“Black people are in danger. Because it keeps happening time and time again.” Colorlines was able to get a first-person, on the ground account of the New York City protests in Brooklyn and Manhattan, from May 28-May 30.
The person who captured the footage, and who uses they/them pronouns, took to the streets to decry the state violence inflicted against Black bodies, including George Floyd, whose filmed death at the hands of Minneapolis police has galvanized the country to say enough! Their account of the brutality against protesters and those exercising their right of free speech and assembly proves that there is a long way to go in reforming the culture that led to the death of Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmad Arbery, Tony McDade, and so, so, so many more, named and unnamed.
The fact that even with the eyes of the world on them, the NYPD, the country’s largest police force, still treated American citizens protesting police violence with such disdain, disrespect and savagery is a sickening irony. And just another day in America for so many.
“We’re all people who are hurting,” they said. “We’re all community members. These are people that are bartenders, these are people who are baristas, these are people who are waiters; that work in the public sector, who are essential workers. And all they want to see is a better world, and they’ll do whatever it takes.” May it be so.
Black Lives Matter.
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rnTrigger Warning: This video depicts police violence.
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CREDITS
rnPhoto:
rnDrew Angerer/Getty Images
rnPablo Monsalve/VIEWpress via Getty Images
rnIra L. Black/Corbis via Getty Images
rnBastiaan Slabbers/NurPhoto via Getty Images
rnAngela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
rnSpencer Platt/Getty Images
Video footage:
rnTiye Rose
rnLeah Obias
rnKatie Arizmendi
rnZ. Afshar
Music:
rnFormer Selves