What Happened To George Floyd Was Bad. But Don't Think For A Second He Was Good.

OK, here we go. Here’s my take on the last few days and the spill-over from the latest unjustified killing of a black man. So we all agree that what happened was bad, and that justice needs to be seen to be done, and that this is a time for reflection. I don’t think I’ve seen a great deal of controversy about that. Yet suddenly we are all institutionally racist, all needing to check our white privilege and self-loath to a sufficiently deep degree otherwise we are guilty of not treating the moment with due deference.
Which is stupid. And whilst we’re at it, George Floyd should not be treated or revered as a Martyr any more than Sweeney Todd lauded as a barber. If you doubt this then you clearly haven’t seen his criminal record. Might I suggest that any person who deceives his way into the home of a young pregnant black women, points a firearm at her belly, and then gets an accomplice to watch over her as he and his cohorts turn the joint over is probably some distance short of meeting the criteria for Sainthood. He was not a good man and he most certainly was not a role model.
So what to do at times such as this? Well showing kindness would be a good start. And should you wish to protest do so peacefully. None of this downplays the need to explore the socio economic conditions that may compel young men of colour into lives of crime, and thus hugely increases the risk of them encountering the kind of Neanderthals that had him under arrest and whose brute ignorance caused his death. There are problems to address, scales to balance, and injustices to overcome. These will be achieved when we as individuals start looking more closely at the things which unite us rather than that which divides. When we look at each in a way that see’s beyond skin pigmentation and instead into the content of our character. But that seems not to be the way society wants to go. We want to create our enclaves, our dominions, and play identity politics. If you really want to make a society better we should resist this. Retreating into cults now is going to make things a shed load worse. How could it not? We need to be brave enough to engage with alternative perspectives, listen to voices that don’t echo our own. And even then that’s only half the battle. There are rarely truly simple solutions in this world, but the complexity is a bit less daunting when we all go into the arena with a spirit of openness and engagement. I hate what happened to George Floyd. I also disapprove that we have elevated him way beyond what his life choices merited. All any of us can choose to do now is listen, learn, and reflect. And pro tip; do that before you start flouting your own opinions. And you don’t have to self-loath or grovel to demonstrate that you are against racism and for equality, either. You have every right to be proud of who you are irrespective of your colour or your culture. Don’t buy into this deranged woke narrative. That’s a rabbit hole that leads to lunacy and derangement.