when we lived in Jacksonville, Florida. However, there is enough "white" crime that we absolutely can not blame all of the crime in America on blacks.
"I recall when a 20% out-of-wedlock birth rate among black Americans was hard evidence of "out of control, animalistic behaviour." Well, now the rate is 30% among whites.Just a thought..." John, I may disagree with you on some things but you often post interesting and relevant information.