Muldoon wrote:
Armstronglivs wrote:
I see that the definition of a drug overdose has expanded to include a police officer's knee on the neck for 8 minutes. I suppose that is what is called in some circles as "assisted dying" - although that was hardly what Floyd wanted, as he repeatedly begged for his life. If Floyd was dying of a drug overdose - as some here claim - I wonder what medical procedure Chauvin was following when he kept his knee on his neck till after Floyd was lifeless.
This post is worth analyzing. It is a mediocre attempt to deflect from the fentanyl overdose issue with strangely conflated arguments and appeals to emotion, all culminating in what they author really wanted to allege yet again (his reputation for this precedes him) – America is nothing but a racist country.
The author wants to immediately turn attention away from the drug overdose issue and back to an issue he is comfortable with; Chauvin’s knee restraint. But the author isn’t very good at this (certainly not as good as he thinks he is) and his transition is awkward at best (“the definition of drug overdose has expanded”). The author presumes the only possible cause of death is Chauvin’s knee restraint, by attempting to relegate the drug overdose to an irrelevancy. Note also the silly, conjured reference to “assisted dying” thrown in as a distraction/strawman, and then the appeal to emotion following the strawman (“he repeatedly begged for his life”). The author also resorts to hyped up rhetorical questioning when he ponders “what medical procedure Chauvin was following when he kept his knee on his neck” as if the police have clairvoyant knowledge of the type and amount of drugs a resisting arrestee has in their body, and are required to transform into paramedics when a certain thresholds are present.
The author then attempts to pretend there actually is no drug overdose issue with Floyd at all, suggesting that it is nothing but an unsupported message board claim (“as some here claim”). This is highly disingenuous. The author is knowledgeable enough about the Floyd death to know there is an independent autopsy/toxicology report on Floyd that reports he had lethal amounts of fentanyl and methamphetamine in his body. But the author is hoping that uninformed readers will now ponder whether there is such evidence or whether it is merely message board rhetoric.
Armstronglivs wrote:
It is also apparent that quite a few would give the police the right to execute people on the street that they see as a burden on society - and sanction that retrospectively by subsequently judging that person unfit to live.
Possibly realizing the weakness of his attempt at distraction from the drug overdose issues, and also perhaps unable to stop himself, the author then resorts to gross hyperbole with the assertion that it is “apparent that quite a few would give the police the right to execute people on the street that they see as a burden on society.” A quick review of the thread reveals that while there may have been some harsh remarks about Floyd’s past and current lifestyle, no one came close to the author’s exaggerated statements. This is a common technique practiced by politicos (e.g., Donald Trump) all the time - grossly mischaracterize your opponent's view, in hopes of making your own look more reasonable.
Armstronglivs wrote:
Of course, the easiest way to judge someone to be unfit to live is by the color of their skin; American culture has had a lot of practice in doing that.
Lastly, we come to the real reason the author (Armstronglives) posted here (or anywhere for that matter). The author, who ironically has never set foot in America, has a compulsion with America bashing, particularly regarding racial issues. All of America is forever trapped in some kind of Jim Crow era in his view, and he seeks out any opportunity he can to express that. There is no evidence of racism in the Floyd case (at least yet), although the author is not alone in pretending and/or presuming there is. But I do suspect that even the author’s most hard-core comrades on the far left, even the ones who truly believe there is an epidemic of racist white cops roving around America's streets looking for black people to kill, have grown tired of his uninformed America bashing.