Yes, I realize the murder of George Floyd was a terrible atrocity. I saw the video. But have people forgotten that there’s a pandemic virus still spreading through the country? I thought the right wing anti-lockdown protests were ill-advised, and I think the same thing about these protests (even though I deeply sympathize with them). The virus does not care about the righteousness of your cause.
Some people characterize them as courageous. Others, stupid.
I wonder if unemployment wasn’t as significant as it is, would the crowds be as large?
This will be test upon the effectiveness of lockdown over the last two months. As the incubation period is 3-5 days after exposure, we should start seeing signs in a few days.
I guess that’s a matter of opinion, isn’t it? I thought the people in Wisconsin who braved going to the polls were justified after the GOP forced them in between a rock and a hard place: forfeit their right to vote, or risk getting sick.
Democracy is worth dying for. But is justice for one murdered man worth sickening thousands of people? If you’re going to take to the streets, why not demand Medicare for All or a Universal Basic Income? Reparations for Jim Crow? Specific, concrete policy solutions that will alleviate suffering and save lives. That might be worth it. But I personally don’t think this is worth it.
I think that’s the disconnect. It’s not justice for one man. It’s justice for every person who has been in the same situation or legitimately fears they will be.
How many similar cases have we seen? Just in the last 5 years? And what has changed to materially improve the situation? Anything? Anything at all? Is there a legitimate reason to believe it will improve if we wring our hands and call this an isolated tragedy that magically isn’t indicative of a systemic failure?
At some point, people say enough is enough, and that’s what we’re seeing now.
Sticking to the OP…what activities are justified for risking the health of a nation?
- Voting in person
- Protesting systemic racial injustice
- Protesting infringement of civil liberties (masks, church openings, etc.)
- Weddings
- Graduations
- Celebrating holidays at the beach
- Family reunions
- Movie premiers
- ???
Mass gatherings during a pandemic are not good, but sitting silently in the face of injustice is worse. The risks to society are grave if people do not take to the streets to protest sanctioned racism and murder.
I’ve seen this discussion “in the wild” a bit (as opposed to this thread), and I’ll repeat what I’ve said elsewhere: there (again, as opposed to here), I can’t help but think a lot of them are white people saying, “stopping coronavirus is more important than systemic racist murder because coronavirus actually affects ME.” But then, an unfortunate number of people don’t believe in systemic racism either, so I guess it makes sense.
Mass gatherings during a pandemic are most definitely a terrible idea. Allowing systemic racism and police brutality to continue without rebuke is also a terrible idea. Everyone has to make their own decision about the relative importance.
I’ve been a good quarantiner since March and have fully supported the lockdown in my state. But I marched in a protest on Monday. Everyone was wearing masks, but I’m sure some people will still get sick if any marchers were infected. I hope I don’t, but this cause is important enough to me to take the risk.
I think the people protesting for their right to get a haircut or hit the bar for happy hour are complete idiots. I realize that many people will consider me an idiot for attending a protest. But I’m comfortable with my personal calculus on the relative importance of these activities.
We recently lost 100,000 people to the virus. People of color have been disproportionately hit by COVID-19. Are 100,000 people murdered by cops every year? Is it possible to step back and put this problem into perspective?
Yeah, as Great Antibob suggested, this fundamentally mischaracterizes the nature of the protests. It might have been George Floyd’s murder that provided the spark, but these protests are about a much longer history of police violence and mistreatment, and more generally inequality for black people under the law.
I think that there are reasonable arguments to be made that these protests are unwise during a pandemic, but let’s not pretend they’re just about one man.
What others have said.
Gathering in crowds during a pandemic is a bad idea.
But some reasons are important enough to justify doing it. And protesting to try to stop ongoing racial violence is a very important reason.
It’s not just George Floyd. It’s also Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor. And it’s Christian Cooper, who was threatened with violence because he was black. And if I went back more than a few weeks, I could mention dozens of other famous examples and hundreds of others that didn’t make the national news. These aren’t isolated individual incidents; they’re part of a pattern of racial violence.
This country has failed to live up to its ideals for 244 years now. We have a dangerous wanna-be strongman as President. While these protests are in a dangerous time, it is well past time for things to change. We have a dangerous leader that wants to use the armed forces against protesting citizens.
Support the efforts of the protesters if only in words.
It’s not just about people who are killed. Minorities are treated as less-thans in myriad ways every day. There are 42 million Black residents of the U.S. who suffer under racism in this country. There are 50 million Hispanic and Latino residents, and millions of other minorities who are affected by this. It has happened for hundreds of years, and will continue for the foreseeable future unless we change it.
There are 2 other things that strike me.
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The idea that “now is not the time”. Then motherfucking when IS the time? 'Cause the answer I see given is, at best, “when things are calmer”. They really mean “never” - somehow it’s never an appropriate time because of the contrived reason du jour. Well fuck that noise. If ‘never’ is the answer they have been given, then now, now, now is the response. The situation is unacceptable. COVID worries are legitimate but to use disease fear as a catch-all to deny the wisdom or utility protest is obscene.
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It is patronizing and infantilising to tell Black people you know their situation so much better than they do that you can somehow tell them now is not the right time to protest. White people have been telling black people they know best about everything - including how to protest apparently - and that’s a big part of the problem. It’s on full fucking display here. It’s disgusting and implicitly assumes they don’t have and don’t deserve their own agency. I think children shouldn’t be at some of these protests, given the violent police response and disease risks, but these are otherwise mentally competent adults who are capable of assessing their own risks. There’s a reason the vast majority are out there with masks, and it’s not because they’ve discounted the public health risks, unlike the bunch of MAGA idjits claiming oppression because they’ve been kicked out of a Costco.
That’s ridiculous. Burning cities and looting Jordan’s isn’t how one achieves justice. Pandemic or not. Doing so during a pandemic is just completely stupid in addition to the other problems that come with using riots and terror as opportunities to enrich oneself.
Oh, and now Mr “It’s all about me” shows up.
Shut the Fuck Up.
This is about protest, not looting, you immoral sack of dung.
Pro-tip to everybody else: if octopus is arguing on your behalf, you know you’ve made a bad move somewhere. Time to reconsider your position.
I agree that cops should stop killing citizens. They are (to borrow a Republican copout) “Forcing” people to make their voices heard. More subtle attempts have been made, but the NFL dropped that guy like a hot potato.
Which one killed more people two years ago? Five? Ten? Which will kill more people two years from now? Five? Ten? I’d say it’s an insult to the protestors to assume they haven’t thought about this and come to an entirely rational conclusion.
Exactly right, and a good start for the police would be to make an effort to track down and arrest the looters and arsonists. But they’re wasting their time shooting protestors with rubber bullets instead. Why is that? Might it be because not enough of the looters and arsonists are black?
You do realize that this is connected to the very same reasons why George Floyd (and many, many other people of color in police custody) have died, right? When you get treated as ‘less than’ or ‘other,’ a lot of suffering and dying happens as result, and it happens in all kinds of ways, not just at the hands of police. I’d bet there are folks who feel that they don’t really have that much to lose at this point.
It’s been way, way past time for this shit to stop. If not now, when?