I Can't Breathe
For the last couple of months, protests against racial oppression and police brutality have taken place on a global scale, as a result, this is a perfect time for our community to reflect on the BLM movement and its significance.
On May 25th in Minneapolis, Minnesota, George Floyd, a man of African American descent, was arrested (Derek Chauvin, Tou Thao, James Keung, Thomas Lane) for allegedly using a counterfeit bill. Four cops detained him and wrestled him to the ground. In a clear act of hatred , one of the cops, Derek Chauvin, placed his knee on Mr. Floyd’s neck for upwards of 8 minutes, ultimately killing him. Despite the pleas of many onlookers recording the incident and even Mr. Floyd begging for air, Chauvin murdered him. Eventually, after the mass circulation of these recordings on the internet, Derek Chauvin was arrested along with his 3 other accomplices (Tou Thao, James Keung, Thomas Lane). While the perpetrators were arrested, this incident is one of countless stories of racial oppression in America’s history.
Founded in 1776, America was birthed on the concept of slavery. The stories are of unspeakable cruelty. People of color were raped, murdered, tortured and dehumanized. Even with the Emancipation Proclamation and the conclusion of the civil war marking the end of slavery, people of color, specifically African-Americans, were viewed as inferior simply because of their skin tone. American society was divided into two groups: “the Whites” or the better people and people of color. People of color were subject to segregation, as their interactions with “the Whites” were limited and they were forced to drink from their own water fountains, attend their own schools and sit at the back of every bus and obey many other racially motivated rules simply because of their skin tone. As a result of the systematic racial oppression, people of color had less job opportunities and social mobility, and the socioeconomic disparity between the two groups grew. However thanks to the efforts of the Civil Rights Movement spearheaded by icons like Malcom X, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr, segregation was outlawed and under the law, everyone was supposed to be treated equally. Unfortunately racism continued and the divide created by segregation and slavery was never quite bridged. Even in today’s society, racial disparities and tensions exist.
In retrospect, what happened on May 25 in Minneapolis was not a one-off, if anything Mr. Floyd’s death was a microcosm of the longstanding racial disparities that have existed in America since its birth. Ahmad Arbary. Breonna Taylor. Aura Rosser. Stephon Clark. If this list were to continue, it would fill up more pages than your favorite novel. That is the unfortunate truth. In America, the “world’s greatest country”, people are judged based on their skin tone and in extreme cases murdered in cold blood because of it. Some of these murders are not even mentioned in the news! It has become a normal for people of color, specifically African Americans, to be mistreated. Nearly every day, a new martyr is added to the list.
As a result, this current BLM movement has extreme significance. The current BLM movement is looking to destroy the system that has oppressed countless people for countless years and decades. A critical part of the movement is to create change in the police system, a system where horrific hate crimes and murders have occurred. Police brutality and racism in the police force have come to light recently, after the countless murders and crimes committed by the police themselves. Many protests are asking to defund the police or in some extreme cases for the police to be completely removed. While at the surface, these ideas may seem like a solution, defunding/removing the police would lead to higher crime rates. If anything, the government should invest more in the police. To become a police officer requires no real skill or education. In some cases, becoming a fast-food chef requires more effort than becoming a police officer. THAT NEEDS TO CHANGE! Police officers should be subject to at least a couple years of training, instead of the 6 month training sessions they currently attend. In addition, each candidate vying to become a police officer should undergo a screening process as rigorous as the process FBI subjects its candidates to. Any documented history of racism or hate crimes should be a red flag and the candidate should be immediately eliminated. At the end of the day, the police force is a massive part of our system and should be invested in as such.
