Journeys along the moral arc of the universe
That's the basic fact. Many have said that yesterday's verdict wasn't justice, but accountability. Justice would mean that George Floyd would be alive and with his family.
But what his daughter told then-candidate Joe Biden is also true: Her daddy changed the world.
Human moral culture is often one of sacrifice. Nothing changes, often, without a blood offering. We see this down the centuries and millennia of human history. The great religions are built around the notion of sacrificial penance. The world's largest religion is predicated on the idea that God became Man and sacrificed himself for humanity. Blood atones, and blood waters the soil for revelation.
It wasn't just that Mr. Floyd was murdered. It wasn't just that it was caught on camera. It was the length of his execution, the sadistic nature of it, the nonchalance of the police officer as he snuffed out this man's life as if were exterminating a rat. All of that contributed to making his murder one which most people could understand, which most people could fit into their moral cabinet. Other murders by cops have been recorded, but this one was of mythic proportions, because we could see the murder transpiring over nine long minutes, as he begged for his life, as he told his mother he loved her as his soul left. The horror was mythic and religious. That's what it took to convict a white cop of a Black man's murder. That's what it took to indict an entire mindset of policing. That's what it took to engender a revolution.
George Floyd shouldn't have had to die. This country should have dealt with its foundational sin decades ago. This country is a dichotomy: lofty ideals matched by grubby reality. But in this grubby reality, we struggle and strive to make those ideals reality. We work to bring those ideals from a Platonic realm down to the earth which needs them, and where they can create a more just, more moral society. And it's a sad fact of humanity that often nothing but blood will germinate those ideals. George Floyd shouldn't have had to die. But in our fallen world, it was inevitable that he, or someone like him, would have to be the burnt offering.
His death isn't the end. The conviction of his murderer isn't the end. One victory does not end the war. But this victory was essential. Without it we would be spiraling down now. Authorities across the country were ready for war in the event of an acquittal. George Floyd's sacrifice did what sacrifices are supposed to do: impart grace upon a broken community, and allow that community to take action to correct the evils which led to his death. The work is far from done; it's barely begun. But if the offering into which we've turned George Floyd is to have any meaning, we must take this victory and press on. Until our ashes return to the earth from whence they came, struggle is our lot. Make it a good struggle.