Sage Kiernan-Sherrow |  News Editor

Disclaimer: Please be advised that this article details police brutality, racism and murder. If those topics are triggering to you, please peruse our other articles. 

Protestors nationwide hold up signs reading “I can’t breathe,” the last words spoken by George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man and resident of Minneapolis, as he suffocated under the conjoined efforts of white Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin pinning him to the ground with his leg and multiple other police officers restraining him. His crime? An alleged use of a counterfeit $20 bill. While four officers at the scene have since been fired, only Chauvin has currently been charged with third degree murder. 

Floyd is not the first black man to have been unjustly killed since 2020 began, nor is he the first reported case of police brutality against a black person this year; making headlines earlier this year were the deaths of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery. According to mappingpoliceviolence.org, regardless of the crime, if any, black people are three times more likely to be killed by police than white people, 1.3 times more likely to be unarmed — and in 99% of cases officers are never charged. Ruled a homicide, Floyd’s death, occurring on May 25, is the latest instance of police brutality in the United States’ long history of targeted racist encounters — and the 10 minute recording of his murder has spurred protests globally. 

What began as peaceful protesting has escalated, with police retaliating with brutality reminiscent of that at Standing Rock in 2016 and 2017, complete with tear gas, rubber bullets and stun grenades. Minneapolis is now on its seventh day of protest; each day, the protests have become increasingly more violent as agitators — some, allegedly, from white supremacist groups — enter the fray, and, in some places, the government sends in the National Guard to assist in halting the destruction to private and public properties. One could argue that the United States was not built on the back of peaceful protests, but President Trump has other ideas; in a series of tweets, he threatened to send the military to halt the protests, saying “when the looting starts, the shooting starts,” — a racially-charged phrase, according to National Public Radio. And shooting has, in fact, started — by both police and civilians on multiple occasions, resulting in a total of six civilians losing their lives at multiple different protest sites. 

To ensure safety — or to combat the effectiveness of the protests — many major cities across the United States have implemented curfews. In Oregon, Portland’s protests, which began peacefully, escalated on Saturday, May 30, leading Mayor Ted Wheeler to issue an 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew for the city. Salem followed suit, after several instances where individual groups among a crowd of peaceful protesters instigated violence, resulting in police ordering the mass to disperse, later tear-gassing them when they would not. This did not occur at the protests to reopen Oregon nearly a month ago amidst COVID-19, when a group of largely white protestors gathered at the Salem capitol, toting assault rifles. The protests have been criticized because of amassing large crowds during a pandemic, but COVID-19 is not a racially unbiased issue — it, too, disproportionately affects black people and minorities due to economic, health and social disparities, arguably conceived by systematic racism. 

Across the ocean, Floyd’s likeness has been painted on the Berlin Wall, and citizens across many major global cities have taken to the streets in support of the United States protests or held vigils in Floyd’s name. It’s clear that the world is watching to see if U.S. leadership, the police force and allied citizens across the nation will finally acknowledge that black lives matter.

ASWOU’s statement about nearby protests can be found on our website.

Contact the author at howlnews@wou.edu

Photos courtesy of Sinead O Grady