I CAN'T BREATHE!
omg. Let me see if I comprehend this.
In America today, not only can the police kill you for being a rude young "thug," stealing a few cigars and then being rowdy, grappling with an officer, allegedly punching him in the face, trying to grab his gun, trying to run away - and then be shot to death with your hands up over 100 feet away;
also, now, apparently the police can kill you for being an unarmed 43-year-old family man suspected of selling loose cigarettes (yes, not pot, not crack, not meth, but f*ing cigarettes?!), completely nonviolent, not threatening anybody, as proven on video seen by millions of people; instead of writing a ticket, the police are allowed to throw you to the ground using an illegal chokehold while another jumps on your chest, ignoring your cries of "I can't breathe!" until you suffocate (coroner rules Homicide) -
and it is totally ok for them to do that. No charges whatsoever. Not manslaughter. Not even "assault." Not even "using an illegal restraint method."
Did I miss something here? Why do I feel so afraid? "Serve and protect"?!
Yes, it's a "race" issue in that this sort of thing statistically is much more common if you are black. But, my fear is this: If the Grand Jury says it's totally ok for police to do it to these guys without consequences, then what is preventing them from doing it to anybody anytime they want?! The precedent has been set. Instead of being a rare fluke, a mistake, an outrage, it becomes the accepted norm.
IMO these black victims of police violence are like "canaries in a coal mine." Their deaths tell us that something is very wrong with our "justice" system and there is nothing to prevent it from spinning totally out of control and becoming a police state. If we stay in this hole we have dug it will eventually blow up, if we don't all die of suffocation first.
"First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."
- Martin Niemoller