by jdb5588
A few weeks ago, I unexpectedly lost my older brother to a massive heart attack from an undiagnosed heart condition. He was a handsome 38 year old man that took really good care of himself. He had a loving wife and two adorable children under the age of 6. So many people loved him and we were all absolutely crushed by the news.
When the media made it apparent that Covid-19 was dangerous, I took all the precautions. I remained in my small apartment by myself for months with no contact. I even said goodbye to my childhood dog through Zoom when my parents (who live 20 mins away from me) were about to take him to the vet to be put down.
It soon became apparent that Covid-19 numbers were not as bad as they projected. What once was a justifiable act of flattening the curve and keeping our hospitals manageable turned into “you are an evil and selfish person if you do not social distance yourself and wear a mask until we find a cure.” Societal pressure made me eat this bullshit. Although I no longer feared my own life, I did not want to inadvertently kill an old lady somewhere. It was my duty as a human to quarantine.
Once my older brother died, my family needed each other more than ever. Social distancing away from each was no longer an option. My immediate family grieved together, but all others had to awkwardly pay their respects from a distance. So many people my brother impacted in his life were conflicted on how to reach out. It was painful to watch. We were all so isolated.
Any other year, I would have expected hundreds of friends and family at his funeral. He was the most charismatic and genuinely loving person in my life. But he died in the year 2020, and the law forbade anyone to exceed the limit of 10 people at his outdoor funeral. Out of the 10 people allowed to attend, one was the priest and TWO were appointed funeral directors. No matter how much we begged and pleaded, their policy was unwavering. They would not drop ONE funeral director so that my sister-in-law’s mother could be by her side as she buried her husband’s ashes.
As we were still in the process of mourning my brother, that cop disgustingly murdered George Floyd in Minnesota. And thousands of people attended his indoor funeral service led by Al Sharpton. Thousands of people who never met George Floyd were there holding hands and many of them were not even wearing masks. It was a slap in the face.
From that moment, millions of people gathered the streets in protests with politicians. Covid-19 was suddenly an afterthought. The mass media had a new agenda: “Riots are out of control! Cops are beating the shit out of everyone!” They found a new way of implementing curfews with a new woke message: “if you ain’t with us, you are against us.” A message that represented the complete opposite of what they condemned just a week ago. I believe that our black culture is treated unfairly, but this oppression is far beyond any police brutality. But…with a blink of an eye, everyone on social media was a social activist with the answer. If you are a cop, you have no race, you are a racist, and you are the enemy. Defund and dismantle the police.