The George Floyd Protests – 20 unanswered questions

Racial politics in America are a simmering pot waiting to boil over, they have been for decades. This is only exacerbated as the poverty created by the (totally unnecessary) lockdown starts to hit home.

As the weather gets hot, and jobs dry up and prices skyrocket and the small businesses close…people will get tense. They will get angry.

This is dry tinder which can burst into flames at any moment.

All it took was a spark.

Now the protesters swarm cities all across America, as windows are smashed, shops looted and public buildings set afire. Civilians are being maced and tasered and the rubber bullets are flying.

How did we get here?

It started when a video of a police officer (later identified as Derek Chauvin) kneeling on the neck of a black man (later identified as George Floyd) went viral.

And this is the first thing we need to interrogate. Though, of course, most of us won’t.

“Going viral” is a term that has smoothly worked itself into our collective lexicon over the last decade and a half. Everyone thinks of it as an organic process that lacks impetus or agency. This is not so, as a moment’s reflection will tell you. Things don’t just “go viral”, things are made to go viral.

Videos need to be made, edited, uploaded and shared by the right people at the right time in the right way in order to ‘go viral’. Backstories need to be written up. Narratives created.

Why is George Floyd’s tragic end now a viral vid?

Police brutality is an unfortunate fact of life in over-militarized America. It happens every day, to poor and disenfranchised people, black and white. Some even get caught on a phone vid (just search “police brutality compilation” on YouTube). And almost no one sees, and no one much cares.

Why is this death different? Why did this video suddenly get noticed, and not the dozens of other videos of police being brutally violent?

Why, within mere days of the incident, did NIKE have a brand new ad endorsing the protests?

Why is an allegedly grass-roots social revolution enjoying sponsorship as if they were a sports team?

And why has the deification of violence become a central theme?

It’s important to note that not all of these protests have been violent:

Quite the contrary.

For years the “liberal” press has clutched its pearls over even the hint of aggression (often associated with ‘toxic masculinity’). Even virtual aggression. Even harsh language.

Twitter and Facebook shut down accounts based on people using ‘hate’. People are “traumatised” by “cyber bullying”. The “aggressive language” and “bullying tactics” of Corbyn’s “hard left” supporters were constantly complained about throughout the pages of The Guardian.

Until yesterday when, with that transformative magic available only to a propaganda outfit with no perceived need to make internal sense, suddenly the Graun decided to run a story headlined “If violence isn’t the way to end racism in America, then what is?”.

Why are they saying this?

Why did RT run a similar op-ed that used exactly the same arguments, in exactly the same way?

In The Now, with Rania Khalek, actually had a guest say:

More attention gets paid when stuff burns down

Why are we being sold this new meme that violence is now, it merely acceptable, but inevitable, even good.

And let’s recall (though it seems we’re not supposed to) that for months now we’ve been told only “covidiots” would dare go outside without permission. That only the irredeemably selfish would go out without wearing a mask. That lives were at stake. Last month, Khalek herself even called anti-lockdown protestors members of a “death cult” for simply doing exactly what the rioters are now doing – sans most of the violence.

So, what does Khalek think has changed exactly?

Actually let’s ask the same about the UK police who are now, suddenly and without explanation just fine with large numbers of people mingling in Trafalgar Square.

It’s the responsibility of the alternate media to hit the pause button, to take a breath and not be swept along with the emotional current.

We have to ask the questions no one is asking.

Exactly how did the video of George Floyd’s last moments go viral?

Why are people on the streets are reporting stacks of loose bricks on street corners:

Why are they reporting “organizers” of the riots “encouraging kids to attack cops”:

Further, the police seem to have no regard for their own public image.

The Minneapolis riot police detained a black CNN reporter live on air, without first insisting they stop recording.

Other police across the country are ramming protestors with their cars and pepper-spraying little girls. Why?

Why are police currently going of their way to make themselves look as bad as possible and to further incentivise this multi focal promotion of violence? Because they are entirely corrupt and almost cartoonishly evil? Well, maybe. Or is it because in this narrative they have been cast as the Heel?

Lastly, what do the rioters want? Sure, the people themselves, the ones in the streets, are angry, about a lot of things, and rightly so. But what do the new supporters of this violence – the people telling us sometimes it’s the only way – actually want?

The only way to what?

What is the goal that, when achieved, will signal everyone can go home?

Is there one?

Or is the importance of violence to the ones advocating it from the safety of their middle class workstations, that is has no clear aim and can therefore – much like the one apparently superseded covid19 crisis, be turned on and off at will?

Violence, looting and riots won’t solve any of the political problems in America, but will cause more. So why are they being encouraged?

As this gets published, curfews are being introduced all across the country, national guard units are on high alert, and the media continue to pump out alarmist stories stoking the conflict.

Who will benefit from this chaos?

https://off-guardian.org/2020/05/31/the-george-floyd-protests-20-unanswered-questions/