{"id":859,"date":"2020-05-31T01:45:48","date_gmt":"2020-05-31T01:45:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859"},"modified":"2020-05-31T01:45:48","modified_gmt":"2020-05-31T01:45:48","slug":"taking-the-knee-will-the-murder-of-george-floyd-shatter-americas-emotional-paralysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859","title":{"rendered":"Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?"},"content":{"rendered":"

May 30th<\/sup> 2020<\/i><\/p>\n

As I write this, we\u2019re moving into the fifth night of civil unrest and full-on riots in the wake of the video of four Minneapolis police systematically murdering an African American man for \u2013 supposedly \u2013 spending a ten or a twenty dollar bill that might have been counterfeit. There\u2019s pretty much zero evidence of any criminal intent, and even if Floyd was an evil mastermind producing millions of bogus notes in his basement, that usually doesn\u2019t carry a death sentence.<\/p>\n

Under any circumstances, the videos of Floyd\u2019s murder would have been horrifying, but what made this stand out was how calm and collected the four cops were as a man lay dying under their knees. They were chatting, who knows about what? The Stanley Cup round robin? The weather? Lamenting about how the Civil War made killing slaves illegal? It was a cold, calculating murder, of the sort you associate with the Nazis, or Bond villains.<\/p>\n

I was scared that America was becoming inured to the willful murder of African-Americans. In recent times, there have been Trayvon Martin, who was shot in 2012 by a murderous cop wannabee, George Zimmerman. Michael Brown was killed in Ferguson, and neo-Nazi bigots crowed that he had it coming because he shoved a shopkeeper a half-hour earlier. Brown\u2019s murder sparked the \u201cBlack Lives Matter\u201d movement, much ridiculed by Donald Trump and other right wing trash. Dontre Hamilton was killed for being schizophrenic in public. Aside from being noisy, he wasn\u2019t breaking any law, but a cop, Christopher Manney, decided to pat him down, and when Hamilton pulled away, Manney shot him.<\/p>\n

Eric Garner was famously murdered by New York\u2019s finest for the crime of selling cigarettes on a street corner. He uttered the phrase, hideously echoed this week, \u201cI can\u2019t breathe.\u201d There are still apologists for racist murders who say if he could speak, he could breathe, and that he probably actually died from an ingrown toe nail, or some other hidden medical condition aggravated by having oxygen to the brain cut off for ten minutes. The same fools were saying the same thing six years later.<\/p>\n

John Crawford, 22, was gunned down for picking up a toy .22 rifle in a WalMart and walking with it to the checkout stands in order to purchase it.<\/p>\n

Ezell Ford, unarmed, was shot in the back by two police officers. He was accused of no crime, and the investigation was put on \u201cadministrative hold.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dante Parker was tased to death by San Bernardino cops. Tanisha Anderson, 37, died after cops smashed her head repeatedly against the pavement. Apparently they considered that a viable treatment for schizophrenia. Akai Gurley, 28, was shot for no reason at all by a cop. \u201cAccidental discharge\u201d they called it. Gurley wound up accidentally dead as a result.<\/p>\n

Tamir Rice, age 12, was just a kid playing with a toy gun. In Cleveland, that, and black skin, is enough to get you killed. The poor panicked cops mistook him for an adult with an AR-15. The one who actually killed Tamir got fired, but don\u2019t worry\u2014he\u2019s a cop somewhere else now, protecting white society from kids with toy guns.<\/p>\n

Jerame Reid, 36, was shot and killed by police on suspicion of being black while a passenger in New Jersey.<\/p>\n

That just brings us up to 2015. There have been a dozen or more incidents each year since of African-Americans dying at the hands of police where there were images proving that the cops were, at best, reckless, and at worst, murdering swine. Multiply that by dozens, perhaps hundreds of incidents where it was the word of our noble police against that of some black street thug who \u201creached for his waistband.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the Guardian, in the first five months of 2015, \u201cIn total, 478 of those people were shot and killed, while 31 died after being shocked by a Taser, 16 died after being struck by police vehicles, and 19 \u2013 including 25-year-old Freddie Gray<\/a> in Baltimore \u2013 have died after altercations in police custody.\u201d We were on course for, and eventually met a total of 1,100 dying in police custody or confrontations with police. Over half of those killed were black. Twenty percent were white. It\u2019s only gotten worse since then, led by a fascist regime that values vicious police suppression. Further, there\u2019s no federal law requiring police departments to report fatal encounters to any central agency (the Guardian did its own, private survey), so the number of people killed by police may be double what we know about, or even worse.<\/p>\n

