I CAN'T BREATHE...MAMA!!!

Have we learned anything since 5.25.20??

(all photos: Jack Cluth)

It was a cold and blustery mid-October Sunday afternoon in Minneapolis, the sort of day that makes you reconsider why you’d ever want to go outside in the first place. Erin and I were heading to a friend’s lake cabin near where I grew up in northern Minnesota. First, though, I wanted to stop by George Floyd Square at E. 38th St. and S. Chicago Ave. in south Minneapolis.

Prior to the murder of George Floyd, Cup Foods at 38th and Chicago was a quiet little grocery store in Minneapolis’ Bryant neighborhood. It was a place where little of note happened. When something did happen, the police were usually involved…and not in a good way.

The neighborhood, prior to gaining notoriety as the place where Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police office Derek Chauvin, was the sort of place most White folks steered clear of. It wasn’t racism, necessarily; more that there wasn’t any reason for White people to frequent the area. Minneapolis doesn’t have ghettoes, at least not in the traditional sense, but the Bryant neighborhood is about as close as the city comes. The fact that most of the faces around 38th and Chicago on May 25th, 2020 were Black wasn’t particularly unusual.

I stood in the intersection and tried to imagine what the neighborhood must have been like before Derek Chauvin and George Floyd crossed paths. As a chill wind sliced through every layer I had on, I looked around at what had been turned into a police-free memorial zone. The spot where Floyd had been murdered was marked, and the displays, artwork, and flowers surrounding it stood as a testament to the gravitas that 38th and Chicago held for the community. This was clearly sacred ground.

What was once a nondescript intersection in an unremarkable neighborhood had been transformed into George Floyd Square- a memorial to a man murdered by a Minneapolis police officer. What was once a place where the Minneapolis Police Department would taunt the local community when they’d killed someone was now a symbol of resistance.

I tried to imagine how Chauvin could have so casually kneeled on Floyd’s neck for nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds. I wondered how the three officers who accompanied Chauvin did nothing to stop him. How callous and depraved must one be to so coldly and slowly squeeze the life out of a fellow human being as others recorded it on their cell phone cameras? I wondered what could have driven Chauvin and how events could have spiraled so out of control so quickly.

Standing in the intersection and looking for answers, I found none. Instead, there were only more questions. What I came to realize was that there may have been only one explanation for Derek Chavin murdering George Floyd. Perhaps it was an historical inflection point, an event that feels as if it was almost meant to happen in order to change the arc of our country’s moral history.

Martin Luther King, Jr., once said that “The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” Perhaps the murder of George Floyd, terrible, senseless, and inhuman as it was, was meant to help bend that moral arc. That may seem like a terrible thing to say, and perhaps it is. The reality, though, is that George Floyd has, in fact, become a symbol of racism and racial injustice in America today.

Whether you believe in fate or historical preordainment or not, the end result is the same. The name and memory of George Floyd have been held up as a symbol of everything wrong with race relations in America. His legacy is helping to shine a light on police misconduct and mistreatment (up to and including murder) of minorities. His life and his death have sparked protests nationwide demanding change. His life and death stand for something.

A year after his murder, I find myself reflecting on what’s happened in America over the past year. I wonder if anything has changed…or if that process is still only in its infancy. The process of bending the moral arc of the universe toward justice can be long and arduous. Sometimes, it can be difficult to see much progress over the course of a year.

In many ways, it can feel as if we’ve taken two steps back for each one we’ve taken forward. Many red states have passed legislation banning the teaching of “critical race theory,” though if you ask most Republicans (or anyone else, really), they couldn’t tell you what critical race theory is. Many Whites are fearful (whether justifiably or not hardly matters) of losing their position at the top of the socio-economic food chain

Racism and race relations seem more tense and fragile now than at any time since the ‘60s. Evangelical Christians and politicians on the Far-Right are employing racially charged language in ways they haven’t previously. There seems to be a very real (if unsubstantiated) fear that Black Americans are working to destroy White prerogatives and privilege.

Many White Americans now see the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement as a threat, a diminishment of the importance of White lives. They fear that BLM wants to take over America and make White lives secondary to Black lives. What they don’t understand is that we’re not talking about pie; more for Black Americans doesn’t ipso facto mean less for White Americans.

What frightened Whites fail to recognize is that ALL lives can’t matter until Black lives matter. Sure, you can chant “White Lives Matter!” until you’re hoarse…but White lives have always mattered. White lives have always been valued above and beyond the lives of Blacks and other minorities.

What they also fail to recognize and/or admit is that White privilege really is a thing. The advantages that accrue to those of us with White skin simply because of our skin color are so interwoven into our system that it’s easy to accept it as our due. That said, failure to recognize those advantages doesn’t make them any less real. Whether it’s a job or college application, buying a house, or trying to rent an apartment, there’s a long list of things in life that are impacted by skin color. Whether implicitly or openly, it’s a fact of life.

I grew up hoping that things would be different by the time I came of age. Surely by the time we reached the 21st century, racism and racial disharmony would be a thing of the past? Surely we’d have found common ground and a way to live together and peacefully coexist?

Standing and shivering near the spot where George Floyd was murdered, I felt horribly naive and more than a little disappointed. We have SO many battles to fight…and here we are, still fighting over skin color and the privilege attached to that?

A year after Floyd’s murder, we have the satisfaction of Derek Chauvin being convicted by a Hennepin County jury of his murder. Kneeling on another man’s neck for nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds, especially when no threat is posed, can’t be held to be anything but an unjustifiable use of force. Chauvin ceased to be a police officer over that 9:29 and became a common, garden-variety murderer with a gun and a badge.

In my lifetime, I’ve traveled to places where the respect for the value of life was minimal at best. I’ve lived and worked in places where people would be killed without a second thought because they worship the “wrong” flavor of Supreme Being. It took George Floyd’s murder to make me realize that America isn’t immune to such senseless violence and lack of respect for human life.

As I turned around to walk back to our car, the lead-grey skies seemed to reflect my sense of despair. As the wind picked up and sent shivers through me, optimism seemed as if it was in very short supply…but I forced myself to remember that change takes time.

The moral arc of the universe IS long, and it DOES bend toward justice. It just takes time, and sometimes events that help to crystalize resolve and create a movement. George Floyd never set out to be a martyr when he went into Cup Foods on the morning of May 25th, 2020. He may not have even known that the $20 bill he used to pay for his purchase was counterfeit. As things happened, though, he had the misfortune to cross paths with Derek Chauvin…but also the good fortune that a bystander recorded the encounter on her cell phone.

Such are the moments that give rise to movements that change America.

I wasn’t really thinking about all of those weighty matters on that uncomfortable Sunday afternoon, though. I was freezing…and I couldn’t feel my fingers.

Today, though, I am thinking about them…and I hope to live to see the day when the color of one’s skin matters far less than the content of one’s character.