The white former Minneapolis police officer convicted last month of the murder of the black man George Floyd has requested a new trial.
Introduction – New Journalism Project
The role of the press in the old days was to be the watchdog of democracy – to make sure a different voice is being heard. The new press seeks to act as a responsible participant in what the times require, and a creator of many other responsible participants.
Wisdom, possibility, and creativity exist in everyone. The role of the media and the leaders is to create an environment that brings THIS to light.
As a responsible participant I will listen to what is required in order to serve the higher good of all and of everything.
But what does “what is required” mean when there is no frame of reference? How does one know how to go about it when there are no agreed upon assumptions? Because a ‘frame of reference’ is a premise, a thought. And a responsible participant will cast doubt on old premises and thoughts, and will ask – what would life be like without them?
The mind that is run by fear – interpreting, analyzing, preventing, solving, leads to a survival mode. Where it can no longer exist or when we don’t obey it blindly – there exists the kind of knowledge which is life giving.
Responsible participation is not to shut myself off but to truly experience. Ask to be touched, ask to be shaken to the core and hear the silence that can be heard between the words. This silence reminds us of what really is.
About the article from the eyes of New Journalism Project –
He is down to the floor. His breath is short. Completely submissive. People are shouting at the police officer. Calling him. Trying to wake him up from his red mist. How can he not hear them? How can his friends not hear them? How can he not notice the man dying under his knee? How can he not care about the man dying under his knee like he’d care for someone he cares for?
How did it happen that police officers became executioners?
This whole situation feels so distorted that getting closer to it feels like entering an infinite swirl. Like an endless loop. Like the paradox of the chicken and the egg.
What are they doing there, those fully equipped robocop officers, ready to save the world, trained to eliminate what’s out of order. Can you really expect them to behave differently? How can one think straight when he’s taught to silence his heart?
I don’t know who educated Derek Chauvin but I doubt it was a loving person or teacher. I don’t know if he experienced violence but I doubt he didn’t. So why should he act differently? In this tragic situation, it went too far till it reached death, but the path is the same path – the path of domination, controlling, not loving, forgetting.
So I’m asking myself, quietly and not determinedly: is punishing Derek Chauvin and sending him to jail is what we really need? Is he alone the one to blame? And is “blame and punish” still the best way we have to encounter these tragic situations?
I guess so. I guess this is where we’re at.
There are no words to describe the price of our ignorance. Of our forgetfulness of love. That if we would just ask her, Love, what to do, she would tell us.
And maybe these are too, just words we invented; price, ignorance, tragic, punishment. Maybe these are only words we invented in our on-going lesson on this planet. Learning what love really is. And we’re learning. Slowly. Or maybe fast…? Who’s to tell? Nature is indifferent to death. Nature doesn’t cry over death. Nature lives death. To nature, death is just a part of living. Death is not “the opposite of life”. There is no opposite of life. Life is and there’s nothing else. According to my current state of consciousness anyway.
So what is “responsibility” and who’s the one to take it?
Maybe responsibility is to remember Love. Maybe this is the only non-ignorant thing to do. And maybe the ones to take this responsibility are the ones that love comes easy to. It’s easy for them to love. The ones who were nurtured with love or learned it intently, with devotion. And now it’s easy and natural for them to pass it on. With words, with a look, with a touch, with a loud shout. This kind of love is not made for someone or something specific. It is. In life, in death, in uniforms, with a knife, with a pen, with tears in your eyes.
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