#Floyd Protest

[animentality]

[decolonize-the-everything]

In response to the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people, Operation Enduring Freedom officially began 7 October 2001 with American and British bombing strikes against al-Qaeda and Taliban forces in Afghanistan. Initially, the Taliban was removed from power and al-Qaeda was seriously crippled, but forces continually dealt with a stubborn Taliban insurgency, infrastructure rebuilding, and corruption among the Afghan National Army, Afghan National Police, and Afghan Border Police.

On 2 May 2011, U.S. Navy SEALS (Sea, Air, Land) launched a raid on Osama Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, during Operation Neptune Spear, killing the al-Qaeda leader and mastermind of the September 11th terrorist attacks. Operation Enduring Freedom officially ended on 28 December 2014, although coalition forces remained on the ground to assist with training Afghan security forces. The United States Armed Forces completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan on 30 August 2021, marking the end of the 2001-2021 war.

Walz and the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul said Saturday morning that the vast majority of those who were arrested Friday night were outside agitators who were not from the Twin Cities region. Walz called those people a group "bent on adapting their tactics to make it as difficult as possible" to maintain order. "Let's be very clear: The situation in Minneapolis is no longer in any way about the murder of George Floyd. It is about attacking civil society, instilling fear and disrupting our great cities," Walz said. He said he had mobilized more than 700 National Guard soldiers on Friday night, and that after television cameras found large gatherings of protesters with no police presence at all, he was authorizing the head of the state's National Guard to fully mobilize on Saturday.

Contrary to activists’ calls to defund the police, the bill provides over $3 million in new funding for these initiatives and extends an existing $6 million in annual training funds until 2024.

[...]Dropped from the bill were DFL provisions that would have turned over prosecutions involving deadly force to the attorney general’s office and restored voting rights to some felons.

[...]Civil rights lawyer, activist and former Minneapolis mayoral candidate Nekima Levy Armstrong called the bill “watered-down legislation” and “a slap in the face, especially to Black residents in the state of Minnesota.” Activists weren’t the only ones disheartened. Andy Skoogman, executive director of the Minnesota Chiefs of Police Association, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that he wanted to see greater changes to arbitration as well. And Julia Decker, police director for the ACLU of Minnesota, told the Star Tribune that she was disappointed the bill didn’t require an independent prosecutor like the attorney general to handle cases like Floyd’s.

Did you know that the Minnesota State Board of Investments holds around 10,000 shares, worth a whopping $1.2 million, in Israel’s largest weapons company, Elbit Systems — the world’s largest exporter of drones?

Elbit has been involved in all of the major Israeli assaults in Gaza, contracts with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for, among other things, a virtual surveillance wall at the U.S.-Mexico border, and markets its equipment to governments around the world as “battle-tested” (on the Palestinian civilians). Elbit drones constantly fly over Gaza, providing surveillance targeting for military assaults and Israeli snipers that hit peaceful protestors.

What are the odds that the drones over Minneapolis were Elbit drones, especially given that Metropolitan State University, located in the Minneapolis–St. Paul, metropolitan area, partners with Elbit on a state of the art cybersecurity training facility? A number of Democrats in Congress have written to the Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf expressing “grave concern” over the use of drones over Minneapolis on May 29th to “surveil and intimidate” protestors.

Pro-Palestine protesters have been demanding that the state of Minnesota divest its financial stakes in Israeli companies and bonds, which they say are worth around $119m. Activists have also for years been urging the state to repeal its anti-boycott legislation, which forces state contractors to sign a pledge that they will not engage in a boycott of Israel. The law was first passed in 2017, prior to Walz becoming governor. However, he has made no moves to try to repeal the law. In December, a group of 1,000 Palestinian solidarity activists in Minnesota disrupted Walz's Christmas party, demanding the governor commit to divesting from Israel. “Governor Walz has ignored our calls for the divestment of taxpayer dollars and public pension funds from Israeli apartheid. But he will never stop hearing from us or seeing us until he finally ends Minnesota's complacency in genocide,” Christine Hauschildt of the Minnesota Anti-War Committee said back in December.

