What we need to do first is talk about what this Sunday entails, what it marks. It marks the five year anniversary since George Floyd was murdered. If you remember, George Floyd, and on black man.
Was killed.
By a white police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in twenty and twenty May twenty fifth, twenty twenty to be exact. The officer, Derek Chauvin, would eventually be found guilty on charges of murder and manslaughter and sentenced to more than twenty years in prison. I think that on a daylight today a subject that needs to be broached. It's not about George Floyd specifically, because we know he was murdered. Anytime an officer keeps his knee on an individual net
for more than nine minutes, that's murder. We're not debating that. No matter how much the Ben Shapiro's of the world and others who have talked to me about it, and I respect their opinions, but we'd have to respectfully disagree.
That was murder. That's the way that I look at it.
Plain and simple, and I'm not deviating from that thought process one iota. Having said that, that's not the subject that I think today's show should warrant. I think that the question that should.
Be asked.
Is, if you're an adult in the United States of America considering the increased focused that existed in twenty twenty on issues of race and racial inequality, and whether or not that was really really going to lead to changes that would prove the lives of black Americans in this country.
Has that happened? Has that happened?
Because if you recall, in the aftermath of George Floyd's killing, there were riots in the streets. Just remember that Floyd's murder occurred just months after the killings of Ahmad Arbery and Breonna.
Taylor, which sparked nationwide protests.
Millions of Americans marched in communities across the country, drawing attention to issues of racial inequality, including the treatment of black folks by some police officers. I don't engage in black in saying police brutality. I say brutality on the part of some police officers because I believe, by and large, police officers who have vowed and took an oath to protect and serve do just that. A few rogue individuals should not castigate and stigmatize an entire entity that is
law enforcement. I'm not doing that, But with that being said, I still think that it's important to at least broach the subject as to whether or not real change has occurred, because, according to recent polls, fifty two percent of yours adults said the priest focus on issues of race and racial inequality would lead to changes that would improve the lives of Black Americans. Forty six percent said it would not.
That was in September of twenty twenty. If we look at it now, in February of twenty twenty five, according to polls that I'm looking at, seventy two percent said it didn't lead to changes at all, didn't lead to changes at all. And when we look at that seventy two percent, they say the increased focus on race and racial inequality after George Floyd's killing didn't lead to improvement to the improvement of lives of Black Americans in this country.
The shriff of Americans who express support for the Black Lives Matter movement stands at fifty two percent today, a drop of fifteen percent compared to what it was in June of twenty twenty. This is according to the Pew Research Center commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion has also declined. Companies have pulled back on DEI initiatives and workers view them and workers' views of them rather have grown to be more negative. We see that particularly since the Trump
administration came into play. Now, me personally, I've been one who has been diametrically opposed to DEI being associated with Black Americans in this country, considering the fact that white women have been the biggest beneficiaries of DEI according to numerous statistics, just as was the case with white women being the biggest benefactors or the beneficiaries rather of affirmative action. I get tired of black folks being seen as beneficiaries to something someone white has benefitted from.
More So I thought it was important to point that out.
But nevertheless, the negative connotations still get associated and connotated with black people, and so that's something that we have to look at moving forward. Forty nine percent expressed doubt that black people will ever have equal rights with white Americans, even though that's up from thirty nine percent. I said that is up from thirty nine percent in twenty twenty
twenty two. Only thirty nine percent doubted that blacks would ever have equal rights complied to white folks, and now that number has increased to forty nine percent again according to the Pew Research Center. So all of these things are things to pay attention to, and the thing that alarms me personally is that Black Lives Matter certainly has brought some scrutiny. The leaders of the movement itself brought some scrutiny upon themselves in terms of how they were
handling finances and things of that nature. We don't need to get into that today, and they gave folks on the right an opportunity to come at them, to really question their validity, their intent, their agender and those who were down for the course for all the right reasons, essentially their voices. It was like whispering into the wind.
No one really really heard them. Because the few who appeared to be corrupt, whose agenda is an intent appeared to be a bits, were the ones that ended up being the face of the movement, and to some degree it diluted its impact and potency.
There is no way around that.
And one of the things that I lamented when all of this stuff was going on, and when we saw players taking anew a knee, whether it was on NBA courts during the bubble, whether it was on a football field where even Jerry Jones ended up taking a knee when then President Donald Trump insulted NFL players and stuff like that, I found myself saying, with the collective value monetarily that professional athletes possessed, why don't you connect with folks on Capitol Hill, Why don't you serve the role
of being a modern day lobbyist and making sure that you funnel money into the coffers of whatever organization you choose to influence individuals on Capitol Hell to support your cause, since that's what everybody else is doing. But the professional athletes, who had this cachet, who had this power, who appeared to be committed to making this kind of difference, never took the bull bottle horn and did that. And so now here we are five years later, and the question
is a legitimate one. What through the riots, what through the protest, what dough these kinds of things have to show.
For its efforts, What.
Indeed has been accomplished. I don't know the answer to this question. I just know it's a pretty damn good one. A majority of yours adults say relationships between black people and the police hasn't changed since George Floyd's killing.
How true is that? We don't know.
We just know what's being said, and to me, that matters. Black lives matter painted in the streets to watch d that was a race. We all know that men and Trump got in office, that was going to be a rased.
But I'm not tripping over that personally, because I need more than symbols when we look at DEI, when we look at affirmative action, when we look at the positions that are being taken, when we see some of the things that have transpired, and I'm not blaming everything on Trump, and I'm not blaming everything on his administration, because I do think that things got a bit excessive, and I do think that there were people out there that used causes that were legit those the kind of things that
were being protested in the streets of America to empower themselves to get whatever they could out of it instead of contributing legitimately to the cause. I don't need to belabor this point. I just need you to know what kind of things I'm thinking about as we explore what's really come of George Floyd's killing, what our aspirations were compared to what we truly legitimately.
Accomplished or have failed to accomplish.
Because the fact remains that as we look at our society right now, you would think that we wouldn't have the complaints about the goings ons that's taken place in
today's society if those changes were indeed made. But they weren't made, it shows that there was a bunch of lip service because the real change that needed to be made involved our laws, involved participation in issues that pertain to the American public, and to make sure that our voices were heard in a resounding fashion so people would know never to let these kind of things happen.
Again, that's not what's happened.
As things have changed, some would say they've remained the same. Others would say times have gotten worse. That's just the way it is right now, which means that as we move forward, maybe a little less talking and more acting
more action is necessary. I'll say it one last time, if you got that kind a financial cachet, considering lobbyists all across America and how they influenced our politicians on Capitol Hill, professional athletes, Hollywood, and everybody in between had an opportunity to do this in twenty twenty, folks didn't
do it. Instead, they gave lip service. They protested Biden got in office, Trump was out, and as a result, they turned their attention towards stuff like cancer culture and woe politics, and the other side paid their attention to denigrating the left for focusing on those things and highlighting how it would hurt the fabric of America and the issues that existed in twenty twenty still exist today. Go figure