Most encounters aren\u2019t caught on camera. Personal webcams some police have to wear have a way of failing at critical moments, so until the rise of smartphones, it was always the word of sorrowful-looking officers against that of some dead guy.<\/p>\n

But phones have changed all that. As Will Smith the actor acidly remarked, \u201cRacism isn\u2019t getting worse, it\u2019s getting filmed.\u201d And dozens of times a year, the viciousness and sadism of our alleged public defenders is put on full display.<\/p>\n

Such spasms of rage are nothing new in America, of course. Slave revolts were so common, and so feared, that the Founders put the second amendment in, giving cover to slaveowners to hunt down and\/or kill rebellious slaves. Slavery led to the civil war. Tulsa, Oklahoma saw its black community nearly exterminated by a mass lynching some 120 years ago. Lynchings were common, and praised by civic leaders from 1870 to 1960. The race riots of the 60s were sparked by a minor incident in Watts, where police stopped a youth, determined he had an outstanding warrant, and arrested him. They didn\u2019t kill him or even rough him up. But onlookers were tired of constantly being detained on suspicion of being black. Then Martin Luther King Junior and Robert Kennedy were assassinated, and the rage broke wide open.<\/p>\n

The only thing surprising about this week\u2019s events is that it took so long to happen. We\u2019ve had three years of a president who has devoted his whole vicious, wastrel life to cheating and defaming African-Americans, a weak, cowardly racist even by the shit standards of the white supremacist.<\/p>\n

He demonstrated his hate and fear on the third night, tweeting that that protesters could have been attacked with \u201cvicious dogs and ominous weapons\u201d wielded by the US Secret Service. He also attacked the Washington DC, mayor for supposedly not providing police to protect the White House. Poor defenseless widdle American president. I posted that perhaps the best answer was to put one of those vicious dogs in the Oval Office and put Trump out on the White House lawn to snarl at passers-by. Certainly it would be a win-win for the nation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey let the \u2018protesters\u2019 scream and rant as much as they wanted, but whenever someone got too frisky or out of line, they would quickly come down on them, hard \u2013 didn\u2019t know what hit them,\u201d Trump said. Nothing more pathetic than a blustering, cowardly, racist bully.<\/p>\n

In all of this, there was one gleaming, memorable moment that happened after the night protesters burned Minneapolis\u2019 3rd<\/sup> Precinct, the pig pen that housed the four cops that murdered George Floyd. The nearby Gandhi Mahal Restaurant<\/a> was severely damaged by fire. The owner, Ruhel Islam, told a friend, \u201cLet my building burn,\u201d he said. \u201cJustice needs to be served.\u201d The next day, he stood by that statement, saying, \u201cWe can rebuild a building, but we cannot rebuild a human. The community is still here, and we can work together to rebuild.\u201d Mind you, Mr. Islam is almost certainly a Muslim. He\u2019s as much a target of Trump\u2019s fear and hate as any African-American. Nonetheless, he believes in us, whether we deserve it or not.<\/p>\n

In the 18th<\/sup> century, a slaveowner, anguished by guilt and aware of the incredible damage slavery and bigotry would do to the country he helped create, wrote, \u201cI tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.\u201d Thomas Jefferson, no Christian, knew the price to be paid because humans value justice. He would be totally unsurprised by the events of this week.<\/p>\n

He might have even felt that justice was being served.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