"I don't know of a single educator who wants our money invested in weapons companies, and in bombing school buildings in racist wars,” Drake Myers, a member of the Minnesota Anti-War Committee who is also active in the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers, told the panel. Max Vash, who has a Palestinian son, spoke out against the state’s holdings in Elbit Systems, an international defense and aerospace contractor based in Israel. “You have the power and the responsibility to ensure that neither my son, nor any other Palestinian person experiences these horrors,” Vash said. Lucia Wilkes Smith, a longtime member of Mothers Against Military Madness, said the BDS movement — Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions — shouldn’t be written off as antisemitic. Mike McDonald of Veterans for Peace didn’t address Israel directly but said the Board of Investment shouldn’t have money in defense contractors that are arming nations across the planet. He asserted the state has $800 million in holdings in companies that make weapons of warfare. It’s not the first time the investment board has heard from people calling for divestment from Israel. In 2015, activists unsuccessfully pressed the board to sell off its Israeli government bonds. This time around, activists look to build support based on outrage over thousands of Palestinian civilian casualties in Gaza in the war between Israel and the Hamas militant group. That fighting was sparked by a series of coordinated surprise attacks by Hamas on Israel Oct. 7, in which 1,200 Israelis and foreigners were slain and 250 others were taken hostage. Since the war began, the Gaza Health Ministry has reported more than 13,300 Palestinians have been killed, roughly two-thirds of them women and minors. The board members — Walz, Simon, and Blaha — listened and took notes, but didn’t take any action in response to the request.

.....gonna wait to hear more but I'm not super impressed thus far.

I don't give a shit what your domestic policy is when you're actively making money off of a genocide started by the "war on terror" you personally helped start.

[wilwheaton]

The true history of Mount Rushmore is appalling. In a nation that is awash in the blood of innocent humans who were murdered by colonizers, that refuses to reckon with its white supremacist history, Mount Rushmore stands out as a glaring example of the cruelty and violence of America’s brutality.

“The Lakota considered the carving of the four presidents' faces on what was once Six Grandfathers, a defacement of their sacred site, especially as "those four people had a lot to do with destroying our people's land base," Douville said. Indeed, Washington waged war against Native American tribes, Jefferson was considered the architect of policies that would result in the removal of Native Americans from their lands, Lincoln ordered the execution of 38 Dakota Native American rebels, the largest mass execution in American history, and Roosevelt systematically removed Native Americans from their lands.”

“We found the monument had a dark history of ties to the KKK, an illegal war, and the violent suppression of the Native American Lakota (also known as Sioux) people. We looked at each claim in the meme, starting with the history of the region before Mount Rushmore was built, followed by an investigation into its creation and alleged KKK funding.“

If you don’t know the truth about this monument to hate and genocide, please look into it, and encourage others to do the same.

[anarchotahdigism]

y'all do not post or rb videos of people being arrested or doing cool leftist shit that would result in such talk about it, describe it in detail, but don't say precisely where or when or who unless specifically asked by those involved the US government will absolutely find those graphic pieces of evidence much more easily if you do. If you don't post it, they do not have it.

make sure to obscure faces in anything you do post or boost you can say you support something without having to document every single incident that the state will want to investigate---which it will people are still catching charges from 2020 because of stuff people posted then and now Read about the Ferguson Six.

[wakandan-goddess]

Here we go again with the “I wish Americans protested like the French” shit again.

I don’t know if some of y’all have memory loss but we did protest “like the French” in 2020 (George Floyd Protests) and got shit on and called thugs by the public,the media and politicians. People were seriously injured by police and other random people who wanted to be violent. We were told that peoples property was worth more than justice for a wrongfully taken like. So don’t bring that shit over here. Y’all just like the idea and look of protest but let it inconvenience or the message calls you out then then it’s not the right way to protest.

Just say what you really mean with your chest.

[alwaysbewoke]

[sophiaphile]

BLM protest street art on boarded up windows, Chicago, June 2020

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Judd Legum at Popular Information:

On Sunday at 1:46 PM Eastern Time, President Joe Biden announced he would end his campaign for reelection. Seconds later, the attacks on Vice President Kamala Harris began.  Harris is not yet the nominee. But she has declared her intention to seek the nomination and received an endorsement from Biden. Prominent Democrats including former President Bill Clinton, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, and many others quickly threw their support behind Harris. She is the strong favorite to secure the nomination.

Some of the attacks on Harris were predictable. For example, shortly after Biden's announcement, the Trump campaign blamed Harris for a "migrant crime wave" over the last three years. This was also the centerpiece of Trump's campaign against Biden, but the "migrant crime wave" does not exist. Violent crime has decreased every year since Biden took office — and is down sharply again in 2024. (The last time violent crime increased was 2020, when Trump was president.) Further, a study of the 14 Texas counties along the border with Mexico by crime analyst Jeff Asher found "no evidence of increasing violent crime along the US border with Mexico." In fact, border counties "have seen a relatively steady violent crime rate below that of the rest of their state and the nation as a whole."

