Thoughts!

I haven’t watched the George Floyd death video.  I won’t watch it.  Of course I’ve seen bits and pieces of the video (impossible to avoid them if you watch the news), but the idea of watching a man die for 8 minutes and 46 seconds is too gruesome for me.

I did see the sequel – the killing of Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta.  It was like a movie chase that only took a few seconds, not up close and personal as with George Floyd.  And the result?  Another dead black man at the hands of a white police officer.

So what else is new?  The pundits have been opining nonstop about whether we are a country besieged by systemic racism.  Hello?  Where you been for four hundred years?  White men didn’t come alone to the new world.  They were accompanied by their black slaves.  And while there have been changes over the centuries, overt and covert racism has gripped the American psyche every step of our historical way.

We cannot get rid of our racist way of being with legislation – see the Civil Rights and Voting Acts of 1964-65.  Or by declaration – see the Declaration of Independence.  Or by proclamation – see the Emancipation Proclamation.  Our racism is indeed a way of being, ingrained in how we respond to those who look different, our fear of the other, our unwillingness to question even a little of our perceived superiority.

So what now?  Is there any chance that recent events are a moment in time when a transformation is possible?  Or will we at best nibble around the edges and fundamentally change nothing?

I won’t say impossible.  I will say, am sorry to say, not likely.