If the world ran by US standards, foreign leaders would be coming together to bomb the US Gov’t amid calls for “Freedom and Democracy” over the protests in Minneapolis. In the same way the Gov’t operates with impunity, Police in America have a major accountability problem…
On today’s edition of “Why Isn’t Anyone Talking About This?!” if we all lived by the standard set by the United States, then right now, world leaders would be coming together to bomb the US Government amid calls for freedom, democracy, and the need for new leadership. The protests we saw in Minneapolis this week are exactly what the Trump Administration has been longing for in countries like Venezuela and Iran.
When looking at the protests over the killing of George Floyd at the hands of police, many have noted the similarities to protests we saw in Ferguson and Baltimore a few years ago. But despite the gap in time, we are still dealing with the same issues, and there is still an overwhelming need for police accountability.
There is a drastic need for accountability across the nation, and in Minneapolis, where a state-led task force released “an extensive set of recommendations for how to prevent law enforcement from using deadly force on civilians and how best to respond when police do kill people” back in February, which included 28 recommendations and 33 “action steps” for state and local police to implement.
When looking at the record of Derek Chauvin, the man who suffocated George Floyd by kneeling on his neck for around 8 minutes, was previously involved in two shootings and had nearly 20 complaints and two letters of reprimand filed against him during his 19-year career.
Cases similar to this one are seen across the US, and far too often, the current system of policing allows officers to quite literally “get away with murder,” by simply claiming they feared for their lives. While some argue that the media is only magnifying the “bad apples” within police departments, those who are considered “good apples” often don’t speak up because they fear retaliation.
The same lack of accountability is also seen at the federal level where both law enforcement and the government face little to no accountability whatsoever—a reminder that when it comes to accountability, it must start at the local level and there is no better time to enforce it than right now. And that is something everyone should be talking about.
