I'm going to try to stay out of the political minutia of this, but I do think people have every right to be concerned and even scared. I'm horrified by the scenes I see unfolding. The CVS and a number of other storefronts across the street from my apartment were looted. Safety and security are not the words that come to mind immediately right now. Obviously, this is not the answer and is not acceptable. No, the Nintendo World store is not responsible for systemic injustices. No, not all the violence can be from outside actors. And, unfortunately, if there were any questions about a second wave of COVID-19, this likely resolves those questions. In the next two weeks, I'm sure we'll see many more cases pop up. I haven't seen much defending of the
riots, but defending them is not the right answer in my opinion; they're indefensible. Perhaps some are trying to not let them define the narrative? I don't know.
What I will say is that if you pay any deal of attention to what's actually happening on the ground, you'll see far more instances of peaceful protests and peaceful policing. It becomes quite clear that these instigators and rioters are nowhere near the majority. It also becomes quite clear that these bad actors are either extremists (on
both sides; we've seen reports of various extremist groups organizing online) or opportunists. In any moment of chaos (natural disasters for example) in a free society, there's invariably going to be folks taking advantage of and looking for material gain from the situation. However, I do believe the vast majority of people are community-minded and want to help, not hurt, in these moments. If people weren't that way, then we wouldn't be able to have a functioning free society. I've lived through enough hurricanes to vouch for this.
So I don't think it's productive to try to "punish" whole communities because of the actions of a few (some of whom are not even members of those communities). Remember that when many of us were working at home, myself including, a disproportionate amount of folks from those communities were still reporting to work, so we had groceries, deliveries, and medicine. That's, I think, what the pandemic has to do with this, not necessarily that everyone's been "cooped up" but rather that different communities seemed to be facing different risks and with different levels of protection.
Violence by anyone, civilians or law enforcement officials, is unacceptable. The videos shared above are unacceptable. A friend from Australia shared
this video (warning: while not expletive, it is hard to watch). Thankfully, another video reveals another Guardsman intervening after the fact, but it's still horrifying to watch and absolutely unacceptable. I have immense respect for those who serve this country in any capacity, but we are better than this. At this moment, we
all need to be very careful.
Just like we cannot generalize all police as bad or ill-intentioned, we cannot generalize all protestors as violent rioters. We all have the agency to choose to focus on the destruction or to focus on the injustice. If we as a people are capable enough to send two human beings to space, we as a people should be capable of holding two collective thoughts at the same time: that destruction is unacceptable and that overdue reform is needed.
In the last few days, I've seen so much unproductive arguing on Facebook and social media. People calling each other names and retreating to their readied political corners. If our country were to head south, I'm confident this would be the reason. It would be because we'd have lost our ability to see each other as human beings, because we'd communicate in bites like "Burn it all down" or "Send in the Guard", created for clicks and chyrons, not for nuance, and because we'd forgotten to listen as much as we speak.
Despite all of this, I remain hopeful -- call me young, naive, or shortsighted -- that we will get through these scary moments. These protests may subside in the coming days. When the dust settles, the news cycle will undoubtedly change, but my hope is that the majority (not all but many) at least become more willing to engage, to see our collective humanity, and more willing to feel. I'm inherently an optimist, in which much of my love for Disney is routed, so I'll leave you with a quote from our friend Rafiki in The Lion King: “The past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it or learn from it.”
