On George Floyd

Americans are disgusted by the mirror and the metaphor provided by Derek Chauvin sitting atop George Floyd's neck and watching him die.

Americans recognize their face in Derek's face.

They see their own mortality in George Floyd's cry for his mother.

Further, if as Hobbes says, our greatest fear is violent death at the hands of another, surely this must stir our hearts in a thousand ways. The officers who watched and did nothing shake the invincible belief that 'we' are the good guys.

Pundits claim that the reaction to the problem of selective tyranny and murder is part of a cynical ploy to undermine America.

The popular unrest evolved into larger phenomenon. Tendencies are forming into solid and contrary positions. While I try to avoid epithets, they can be useful as a shorthand in times like these.

Progressives - Those seeking a radical departure from the incomplete and aborted responses to the crisis.

Not the George Floyd crisis, but the broader crisis.

Progressives want change and do not trust the institutions that have left these problems unresolved.

Further, one cannot discount the fury of revulsion felt by every viewer of the murder of George Floyd on video.

That George Floyd called for his mother, that he knew he was being murdered and would soon be dead.

That touched a nerve in America.

Consider the difference between watching a man die and reading the following: Businesses have been forced to re-examine their policies after pressure from employees and ongoing protests over the death of George Floyd on May 25 after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into the handcuffed black man’s neck for several minutes, even after he pleaded for air.

Constitutionalists - The unorganized,quiet majority.

Unmoved by radical arguments and having no love for the authoritarian tendency. The constitutionalist tendency may be present at demonstrations, is active online and is well represented in the media, business and in both parties at the state and local level.

Constitutionalists are disgusted by the murder.

However they are not exploring any major alteration to the institutions as they stand.

Reactionaries - These are those who regardless of their opinion on the murder of George Floyd, see the popular reaction to the murder far worse than the deed itself.

These values are sometimes tied by radicals to white supremacy and systemic racism.

Reactionaries are suspicious of institutions and influential individuals, particularly those that are supportive of the protesters.

Wild rioters or worse, George Soros funded Antifa terrorists threaten to burn down America.

The people's only champion is President Trump, who, while rough around the edges, stands up against the compromised elites who only want to make Americaweak.

As far as I am concerned, the constitutionalists and the reactionaries represent two streams of common sense and are not worth exploring in too much detail here.

Constitutionalists embrace the institutions and structures of America as they have evolved to the present liberal order.

Meanwhile, the reactionaries embrace the simple «Support Our ...» doctrine of the Post-9/11 era, with an admixture of the inarticulate musings of AM radio or 4Chan.

What is interesting are the progressives.

While most will head back home and towards their comfortable political indifference.

This stream is also not worth exploring as it represents the flexible and evolving American experiment.

A small group of the progressives, lets label them the radical progressives, will put themselves in to uncharted waters.

These are the ones who may get our attention.

They will likely include disillusioned reactionaries should the progressive radicals survive as a force in America beyond the next few months.

The progressive radicals face a problematic internal contradiction.

While black and white stand together against tyranny and look for practical solutions, the dreary demoralizing language of academic identity conceptual artists threatens to derail the movement before it begins.

The unproven and tiresome notions of privilege, fragility, white blood guilt serve to ensure that the theoretical underpinning of the movement is thin and weak.

This watery soup of subjective identity-based «truth» if left to rot in the minds of the people will guide the people towards the wrong goals, confuse supporters and, in the worst case, eventually drive the majority into a white identity once their revulsion for the current event has subsided.

If they are to survive they will need to be mindful of agent provocateurs who will try to sway them towards self-destructive activities, like violence.

Even a few sociopaths or mentally ill individuals will derail their efforts.

Objectively it is disorganized and weak.

Their opposition, the mythical establishment, impaired as it is by Coronavirus and economic dislocation, is also weak.

Neither Tucker Carlson nor Munroe Bergdorf want what is best for you. Trust the one's whose shoulders stand by yours and ignore all chatter.