zlacker

>>danso+(OP)
The protests in the wake of George Floyd’s murder are currently tapering off, but I don’t see any evidence at all that substantive changes have been made, which means that this is all going to happen again, and soon, and the protests will be bigger, the police response more violent. The black lives matter organization in my city presented a list of demands to the city council and every one of them was ignored, instead the council promised sensitivity training. This is nowhere close to over.

>>fallin+9m
In terms of sweeping reforms, no – especially re: qualified immunity with SCOTUS recently declining to reexamine it [0]. But I would venture to claim that the Overton window on what police can be held accountable has certainly changed. That all 4 police in the George Floyd case were arrested and charged was unexpected, given the lack of consequences in the Eric Garner case. The arrests and assault charges for officers who attacked protesters in Atlanta [1] and Buffalo [2] is the kind of thing I never thought we'd see, and signals an opportunity (albeit unguaranteed) for the balance to change. The change in public perception is quite striking – including a doubling of white Americans since 2015 who think police brutality is a "very serious problem [3]. And this shift is happening under a presidential administration that is one of the least likely to take federal action against or even just criticize law enforcement.

[0] https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-qualified-immunity-p...

[1] https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/03/us/atlanta-police-booked-felo...

[2] https://abcnews.go.com/US/buffalo-police-officers-arrested-s...

[3] https://apnews.com/728b414b8742129329081f7092179d1f