“My neck hurts, everything hurts. They’re going to kill me. It’s my fave man, I didn’t do nothing serious man, please. Please I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe shit. I can’t move, mama! My knee, my nuts, I’m through, I’m claustrophobic! My stomach hurts, my neck hurts, everything hurts. Some water or something! Please, please! I can’t breathe. Don’t kill me, they gonna kill me man. I can’t breathe! Please sir! Please, I can’t breathe.”
Then his eyes shut and the pleas stopped with urine trickling down from him and underneath the police vehicle which is what happens after someone dies. Shortly after, his pulse was checked and medics arrived to take him away on a stretcher. The day after Mr.Floyd’s death, the police department fired all four (4) of the officers involved and on friday, the Hennepin county attorney, Mike Freeman announced murder and manslaughter charges against Derek Chauvin and the other three (3) officers remain under investigation.
However, the people of Minneapolis were not satisfied as they wanted full justice to be served, hence they took to the streets to protest George Floyd’s death. By the second day, things escalated and the protests became violent and was characterized by mass looting and vandalism of many departmental stores, burning down buildings like police precinct, physical demonstrations and destruction of properties. By the third day, more neighboring states had joined in the protests and it was being televised.
Regardless of all these, the US President, Donald Trump wasn’t too pleased by the protests and looting so in a press briefing he said “I feel very, very badly about George Floyd’s death while handcuffed and in the custody of Minneapolis police, that’s a very shocking sight.” He also went on to say “These thugs are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd and I won’t let that happen”. In another tweet, he said “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”. At this point, Twitter added a warning to the tweet because it violated the platform rule regarding violence, but for some reason, they didn’t take down the entire tweet but went on to add a fact check to subsequent tweets made by Donald Trump on the issue.
Nonetheless, the protests were still on and by Thursday, the 4th of June, 2020. The protests had already spread around all 50 stayed of the United States of the US with over 20 other countries participating as well. The likes of Anthony Joshua and John Boyega led protests in the United Kingdom while so many Hollywood celebrities like Kanye West, Ariana Grande, J. Cole, Jamie Foxx and many more joined the march while tons more posted on their various websites and social media platforms all in a bid to lend their voices and make sure the Black Lives Matter movement was finally taken seriously. Funny how at this point, no one payed attention to the still very present COVID-19 because our voices needed to be heard and it was finally beginning to happen because changes were being implemented. The New York government proposed a motion to make racial 911 calls a crime, the words Black Lives Matter we’re boldly written on the road leading to the White House, statues of past slave lords were maimed and taken down, Edward Colton statue in London was taken down and thrown into a river. All this went on till the ending of June and even though the protests never fully stopped, they were much less but the message was still being carried around on social media. The downside of all this was the spike in COVID-19 cases all around the United States but the message was passed and not only George Floyd’s case was addressed but other cases like Breonna Taylor were brought to limelight so for us as blacks that is a big W !
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