May 30th 2020 As I write this, we\u2019re moving into the fifth night of civil unrest and full-on riots in the wake of the video of four Minneapolis police systematically murdering an African American man for \u2013 supposedly \u2013 spending a ten or a twenty dollar bill that might have been counterfeit. There\u2019s pretty much … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,602,617,735],"tags":[972,974,74,116,351,973,975],"class_list":["post-859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-psyche","category-civil-war","category-history","category-terror","tag-george-floyd","tag-minneapoplis","tag-racism","tag-riots","tag-trump","tag-violence","tag-watts"],"yoast_head":"\nTaking the Knee -- Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis? · Zepp's Commentaries<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Taking the Knee -- Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis? · Zepp's Commentaries\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"May 30th 2020 As I write this, we\u2019re moving into the fifth night of civil unrest and full-on riots in the wake of the video of four Minneapolis police systematically murdering an African American man for \u2013 supposedly \u2013 spending a ten or a twenty dollar bill that might have been counterfeit. There\u2019s pretty much … Continue reading "Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?"\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Zepp's Commentaries\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/zepp.jamieson\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-05-31T01:45:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"zeppjamieson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@zeppjamieson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@zeppjamieson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"zeppjamieson\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"zeppjamieson\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/3fb34fecb9ef3dcfda9cca949be94d94\"},\"headline\":\"Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-05-31T01:45:48+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859\"},\"wordCount\":1394,\"commentCount\":0,\"keywords\":[\"George Floyd\",\"Minneapoplis\",\"racism\",\"riots\",\"Trump\",\"violence\",\"Watts\"],\"articleSection\":[\"American Psyche\",\"Civil War\",\"History\",\"Terror\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859\",\"name\":\"Taking the Knee -- Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis? · Zepp's Commentaries\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2020-05-31T01:45:48+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/3fb34fecb9ef3dcfda9cca949be94d94\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?p=859#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/\",\"name\":\"Zepp's Commentaries\",\"description\":\"Opinions from a liberal\\\/leftist perspective\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/zeppscommentaries.online\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/3fb34fecb9ef3dcfda9cca949be94d94\",\"name\":\"zeppjamieson\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/769e3df482cc849a6cea52069f6da8fe200551b922190cafd5af414dc0713143?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/769e3df482cc849a6cea52069f6da8fe200551b922190cafd5af414dc0713143?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/769e3df482cc849a6cea52069f6da8fe200551b922190cafd5af414dc0713143?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"zeppjamieson\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Taking the Knee -- Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis? · Zepp's Commentaries","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Taking the Knee -- Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis? · Zepp's Commentaries","og_description":"May 30th 2020 As I write this, we\u2019re moving into the fifth night of civil unrest and full-on riots in the wake of the video of four Minneapolis police systematically murdering an African American man for \u2013 supposedly \u2013 spending a ten or a twenty dollar bill that might have been counterfeit. There\u2019s pretty much … Continue reading \"Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?\"","og_url":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859","og_site_name":"Zepp's Commentaries","article_publisher":"http:\/\/facebook.com\/zepp.jamieson","article_published_time":"2020-05-31T01:45:48+00:00","author":"zeppjamieson","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@zeppjamieson","twitter_site":"@zeppjamieson","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"zeppjamieson","Est. reading time":"7 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859"},"author":{"name":"zeppjamieson","@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/#\/schema\/person\/3fb34fecb9ef3dcfda9cca949be94d94"},"headline":"Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?","datePublished":"2020-05-31T01:45:48+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859"},"wordCount":1394,"commentCount":0,"keywords":["George Floyd","Minneapoplis","racism","riots","Trump","violence","Watts"],"articleSection":["American Psyche","Civil War","History","Terror"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859","url":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859","name":"Taking the Knee -- Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis? · Zepp's Commentaries","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/#website"},"datePublished":"2020-05-31T01:45:48+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/#\/schema\/person\/3fb34fecb9ef3dcfda9cca949be94d94"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?p=859#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Taking the Knee — Will the murder of George Floyd shatter America\u2019s emotional paralysis?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/#website","url":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/","name":"Zepp's Commentaries","description":"Opinions from a liberal\/leftist perspective","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/#\/schema\/person\/3fb34fecb9ef3dcfda9cca949be94d94","name":"zeppjamieson","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/769e3df482cc849a6cea52069f6da8fe200551b922190cafd5af414dc0713143?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/769e3df482cc849a6cea52069f6da8fe200551b922190cafd5af414dc0713143?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/769e3df482cc849a6cea52069f6da8fe200551b922190cafd5af414dc0713143?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"zeppjamieson"}}]}},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa7aNw-dR","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=859"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":860,"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859\/revisions\/860"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppscommentaries.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}