Author: TheConversation

By Tom Nolan, Visiting Associate Professor of Sociology, Emmanuel College The unrest sparked by the death of George Floyd after being pinned to the ground by the knee of a Minneapolis police officer has left parts of U.S. cities looking like a battle zone. Night after night, angry protesters have taken to the street. So too have police officers dressed in full riot gear and backed by an arsenal that any small military force would be proud of: armored vehicles, military-grade aircraft, rubber and wooden bullets, stun grenades, sound cannons and tear gas canisters. The militarization of police departments...

By Connie Hassett-Walker, Assistant Professor of Justice Studies and Sociology, Norwich University Outrage over racial profiling and the killing of African Americans by police officers and vigilantes has recently resurfaced following the death of George Floyd on May 25. Video footage a bystander took of Floyd’s death while a now-former police officer pressed his knee into the man’s neck quickly went viral. But tensions between the police and black communities are nothing new. There were many precedents to the Ferguson, Missouri, protests that ushered in the Black Lives Matter movement in 2014. Those precedents include the Los Angeles riots...

By Shervin Assari, Associate Professor of Family Medicine, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science High-profile police shootings and deaths of black men in custody – or even while out jogging – bring cries of racism across the country. The May 25 death of George Floyd by a white police officer in Minneapolis and the shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery in Brunswick, Georgia on Feb. 23, 2020 by a white father and son have resulted in outrage and protests in cities across the United States. But, as a public health researcher who studies the effects of racism on...