By Victor U. Amadi, MD
Spring is a season of transition. It brings forth the first flicker of warmth, after the chills of a frigid Winter. It is a time when fresh flowers bloom and new leaves sprout. It is a period when strong ice melts and frozen earth thaws. Days become longer and nights, shorter.
Every political shift or social change arguably begins with a single act of defiance, potentiated by blood of the innocent. Examples abound in history: Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. (Spring of 1968), Tiananmen Square Massacre (Spring of 1989), Arab Spring Suicide (Spring of 2012). The common denominator is sacrifice and the common trigger is oppression. All humans share a universal capacity for good and for evil. The choice is always determined by love or hate.
Monday (May 25, 2020), was one of the darkest days in the history of America. The world woke up to the graphic horrors of a grisly footage. #GeorgeFloyd, 46 years, black and defenceless was brutally murdered by 4 police officers in public glare, near his home in Minneapolis. A video footage captured through the phone of a bystander, showed him being wrestled to the ground, subdued and handcuffed. The first officer pinned his head to the ground with his knee by the neck; the second officer pushed at his back with his whole weight; the third officer bound his legs; the fourth officer looked on in silent acquiescence. Over the next 8 minutes 46 seconds, Floyd was mercilessly suffocated to death, despite his desperate pleas for a breath.
My illustrious in-laws from Onitsha in Eastern Nigeria, have an Igbo proverb from their Wisdom Trove: “Ajo ife notee aka, odele ani.” Interpretation: “When evil is allowed to fester, it becomes normalized.”
Police brutality against black people is normal and native to America. The entire length and breadth of its history is dotted with countless crimes of hate against people of colour, despite the nation’s claims of high respect for human rights. More recently, you may recall the horrendous murder of Eric Garner in similar circumstances to Floyd’s, by a New York police officer in Staten Island. You may also remember the heartrending killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown, by a white officer in Fergusson, Missouri. There were also the brutal killings of Freddie Gray, Philando Castile, Alton Sterling, Delrawn Small etc. The list is endless. All happened within a decade. The names of victims keep changing but the skin colour remains the same. More heartbreaking is that most of the killers were either never charged with wrongdoing; or received lower charges; or given suspended sentences; or were brazenly acquitted by the jury. The punishments were almost always disproportionate to the crimes. Those are the faces of normalized evil!
What is then the basis for America’s claim to moral high ground?
Can the United States conscionably condemn human rights abuses, anywhere in the world?
March 7, 1965 is known to history as the #BlackSunday. It was a day Alabama police massacred scores of black people on a peaceful, protest march from Selma to Montgomery. That was 55 years ago. Similar and worse incidents had happened much earlier. According to the US Bureau of Justice Statistics, the number of people killed by Law Enforcement officers were 1146 in 2015; 1093 in 2016 and 976 in 2017. Black people constituted 90 to 95 percent.
The United States is a great country with a sinful past! At his inauguration on April 30, 1789, the first president, George Washington owned 317 slaves at his Mount Vernon plantation. The third president, Thomas Jefferson owned more than 600 slaves. Yet, they were sworn in with the Holy Bible on their right hands. In the Slave Ship massacre of 29 November 1781, American slave merchants threw overboard, 130 African slaves to conserve food and drinking water. This atrocity came to be known to history as the ‘Zong’ massacre. You may be familiar with the more recent public hangings of black people, in white dominated cities. This gruesome practice was a common weekend spectacle, for the perverted pleasures of white supremacists.
Nevertheless, it is undeniable that America’s contributions to the advancement of the human species are priceless: Airplane, Space exploration, Lunar landings, Human Genome Project, Polio Vaccine, Incandescent light, Computer science, Telephone technology, Information Superhighway (Internet), Democracy. The list is inexhaustible. Horrifyingly, this nation is also home to some of the most diminishing evils of our time. They include: Systemic Racism, Elaine Massacres of 1919, Medical Apartheid, Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment (1932-72)
Atlanta race riots, Chicago race riot, Tulsa race riot, Miami race riot, Omaha race riot, East St. Louis race riot, Newark race riot etc. (All happened from 1906-1968)
Lynching era (1878-1939). Again, the list stretches to infinity. The Tulsa race massacre (May 31 and June 1, 1921), has been labelled the single worst incident of racial violence, in American history. Yet, the United States is a great country with the world’s biggest churches in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The killing of #Floyd is not strange to the country’s culture of racial brutality. What is strange is the manner in which he was lynched.
