You Really Want "Justice for Tyre?" Don't Make the Same Mistake Again
If we want this to stop, we must be crystal clear about our policy demands. We must be overwhelmingly precise with 1) our strategic messaging, 2) our protest strategies and 3) our civil disobedience
Publisher’s Note
As we watch yet another grainy batch of video showing a gang of police officers brutally beating, to eventual death, yet another unarmed Black man, we’re forced to say: It has to stop. Police officers terrorizing Black communities, hunting down Black people and murdering them in the most cruel and violent ways possible has to stop.
The challenge, however, is that it won’t stop on its own. We all have to end it.
Clearly, Tyre Nichols didn’t have to die. He was murdered by police officers embodying the vestiges of slavery and the modern face of the slave patrol - and, yes, all of what we just said above applies despite the fact these were all Black officers. He was taken from this Earth calling for his mother by the police unions and politicians actively fighting to make sure police face no consequences for their actions, even and especially when they result in murder. We need to ask: Why exactly is Tyre’s child fatherless? Easy: Because an institution of armed white supremacy and the white supremacists and apologists in power create safe spaces for police to kill Black men. The responsibility for that, however, doesn’t end there.
Tyre Nichols is also dead because we didn’t finish the work we were called to do in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. He is dead because we stopped showing up to protest. He is dead because we didn’t pressure legislators at every level to pass laws to protect Black bodies. He is dead because we decided debating a slogan was more important than achieving the goals it supposedly stands for. He is dead because more people got duped into believing that they didn’t have to vote even as they griped loudly about the lawmakers in office who are a large part of the problem.
Tyre Nichols is dead because we ended the protests before policy was passed. We let “tough on crime” tropes take over the criminal justice narrative. We let our movements be mistaken for the violence of the ghost of “Antifa.” Even though we were prepared to shout Black Lives Matter, we really weren’t prepared to deal with the inevitable backlash … nor did we bother to organize for the long term.
Tyre Nichols didn’t have to die. He is dead because the police are continually allowed to use community tax dollars to organize lynchings in Black communities. And he is dead because we didn’t see the job through after the murder of George Floyd.
If we want this to stop, we must be crystal clear about our policy demands. We must be overwhelmingly precise with 1) our strategic messaging, 2) our protest strategies, and 3) our civil disobedience efforts. We need to know our targets, we need to hit them, and we need to gain momentum and overwhelm the opposition until there is no other choice but to exact justice - and, no, justice is not, contrary to popular opinion, the prosecution and jailing of violent police officers or the rendering of a civil jury’s decision to grant millions of dollars of damages to a deceased person’s family. We allowed the window of opportunity after the summer of racial reckoning to close without passing the policies necessary to protect our communities. We also failed to maximize all eligible voter turnout to 1) dethrone the politicians who support unaccountable policing and 2) elect, across the board, the true policymakers who dismantle and purge racist law enforcement agencies.
To that end we are calling for the passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act in its full form. We are calling for a complete purging of police officers with histories of violence from all law enforcement agencies - federal, state and local - especially those with involvement in white supremacist organizations. There is no reason anyone should be murdered over a traffic stop. So, we are also calling for an end to armed traffic enforcement … and, while we’re at it, let’s just put an end to unjustified traffic stops altogether. While there are many more reforms that must be implemented to end police brutality against Black people, we are calling for the Department of Justice to do a full investigation into the Memphis Police Department, along with the disbanding of the Scorpion Squad.
You really want “Justice for Tyre?” Don’t make the same mistake again. Let’s get it right this time.