Black people are no angels but when we are not being angelic, we still should have rights.  All people should have the same rights when under the power of law enforcement that they do when they are free.  No rights are without bounds, obviously someone in custody has rights that are greatly curtailed yet those rights still exist in some limited form.  I propose we amend the constitution of the United States of America to make it clear that the police have a duty to protect the lives of people under their power.

It is a fact that being able to fight people who are being violent is part of law enforcement's job.  What apparently needs to be clarified is that a persons civil rights exist through that fight and that the protection of the well being and the rights of the detainee, prisoner, or protester, or alleged looter exist at all times as human beings and presumptively citizens of the United States of America.  Once the fight is clearly over and they don’t back off that is a violation of civil rights making federal investigation, federal prosecution, and federal civil rights lawsuits clearly possible in cases like that of George Floyd. 

Please support this petition at Change.org to get an amendment to the following effect into the constitution of the United States of America as well as push for the arrest and charges of first degree murder for the killers of George Floyd.

For the establishment of a more orderly and freer society the boundaries of law must be clearly established for all citizens.  Law enforcement officers have a duty to protect the lives of those under their power even at hazard of their own lives. Law enforcement agents must uphold the constitution of the United States of America in its entirety in all circumstances, specifically, first, second, fourth, fifth, seventh and eighth, 13th and 14th amendment rights at all times, in detention, under arrest, while incarcerated, during protest, or assembly  that is lawful or unlawful or any other similar interaction.  The United States of America apologizes for the fact that such rights were denied to African American, and sometimes other citizens, for racist and discriminatory reasons.  

Black people have been victims, in the current day, of a system that the writer Robin DiAngelo describes as “White Centrality” sort of the proto-form of white supremacy.  It may be human nature to think of one’s self as “normal” and measure other people in relation to one’s self.  For example, China refers to itself with a word that means “middle kingdom”.  Most ancient maps start with where the map maker lives at the center.  White supremacy in the Americas positioned non white people as savages.  Human beings one could make treaties with only to disregard them. (Even if some of them owned slaves and their tribes in the south were deemed “civilized”). White supremacy positioned black people as the ultimate racial other to justify hundreds of years of unfree labor, rape, murder, being bought and sold.    Now the White Centrality, which on its face is not so different from other peoples natural tendency, is tainted by the legacy of white supremacy. 

Black People ARE NOT ANGELS.

George Floyd was not a human being three of those four officers.  What of the black officer J Alexander Keung? (Initially misidentified as Thomas Lane that was another officer on the scene)  Black people could not buy partially into that system, right?

As a first admission of how black people are not angels it is a fact that some of us who gained our freedom did own slaves.  The presence of a black person does not make the situation less racist.   When one is part of a group like Black Americans (Such as Native Americans or Jewish people, groups who have faced true racism in North America) one can internalize those views.

 As a second admission, the fact is individual Black people can be complicit in their own oppression. On Black social media the idea was spread that we are protected by melanin, that we have a stronger immune system, that we are too “wild” to get a disease like that. 

 That black officer, J Alexander Keung, not knocking Derrick Chauvin in his head to get him off George Floyd was for that same reason.   Hundreds of years, dozens of generations, of conditioning to see one’s self as inferior is not undone in one or two generations.  I have a friend who when she was younger interviewed some people who were born into slavery.  There are fewer degrees of separation between me.  A black transwoman who is a physicist than there are between me and a random person on the other side of the world.  

 Finally, the fact is Black people can also discriminate against other people.  This is a very disturbing video of young Black men attacking a Black Transgender woman.  Why because she got into a car accident and the person whose car was hit noticed she was trans.  See for yourself. 

Here is one angle. 

Here is another angle and some context. 

Where's a cop when you need one?