Four years have passed since global protests erupted over the chilling and, for many of us, enraging video of the murder of George Floyd, 46, as Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck for more than nine minutes.
Calls went out from the marching masses for a nationwide reckoning on racism, police violence and all manner of historical root causes that had led up to that horrible moment on May 25, 2020.
Four years later, we’re now trying to reckon with what’s happened to the reckoning.
That point came through in a stunning surprise for two knowledgeable reporters, Robert Samuels, now at The New Yorker, and Toluse Olorunnipa of The Washington Post, authors of “His Name Is George Floyd.”
They were preparing to speak at Christian Brothers University in Memphis last year about their book, which tells the story of how Floyd’s life and legacy had been shaped by systemic racism. But a few days before the event, they were notified that they would be unable to read from their book or distribute it because of Tennesee’s “CRT/Age Appropriate Materials law.”
As Samuels put it, “It appeared that our book had been banned.”
Indeed. In today’s sociopolitical times, politically correct “cancellations” are not limited to the left, as if they ever were. Sad. But this is what happens in these times when you venture into what often has been called America’s original sin, racism.
How, I have to ask, are we supposed to reckon with a subject that so many Americans are too uncomfortable to discuss?
No wonder that after Floyd’s killing and several other high-profile deaths of Black individuals at the hands of police, the drive for comprehensive police reform has persistently run up against backlash in various forms.
Last week Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a Texas Democrat, reintroduced the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act that seeks to address the racial profiling and use-of-force issues that too often have resulted in deadly police encounters.
Yet, the legislation, which was initially introduced 2021, still faces roadblocks in Congress and has yet to move forward.
Sadly, the lack of progress reminds me of an old sarcastic saying: Expect the worst and you won’t be disappointed.
Worse, the nation is in the midst of a police officer shortage that many in law enforcement blame on the double hit to officers in 2020: intense criticism and the pandemic. Across the country, small towns unable to fill their employment rolls are eliminating their departments and turning their work over to county sheriffs, state police or some neighboring town’s police. Big cities like Chicago are struggling to recruit officers and have hundreds if not of thousands of job openings.
It’s important to point out here that the “Defund the Police” slogan wasn’t meant by most using it to mean eliminating police departments entirely. Yet the poor wording of the slogan was easily seized upon by those who wanted to defund and demobilize policing reforms by any means necessary.
Still, some reforms have been implemented at the state or local levels. Colorado, for example, now bans the use of deadly force to apprehend or arrest a person suspected only of minor or nonviolent offenses.
And although many states permit the use of deadly force to prevent “escape,” five states imposed restrictions or prohibitions on shooting at fleeing vehicles or suspects, a policy aimed at preventing deaths like that of Chicago’s Adam Toledo, a 13-year-old shot by Chicago police during a foot chase.
Also, nine states and the District of Columbia approved complete bans on chokeholds and other neck restraints while eight states passed legislation to restrict their use of instances in which officers are legally justified to use deadly force.
All of the news isn’t bad, but it will be, if reasonable people fail to get their heads together. Community policing programs, which ally police with the neighborhoods they serve, work very well to reduce tensions and help solve crimes at the local level. We need more of that spirit on the national level, if we can stop arguing with each other long enough.
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