Tuesday, April 20, 2021

Minnesota v. Chauvin

I felt a very strange sense of relief when this verdict was announced.  I still don't know why.  I didn't know anyone involved in the trial, I hadn't followed the case that closely.  I think the relief was that justice in such an obvious case, was done.  I remember the Rodney King case, so I was ready for anything.  I'm glad there won't be excuses for anger and violence and public demonstrations of grief and fury.

But I'm also sad this is what it takes.  I haven't seen the video for a year now, not since the death of George Floyd as in the news.  I remember the look of disdain, of disregard, in the eyes of Chauvin as he knelt on the dead man's neck, knelt there and stayed there and started straight at the camera to be sure he was seen and remembered.

Now I hope I replace that look with this one:
I'm really wondering what he expected.  I think, after 3 years of Trump (at the time), he acted with such impunity because the President broadcast, every chance he got, that impunity was not only allowed, but justified.  And that accountability was for losers, for others, for non-whites and people who didn't align themselves with the President.  Was Chauvin MAGA, or a Trump supporter?  It doesn't matter.  Trump set the table, and the worst among us feasted until they were full.  I agree that President Biden shouldn't have commented on the trial, but he did so after the jury was sequestered.  He spoke out of simple human decency, as a representative of us all who stand as a society against murder, against police who think their badge allows them to do what they want, so long as they people they do it to are considered powerless, and disposable, and less than human.

Biden will not cleanse us of our national sin.  He can't.  Only we can.  Will we, is the question.  I am relieved we can face that question, this time, without violence.  But we can't face without realizing the Chauvin case was so outrageous, so blatant, so public, so acknowledged, that it could not pass.  There was no clever argument this time that so many officers assaulted Mr. Floyd that we could not say who struck the fatal blow.  This was all, for this case, on Derek Chauvin.  If that's still what it takes, if we still can't convict police officers who claim they were "just doing their jobs" when they shoot children and young men and unarmed people and people in their beds, then nothing has really changed.

But I truly thank God this ended well. 
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