What Democracy Looks Like
On sparks and seeds
Having never been one to shy away from the third rail, thought I’d take a few minutes to collect some thoughts around what has increasingly become a rallying point for protests and activists across the country, succinctly captured in 3 simple words:
Black Lives Matter
The intensity of amplification to this meme through channels of virality and mass protest has been quite exponential, well beyond what I’ve ever witnessed — perhaps demonstrating a power law characteristic to mobilization scale. The seed of such resonance a few short clips of repulsive actions, most notably in the case of obvious police brutality in what only can be described as the murder of George Floyd, a black man who in passing has become a kind of martyr to the cause. For several days after this crime, clips and images from the shocking video of the excruciatingly drawn out 8 minute and 46 second ordeal, fully captured in high def video by a bystander’s cell phone, were shared by most major media outlets without discrimination, fanning the flames of outrage which had likely already been sparked by a few other high profile racially tinged incidents that had preceded the news cycle.
Speaking as a white man (with European ancestry), to be honest I have never derived much of a sense of identity from my race, which makes it a little harder to identify with such minority aggregations. I suspect this is partly symptomatic of the dominance of white representations in the zeitgeist — I rarely have to look beyond the mainstream in what media I consume or who I surround myself with in order to find resonance with my cultural values, so there is no sacrifice to adhere to how I was raised, it’s almost like I don’t have a race at all.
This is an interesting way to think about race, not as in what opportunities or rights are denied to you because of your group identity, but as in what sacrifices do you make to adhere to the values of those you identify with as your tribe. And please forgive me as kind of just trying to follow a train of thought with this observation, as I don’t think this is really the right way to approach the issues at play that sparked the movement. In fact its quite the reverse, the protests are not going exponential because people’s rights to make choices are being withheld, they are taking off because choices are being made for them. I mean this might be an over-generalization but that’s kind of the impression that I get. What choices are being made for them? For starters, choices of equality for enforcement by the police, which in aggregate leads to a significantly disproportionate incarceration rate, tearing apart lives and families. I mean policing tactics may not be the only obstacle to minorities, but it has certainly proven to be one of the most consistent. It may also be the injustice that is the most tractable for solution by way of meaningful policy reform. I mean Washington being what Washington is there is rarely much certainty in realized reform until a bill is signed, but if the energy of this movement may be found sustainable it certainly seems feasible.
Consider some of our neighbors in the Middle East, and the political movements sparked by what has been called the ‘Arab Spring’. The mass protests and movements, which in some cases toppled long established regimes, were sparked by the tiniest seed of police harassment of a poor street vendor. The injustice of this single mistreatment was so obvious that the outrage became contagious. A whole generation mobilized to the streets, coalescing through adversity into a concrete and palatable political movement.
The treatment of George Floyd, suffocated under a policeman’s knee, carried echos of this resonance, for these videos were a litmus test of the despicable to not be outraged by this conduct. And I believe it is right and it is just that black Americans found in this incident the call to take a stand, the call to announce what will not be tolerated by the public.
Unfortunately, the nature of the protests that coalesced have not in all cases adhered to the principles of nonviolence advocated by a prior generation’s leader, the reverend Martin Luther King Jr. It is disappointing to see the righteous cause of the just be coopted by anarchists and misguided thugs tearing down the very neighborhoods that support them.
I get the sense that the chaos of early protests may bear some elements of reflex from months of stay-at-home orders and huge spikes in unemployment that have been unavoidable in the context of a global pandemic that remains yet under control. In fact these very protests are somewhat concerning to those who have religiously followed social distancing guidelines, and the risks to seeding a second wave of infections should not be discounted. I take some comfort in seeing the rising acceptance of masks — surgical, cloth, or otherwise — amongst protestors and abstainers alike, as precautions are of certain still warranted in all social gatherings. The New York governor Andrew Cuomo, who has demonstrated considerable leadership throughout these trying months, offers simple guidance here: if you attended a protest, assume you may have been exposed to COVID. Get tested.
The reality of mass gatherings in pandemic conditions aside, one thing that concerns me that has been demonstrated by this movement is just how influential to the public can be a few short seconds of video. Unfortunately now that the protestors are mobilized, with both peaceful and repugnant amongst, there are certain to be further clashes with law enforcement, and in the unstructured interfaces between these two, it seems likely that flashes of confrontation may still occur — which given the at times chaotic elements of any mass crowd, may lead to further incidents of improper enforcement. In the reality of any crowd control in which some bad actors may be found, there is no escaping that further video clips may yet be recorded. I recommend reserving some distance, as there will surely be an element of selection bias at play in what yet may rise to the surface.
Part of the challenge we now collectively face is that these few short moments of footage could in some cases have been engineered for comparable effect. Deep fakes are here and already have been put to use for political effect. I hope that our politicians may recognize the threat to our democracy that these applications present and pledge not to use or accept support from those who would apply machine learning to generate a false representation of their political opponents.
In the end, and turning back to questions raised at the start of this essay, we are all faced with a choice of how we want to define our identity. I consider myself an American more than a caucasian, but then I am blessed not to have the burden of institutionalized inequality in that distinction. There are very few times in history when some spark may successfully seed a movement from marches and chants to realized political change at the largest scale. Let’s get this right.
Mural photo from wikipedia
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