So I live in a suburb of Minneapolis. I have been staying up really late the last few night listening to social media about the police killing and the riots. I absolutely believe that there are issues with law enforcement and bias against people of color. That's not really what I'm going to talk about. The impression I got from listening to the Mayor of Minneapolis and the Governor of the state is that they were sympathetic about folks needing to grieve but that it's gotten out of hand with folks from outside of the state coming in to create nothing but destruction, specifically they mentioned the drug cartels and white supremacists. It seems that they are trying to save lives. It's very disturbing. This is history happening.
From a personal finance perspective, I think this is gutting our community and I can't even imagine how this will impact just nearly everything. I really do wonder what forces are in play here.
Can 2020 get any worse?
May 30th, 2020 at 08:02 am
May 30th, 2020 at 10:27 am 1590834475
I think this is a staged, manipulated series of events that are a lead up to martial law.
I feel like a crazy person saying this, but what I see doesn’t make sense.
Why did the police let themselves be filmed committing murder in broad daylight?
Why are there so many fit young white guys actively involved at the protests?
Plus, all the work of isolation for weeks undone in a few nights of no social distancing.
We are in for tough tough times.
Stay as safe as you can.
May 30th, 2020 at 12:29 pm 1590841740
I've been telling friends and family to ask questions!! Because as Lots of Ideas states there so many things that do not make sense, with this murder and the virus. Asking questions gets us to the truth. We also have to ask why much of our media isn't addressing these same questions!
We must have more love and compassion now more than ever, we must not give into fear.
May 30th, 2020 at 02:19 pm 1590848374
Lots of Ideas, can you please explain this question?
I don't want to comment on it without knowing why you asked it.
May 30th, 2020 at 07:04 pm 1590865465
Lots of Ideas: You are not a crazy person.
May 31st, 2020 at 07:35 am 1590910538
I am sure that there are Young fit white guys who support Black Lives Matter - I hope there are lots of them - but when I wrote this on Saturday morning, I was thinking of how many of the people I saw in videos inciting violence were from that demographic. As the day went on, I saw a lot of other comments, including from government officials in Minnesota, that were asking similar questions. The escalations happened too quickly, in my opinion, and from an odd set of people, to be spontaneous.
Tonight was different in that I think the police reacted very quickly to minor provocation because they couldn’t lose control again. In fact, I think the police tonight were sometimes the provokers.
But the provocateurs from Thursday and Friday did their job - the violence is spreading.
Now we are divided into law enforcement, those who support BLM, and whoever is provoking the violence - and the people on the sidelines wondering what is gong on. Noting that the groups are not mutually exclusive. I feel for the police and National Guard who were heroes last week and ‘villains’ tonight. Most of them are great people just trying to do a very hard job. And those of us not protesting - we probably support one or the other group participating in the protests/riots. And they too are probably people who love their families and feel (probably justifiably) that they work way too hard and end up with way too little. My fear is we are all just pawns in the super wealthy people’s game.
May 31st, 2020 at 03:39 pm 1590939540
May 31st, 2020 at 08:54 pm 1590958468
I don’t know whether it is worse if the whole situation is a result of government manipulation or it is just people spontaneously taking advantage of other people’s pain and undermining what they are trying to achieve.
In either case, this incredibly scary moment in time has moved exponentially up the fear chart for me.
May 31st, 2020 at 11:48 pm 1590968901
June 4th, 2020 at 01:47 am 1591235241
I agree and it's hard to know what direction it's all coming from. My spouse and I haven't been able to go participate like we would normally but today went down to the intersection. So far, we've mostly given money to various organizations. So many folks giving food and supplies to folks in need is really amazing but we know that like a death in the family, eventually those folks will return to their lives. We're re-committing to the actions we can take later. We don't know exactly what that might look like but be part of the community helping re-build. It does feel like there is a beginning of change and folks waking up to the reality of police brutality and bias towards people of color.
June 4th, 2020 at 03:45 am 1591242334