The image of disgraced former police officer Derek Chauvin’s hands cuffed behind his back is an indelible image.
America did right yesterday. At least for George Floyd.
Yesterday, in Minneapolis truth and justice were truly the American way.
A 17-year-old girl provided the truth. A shero with no special superpowers but for her smartphone. A high school girl not even old enough to vote changed history. With a push of a button, she bravely recorded a tragedy that should never have happened but one we can never erase from our minds.
Once viewed, there was no getting around the truth of the police brutality we all witnessed, a murder burned in our minds like a scalding poker leaving an ugly impression forever.
Darnella Frazier recorded the brutal murder of George Floyd spurring waves of protest and resulting in the guilty verdict of Derek Chauvin
Because of Darnella Frazier, we heard George Floyd gasping for air begging with “please, please, please.” Straining to speak we heard those all too sickenly familiar words “I can’t breathe” spoken as a black man struggled under the brutality of a police officer as he lay face down in handcuffs pinned to the floor. We watched in horror as Derik Chauvin pressed a knee against his neck.
For 10 minutes and 9 seconds, we watched a murder happen in real-time.
And when the truth can be heard and seen, laid bare so there is simply no room for doubt, justice really did follow resulting in 3 counts of guilty to Derek Chauvin. It was the way America is supposed to work.
Black Lives did seem to matter that day.
Whose Lives Matter?
But if you are black in America you know systemic racism is also the American way. As though our own hands are tied to change anything it is a hate that persists like a virulent virus we can’t truly seem to eradicate. That too is the truth.
Even as a 17-year old girl helped bring light to our justice system, in Columbus Ohio a 15-year-old black teenage girl was yet another victim, killed by police
Right before the jury reached that guilty verdict of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, 15-year-old Ma’ Khia Bryant was shot 5 times in the chest. The teenage girl who the police say threatened 2 other girls with a knife was fatally shot by an officer.
Columbus police officers were chanting “Blue Lives Matter” at the scene of the crime while the mother of the teenage girl was crying over the murder of her child. Minutes after the Derik Chauvin guilty verdict for murdering George Floyd, moments after killing a child, the police yelled “Blue Lives matter” to the black people that just witnessed it.
Our hands can no longer remain tied. There must be reform in our system.
Envisioning The American Dream 
So well articulated, Sally. I know you won’t let up or give up. We can’t give up.
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The momentum is there to change. We must be vigilant
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Sally, justice was done. Those who tell us not to believe what we saw or not consider, that as one former prosecutor said, the most compelling case against a defendant, are not being forthcoming. This was murder. It is most troubling that it came from a police officer. This is why it is so hard to stomach. So, when police officers support a fellow officer just because he is, is a disservice to our community at large, as well as the African-American community. Our police force must learn the lesson that entities like the Catholic Church, Congress, Michigan State, Penn State, Ohio State, national UK soccer, etc. failed to learn – if you do not govern yourself and address bad actors or actions, you indict all who serve. The police have a hard job, but mistakes happen and not all police have the same level of altruism. Keith
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If you are white, it is ingrained in us from a young age that the policeman is not only your friend but that he is always right and just. Unfortunately, that is not always the same if you are a person of color. The police need desperately to police themselves. It feels as though we’ve had this same sort of dialogue before with spurts and starts to only fizzle out. Let’s hope this time it doesn’t.
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George Floyd has been given justice. Now it’s time for a revamp on how lawless mobs are allowed to run rampant and indiscriminately ruin innocent people’s property and kill adults and children who get in their way. I suggest that even if you can’t catch everyone, a long jail sentence for those offenders who are caught would be a good start.
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Beginning as a young boy, I was left shocked and bewildered (especially after watching the miniseries ‘Roots’) by Black people being brutalized and told they were not welcome — while they were violently forced here from their African home as slaves! As a people, there’s been no real refuge here for them, since. In Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved, the narrator notes that, like the South, the Civil War era northern states also hated Black people but happened to hate slavery more.
Sometimes it seems that a large number of human beings, however precious their lives, can be considered disposable to a nation. And when the young children of those people take notice of this, they’re vulnerable to begin perceiving themselves as worthless. It’s atrociously unjust and desperately needs to stop. Although their devaluation as human beings is basically based on their race, it still reminds me of the devaluation, albeit perhaps subconsciously, of the daily civilian lives lost (a.k.a. “casualties”) in protractedly devastating civil war zones and sieges. At some point, they can end up receiving just a few column inches in the First World’s daily news.
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