Other attacks include those that seem to pop up any time a woman seeks a position of power. The RNC Research X account, which attacks Trump's opponents on behalf of his campaign and the Republican National Committee, posted a video attacking Harris for being "annoying." The post features a video of Harris saying a short phrase — "what can be, unburdened by what has been" — in various settings for four minutes. This is only a slight variation of the common complaint that ambitious women are "shrill."  Other criticisms, however, were more specific to Harris. They will be featured in millions of dollars of campaign advertisements, incorporated into Trump's stump speech, and discussed frequently on Fox News. Here is a brief guide to some of the attacks that will be used to define Harris in the weeks ahead. 

The truth about Jaleel Stallings Trump War Room, the "Official War Room account of the 2024 Trump campaign," posted on X that Harris "helped raise money for a far-left organization that bailed a rioter who shot at police out of jail."  [...] Where's the beef? In the hours after Biden's withdrawal, an RNC Research post suggested that Harris supported banning red meat.  [...] 2009 is not 2024 On X, the GOP account posted an attack ad against Harris that claimed that "as a prosecutor in San Francisco, Harris allowed illegal immigrant drug dealers to enter job training and have their criminal records wiped clean." The Willie Horton-style attack claims that "one of the illegal immigrants Harris released went on to steal an SUV and ran down a young woman, seriously injuring her." 

Judd Legum breaks down the coming onslaught of right-wing attacks against Kamala Harris that are distorted or false.

See Also:

MMFA: Flailing right-wing media are not ready for Kamala Harris

[thoughtremixer]

3 Years, 3 Months, 6 Days and I finally got a speck of justice... hopefully.

For those of you who followed me throughout the years, on May 31, 2020, I was attacked by the NYPD unjustly for covering the George Floyd Protests. I was held in a holding cell along with other protesters and later released literally an hour before the crack of dawn, without being charged with a crime.

A brand-new electric bike destroyed by the FDNY (no fault of their own). My phone busted, along with any evidence. My chest is forever scarred. The memories of the NYPD forever in my mind, altering my already views on policing in general to the point of abolishing the current police system.

What followed years after was me in a case vs. the NYPD and NYC. Along with other victims of NYPD's brutal tactics, we stood firm in holding the NYPD accountable.

I decided to become one of the public faces of this case, by doing interviews (under my real name of course), recalling details while trying to hold back tears mixed with anger.

I spent years reading comments about how I was "a paid actor by the Democratic Party", a "plant" by Black Lives Matter, a "crisis actor" and an opportunist when the only opportunity I wanted was to cover the protest from the protesters side, sell my work to the media and go home and have a quiet birthday.

I have to fund raised and get strangers to help me put my mental state back together in a quick manner so that I will be able to be of sound mind as I speak up for people.

Well, I'm happy to say that something came out of it.

My quote, if you don't want to read the article states:

Matthew King-Yarde, a protester involved in the suits, said all New Yorkers should support the agreement — whatever their political leanings.

“Regardless of your stance, none of us should have faced trauma, both physical and mental, for voicing concerns about law enforcement’s disregard for Black lives,”

King-Yarde said.

“The NYPD must undertake extensive work beyond what’s been done. Are they up for the challenge? One can only hope.”

(The reporter didn't do any research, just grabbed quotes from the lawyers website)

Sadly, one of the things I can't do is go into the exact details of how I feel about the settlement. I do have some strong opinions about it, but that's the problem with settlements. You can't really express them the way you want to.

However, I will in the near future talk about the impact of the settlement.

But at the very least... the very least... I can start to move on from this long and tiring court case.

[iguessyouregonnamissthepantyraid]

anyway my point is that living where there are highly publicized protests happening will fuck you up. you'll see, with your own eyes, in real life, super chill very reasonable people gathered around with signs calling for peace and justice, and you'll sometimes even be there when the police or other authority comes in and wreaks havoc, and then you'll have to listen to your conservative relatives foaming at the mouth over "riots" that absolutely did not fucking happen and "violence" that absolutely was not caused by any protester, which you know, because you were there. you saw it. your closest friends were there, too. it was three blocks from your apartment. and no one listens and then you just have to hear about riots on the news forever

[snoopysfriendwoodstock]

does the rest of the us have any opinions on minneapolis at all?

[nando161mando]

[disgruntledexplainer]

remembering 2 years ago when the people on this site were praising the looting and destruction of small businesses in the name of causing social change.

where’s the change? all I see is permanently shuttered mom-and-pop shops that are never coming back. insurance DIDN’T cover it. and I see people suffering in the wake of the resulting food deserts.

MAYBE if this violence resulted in SOME social change like you guys claimed would happen this could have been an argument worth having. but it DIDN’T. NOTHING. HAPPENED.

all we have is ruined lives and livelihoods.

[etakeh]

Actively dying, and 2022 are the most recent articles I can find on her.

[voskhozhdeniye]