Keeping the Faith

Years ago I discovered Gotham Writers online.  They had a physical presence in New York City but also offered online classes that I could take anytime.   You had homework assignments to write and turn in for critiques and feedback.  At that time in my life I had a little more time so I took a few classes here and there, but those dropped off as I found myself with more responsibilities at work and in my community and a generally busier life.

But I stayed on the mailing list and still receive the periodic newsletter with their events and offerings.  One of which recently was an online workshop, over Zoom like so many things today.  The workshop was one hour and 15 minutes, just a smidge over my lunch hour this past Friday, so I signed up.

The point of the workshop was the leader would give us a word prompt and we would have 15 minutes to write whatever came to mind, and then those who wanted to could share.

Our first prompt was Keeping the Faith.  Some people managed to write entire sections of short stories in that time while I could only manage a few sentences.  Others wrote more "feelings", like I was doing, but got more out of themselves.  I was too busy trying to define which Faith I was trying to "keep" - in myself, in my fellow man, or in my God (which, side note, was never in question, it was just a matter of which path I was going to take for the assignment.)

The ones that shared, not me to Billy's great surprise, talked a lot about the living through the pandemic and really had some beautiful words and alliterations for how their lives had felt in the last few months - looking through windows and comparing the virus to cement that had been dumped on their worlds to keep them in place.

Of course, on last Friday, the virus was still all anyone had to talk about when the thought of keeping the faith was a topic.

It was before the country was set ablaze by rioting and looting.  It was before innocent police officers were killed in the line of duty and hardworking people saw their entire livelihoods get wiped out and destroyed.

It was before.

Some of the thoughts I'm sharing below feel as if they need some kind of "qualifier".  These are only What-Ifs, not what I'm saying is true or trying to detract from what is, just wonderings.

All the rioting these last few days is coming from a tragic event last Monday.   On the evening of Memorial Day, a man was detained after using a counterfeit bill in a store.  From what I have read, the passing of the fake $20 was unintentional and the man was being compliant with the officer to a point, even waiting on the officers to arrive when the store owner confronted him with the fake bill.  He did resist when being placed into the police car and slipped down to the ground.  I have not watched the video of what all happened in the next almost 9 minutes but I do know from what I have seen that the officer detained the man on the ground by using his knee on the man's neck, possibly aggressively at times, but certainly in an unsafe manner, and the man died as a result.  The officer continued to hold him down with his knee even after the man stopped moving and asking him to please let him up.  From the witness accounts, again I have not watched the video myself, the man never tried to be aggressive with the officer or fight him, he was just asking for the officer to move his knee and release the pressure on his neck.  Three other officers were present on the scene but apparently took no actions to stop the officer or assist the man on the ground.

A man died after passing a bad $20 bill from an officer that was too aggressive in his manner of detention.

That sentence alone, as written, should horrify most folks.  It did me.

That is the way the story should have been presented in the media.  But it wasn't.  Notice that nowhere in that retelling did I ever mention the race of the officer or the man.  Ever.  For us to be feel outrage or anger or sympathy or even skepticism, the race of the participants was not important.  The facts alone were enough.

Yet the media immediately put out the story that is was a white racist cop killing a black man.  

Maybe the cop was just a jerk.  Did the media ever even think of that?

You know, one of those bad officers - and there are some just as there are bad priests, bad teachers, bad accountants, bad everything - who gets drunk on the power of his position instead of respecting the badge he wears.   You can be a jerk against another human being without being a racist.

Race didn't have to be brought in to the story to make it a tragedy, it already was.

So the already tenuous pot of race relations in the United States was stirred again.

I have read that, allegedly,  the officer had anywhere from 10 to 18 prior complaints against him for behavioral issues. We know his wife, a Laotian, filed for divorce just a few days after his arrest.  Maybe it was a "last straw" kind of event for her, maybe she'd seen more in their years together and knew he was capable of this kind of act.  Maybe he shouldn't have been out there on the streets anyway?  Were these prior complaints all white persons so it didn't get reported, or was it just because no one died that it wasn't deemed newsworthy?

I will stick my neck out right now and say that incidents occur between black officers and black persons and white officers and white persons, some even ending in death, that we never hear about.  I will go so far as to say that if the officer had been black the man on the ground white with the same result we would have never had heard about it.  The media wouldn't find that "provocative" enough.

No, instead, they threw out the racist tag and what has happened since has been heartbreaking.

The media placed a target on every police officer in this country, most of them good, honest, hardworking, brave men and women who put their lives on the line with every shift for all the rest of us.  They have blood on their hands, too, in all of this.

In the first few days after the incident there were peaceful protests.  People wanted to see justice for George Floyd.  Rightfully so.  The officer was arrested and charged with third degree murder in a matter of days, an act that could have taken weeks or months but with the video evidence only took hours.  The protest might have happened anyway, but I still think a lot of them were the result of the media continually spouting out the phrase "racist cop".  And in the last four or five nights the peaceful protests, while still present, have also given way to rioting and looting across the country.  Big towns and small ones.  Storefronts smashed.  Inventories raided.  I have watched cases of liquor being loaded into cars; big screen televisions being carried off; high end clothing stores being emptied.  The justification is that the businesses all have insurance so let some else pay for it.

Problem is, not all of them do.  Lifetimes of work have been destroyed.  Jobs lost, possibly forever if the businesses don't reopen.  These actions have nothing to do the peaceful protests or the incident itself.  These rioters are just opportunistic criminals trying to grab whatever they can.  They do nothing to honor the man for whom they are supposedly speaking out.

But even worse, I have seen police officers be injured, shot, beat up, killed, and a retired captain died on the street in St. Louis and we could all see it on Facebook.

All because of one jackass.

Well, one jackass and an overzealous media that couldn't wait to create this maelstrom.

I don't know if Officer Chauvin is a racist.  I don't think anyone has actually asked him.  I do know he exhibited very poor judgement in his final act as an officer and he will pay for that lapse for the rest of his life.  I know others have already paid with their lives because of his actions, and I hope he has to live with that knowledge as well.

I pray for the families of the officers killed and injured in the riots.  That should never have happened.

As of now, I don't know where the national story will end.  It may end with military force if the violence on the streets doesn't quell soon.  Or maybe once all the stores are looted and there is nothing else to steal the rioters will all go home and we will only be left with the peaceful protesters.  Only time will tell.

But I do know the pain for the Floyd and Chauvin families will be ongoing.  There will be a funeral, and a trial.  There will be loss for both.   My prayers continue to go out to them as well.