The movement started by Colin Kaepernick and picked up by players like Seahawks tackle Duane Brown was aimed at bringing attention to, and ultimately reversing, the mistreatment of black and brown Americans by law-enforcement authorities. In the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd on Monday night in Minneapolis, Brown admitted that, despite their efforts, the progress has yet to be made.
“No, not really,” Brown said whether player protests during the national anthem have prompted positive change, via Gregg Bell of the Tacoma News Tribune.
“If you know the details of what happened [in Minneapolis], it’s a tragic situation,” Brown said. “It’s just an awful situation -- that could have been prevented.”
Video shows Floyd on the ground with a police officer’s knee pressing hard into his neck. Floyd repeatedly said that he can’t breathe.
“I feel like, someone called the cops on him for, potentially, writing a bad check,” Brown said. “And he ended up dying, on camera, unarmed and in handcuffs. So, I mean, it seems like this continues to happen, every year, at some point.
“I don’t know when it will change. . . . It’s sad, man. It’s sad.”
Brown’s former teammate in Houston, defensive tackle J.J. Watt, was even more candid when speaking to reporters on Wednesday.
“I think it’s disgusting,” Watt said regarding the murder of George Floyd. “I think there’s no explanation for it. . . . I just don’t see how a man in handcuffs, on the ground, who is clearly detained . . . I don’t understand how that situation can’t be remedied in a way that doesn’t end in his death. I think it needs to be addressed -- strongly, obviously. I don’t see how that situation makes any sense whatsoever. . . . It’s terrible.”
Watt is right. Brown is right. George Floyd was killed, on camera, by police. In theory, it can happen to any of us. In practice, it happens much more frequently to minorities. Indeed, for every video that emerges of an African-American suspect being injured or worse by police, there are multiple videos that land on social media of white suspects engaging in aggressive behavior toward police that doesn’t result in guns being fired or knees being buried into necks.
It needs to change. The more that people in positions of power and influence scream for change, hopefully it will.
That change begins by making the persons who killed George Floyd answer for their actions in court, and pay their debt to society, if/when convicted, by spending a fair and appropriate amount of time behind bars.