If you’re still having trouble understanding why so many people all around the world are so outraged over the death last month of George Floyd, then take heart… even Australian Kelpies are struggling to get their heads around it.
No wait, sorry… dog’s aren’t struggling to understand it. Here’s a video of Billie, an Australian Kelpie-X, engrossed in an explanation of why #BlackLivesMatter, courtesy of American comedian Dave Chappelle.
Chappelle’s new show on Netflix, is called 8:46… which is the number of minutes white Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on the neck of George Floyd, aged 46, who died during his arrest for allegedly buying cigarettes with counterfeit money.
In fact, while Chauvin did kneel on Floyd’s neck for eight minutes and forty-six seconds, two minutes and 53 seconds of it were after Floyd became unresponsive. Which is only partly why Chauvin is facing second degree murder charges.
Meanwhile in Australia… no police officer or official has ever been convicted for the hundreds and hundreds and hundreds (437 so far) Aboriginal deaths in custody, which have occurred since the 1991 Royal Commission Into Aboriginal Deaths In Custody, and only two officials have been charged, one got off, the other is awaiting trial).
Prior to the Royal Commission, four white police officers and an Aboriginal police aide were tried over the killing of teenager John Pat in Roebourne, WA in 1983. Pat was 16 when he died. His killers were each unanimously acquitted of manslaughter charges by an all-white jury, and re-instated to the WA Police Service. Here’s a link to a story about one of them – Sergeant Steven Bordas – receiving his WA Police Service Medal 40-Year Clasp late last year (that’s right… he’s still a serving officer).
If you want more Australian context, you can read more about Australian black deaths in custody courtesy of The Guardian here. Or Google ‘David Dungay’. Or read the Coroner’s findings of his death here.
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE THIS: White Man’s Manslaughter. Black Man’s Murder. White Man’s Riot. Black Man’s Uprising.
In any event, back over to Dave Chappelle… unarguably one of the world’s best comedians (and he’s much, much more than that). All of his shows on Netflix are worth a watch, but this one in particular. We’re not going to spoil the punchline for you, because we’re nowhere near as funny as Chappelle (he’s so good, he can tell you the punchline before he even starts a joke and you’ll still laugh at the end… literally).
But if you don’t have a Netflix account, they’ve kindly uploaded it to Youtube so you can watch it here, and below.