As usual, the handling of this murder in the after days, was shamefully indicative of impunity and official cover-up. For example, the initial statement from the Minnesota police shamelessly exonerated the offending officers from the death of #Floyd. It would take the power of non-violent protests, to apprehend the principal officer in the crime. Contrary to expectation, he was initially charged with 3rd degree murder and 2nd degree manslaughter, despite the weight of visible evidence. The other 3 officers were initially at large. It would take more protests and family pressures to elevate the charge to 2nd degree murder and incriminate the other officers. The autopsy report from the police coroner was even more bewildering. It effectively eliminated asphyxiation as a possible cause of #GeorgeFloyd’s death. It would take 2 other independent autopsies to establish the truth.
These dirty lies and deceits stink to every corner of the globe. They are clearly indigestible in 21st century America. They are certainly unworthy of the best episodes in the nation’s checkered history. I refer to three, out of so many.
* Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation to free all slaves, in January 1863.
* Election of Barack Obama as the first African-American President, in November 2009.
* Memorialization of Martin Luther King Jr. as a tribute to Civil Rights Movement, in August 2011.
These great historical touchstones served to elevate the United States to the status of a model nation, capable of self correction and self reformation. Curiously and disturbingly, this great country has been unable to rise above the shackles of race and colour, throughout its 244-year history. Racism in America is entrenched and institutionalized. The ghost of racial profiling is often spotted, trailing business loan applications, mortgage home purchases, employment opportunities and even school enrolments etc. Yet, America is the most recognizable face of freedom and equality, on the planet.
What is it about an oppressed black man that is threatening to a privileged white person?
The first slaves arrived in Jamestown, Virginia in September of 1619!
Are 400 years of brutalities and fatalities not enough to buy back their freedom?
The popular narrative is that the United States is a powerful and prosperous nation. What is not popular is that much of the wealth and power were acquired with the blood and bones of unpaid, slave labour. From the construction of railway lines and the White House, to military exploits in numerous wars, contributions of the African American race can never be erased from the history of the United States.
Expectedly, the horrific killing of #GeorgeFloyd promptly sent shock waves across the globe and sparked off public outrage in Minnesota. Over the next few days, these angry protests spread from Minneapolis to other US cities, leaving a long trail of shattered glass, smoke and fireballs. As unrest and destruction spread from city to city in the US, peaceful protests against racism spread from country to country around the world.
Through its visible philanthropy and altruism, the US, once upon a time, established itself firmly as the moral compass of the free world. Sadly, that is now in the archives of history. The daylight lynching of #Floyd has exposed the racial fault lines that silently plagued the nation, like a virus, for centuries. These lines of segregation have now become more glaring than ever, as the world got technologically smaller in space and time.
The entire world is closely watching the judicial handling of this murder, with disdainful interest. This case will no doubt place on trial, the much-touted American Criminal Justice System. It will be interesting to observe how the jury will be constituted to reflect racial inclusivity. Certainly, it will be more fascinating to see how this jury will make decisions to convict or acquit, based on contradictory autopsy reports.
In European folklore, Spring Season represents rebirth, renewal and new beginnings. The daylight gains signify the triumph of light over darkness and good over evil……
The Spring events of 1968, 1989 and 2012 blazed forth major socio-political changes in their time.
If the killing of #GeorgeFloyd in the Spring of 2020, is the catalyst required for racism to end in America, it would go down as a painful but worthy sacrifice.
#RespectfullyDedicatedtotheMemoryofGeorgeFloyd#
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#AllVoicesMatter
Victor U. Amadi, MD
