By Doug Moore, Executive Director of UDW/AFSCME Local 3930
Last summer when the brutal murder of George Floyd sparked action and outrage across the globe, I said this could be a turning point if we let it be. There have been too many George Floyds over the decades, but the collective grief and anger over Floyd’s death—and the deaths of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery—were felt across continents.
Today’s guilty verdict against Derek Chauvin, the officer who murdered George Floyd, is the kind of justice that only happens when we all stand together and say “enough is enough”. It is not true justice, though. True justice would be George Floyd living and breathing. True justice would be all Black people freed from the fear that we could be killed at any moment. True justice would be a country that is accountable to slavery and the hundreds of years of oppression and systemic and structural racism that followed. True justice would be dismantling the existing system and building something new, something that allows all of us to live, to breathe, and to thrive.
Brothers and sisters, we are not there yet. In fact, we have a long, long way to go. But today’s verdict—along with the collective action we’ve seen in the wake of George Floyd’s death—is a reminder of why we do the work we do. UDW remains committed to this work, and to building a truly just world for all of us.
