Rise Up Against Injustice
We know that unfair treatment applies to many subsets of the population, including people with pain. However, in this blog, I want to acknowledge the toll that racial inequality has taken on millions of Americans for generations.This week, I want to pay tribute to people who have been treated unjustly.
Why Are Police Officers Shooting Civilians?
Since 2015, more than 5,000 people have been shot and killed by police officers sworn to protect citizens. On average, three people were killed by police officers each day in 2019. That adds up to 1,100 deaths. According to the National Death Reporting System, the fatality rate was 2.8 times higher among blacks than whites.
To put that in context, during 2019, 89 law enforcement officers were killed in the line of duty. Of those deaths, 41 were accidental rather than intentional killings.
All deaths are tragic. We must prevent harm to police officers as well as civilians. That said, it is hard understand why so many people of color die at the hands of police officers.
The Tragic Killing of George Floyd
George Floyd, an unarmed 46-year-old black man whose life was ended by a white police officer in Minneapolis, is a recent example of alleged police brutality. A police officer pressed his knee against Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes.
At the same time, Floyd was handcuffed and held by three other police officers. Among Floyd’s last words were “I can’t breathe.” In the final moments of his life, he also asked for his mother. His life drained away during those endless minutes due to “cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restraint, and neck compression,” according to the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office’s autopsy report.
Eight Minutes of Agony
How long is eight minutes? To try to understand, you may want to listen to a song called “Rise Up” by Andra Day. The tune is about 4.13 minutes long. That’s approximately half the amount of time that Floyd was unable to breathe, and half of how long he struggled — and finally failed — to breathe.
You may choose to kneel to protest the injustice of Floyd’s death in solidarity with hundreds of thousands of people worldwide who are demanding a change to the inequality that people of color experience.
As you listen to (and read) the song’s lyrics, believe that we can “rise up” to create positive change. Americans of all colors and ethnicities from coast to coast have demonstrated their unwillingness to stay the course. They are no longer able to look the other way as racial injustice shatters lives.
You can see the song’s lyrics by clicking here.
I hope everyone around the world can agree that we should rise up against all injustices.
Dr was giving me 13 scripts a mo. 23 pills a day blacki g out and having seasuires he said ur gonna have to be careful being careful got my house burned and I almost got burned alive blacked out in the driveway busted my head messed my shoulder up bled down to 11/2 units of blood drove myself to the hospital 8 Staples and 4 units of blood my last app I told him he needed to get the radiologist lined out on the last MRI he put down scolious I told him it wasn’t right he said it was I have 2disk out of my back he did my first mir wrote out a whole page I ask him how the hell did my disk put thier self back he told me to find another Dr. He was giving me 23 pills a day including embeda80 3.2 and searequel 300 that along is deadly. He cut me off cold turky it’s ruff coming off all that by ur self but I found out the embeda and searioqel along were 2000 a month I didn’t write the scripts he did I trusted him the searequel and embeda along is a deadly combo mush less the rest. in the past month I have taken 1 amlodipine 5 mg and 1 linasipril 10 mg is it too much trouble for someone to tell me what the hell I was taking all that for. He just kept building me up. I thought I needed it any king of system I had I thought I had a pill for that.its like a runaway train nobody to stop it Hell there’s nobody to even slow it down.