Talking Points on John Oliver Video
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Talking Points on John Oliver Video
John Oliver addressed the George Floyd protests at the top of the Last week tonight as well as the Donald Trump bible photo opposition and excessive use of police force aimed at the black community specifically. John spent the episode unpacking the police system that has become problematic.
He pointed out that violence that was observed was the tip of an iceberg. He stated that the act was not a new thing and that it did not start with the current president, but it is an act aimed at the black community. He outlined some statistics that are of great concern, and that should be given attention (Andersson, 2018). He stated clearly that it was normal for the Minneapolis police department to use excessive force against blacks. Black Americans are most likely to face death from the mishandling of the police. The probability of the black people to be killed by police as stated. He stated that the black community is scared; they are angry and are exhausted from the police actions admitting that the police the people were against the large police system and racial inequality.
He points out the police culture that is seen as heroes in the firm and the TV. He stated that the American people are heroes, and they love nothing more than the police who did not obey the law. He further states that the policing in America is different and is seen to involve white supremacy. Through the address, he states that the police in the U.S were trained on how to subjugate the blacks (Herman, 2020). The law enforcing patrols are seen as slaves even though slavery ended many years ago, that is not an indication of the end of the white supremacy and the white power. He went ahead and quoted the post-war in the era Alabama planter that was present in the Michelle Alexander writing, ‘the new Jim Crow.’
He states that people have the power to pass some stringiest laws that would govern the Negroes, which would be a blessing. The laws must be, therefore, controlled in different ways, and white people cannot live without black people. It is a century past the time, and police are still launching anti-black terrorism. The migration of the blacks to the south, where they still faced police brutality. He gave reference to 1967 when there were rising cases of racial inequalities and when the white people referred to it as the Summer of Love (Lumsden, 2017). He further joked of the white historians who called the era of the protests the Summer of Chromatica, and he cited the new album of Lady Gaga.
There was no improvement in the situation even under the era of Nixon and the Reagan administration. The war on drugs led to zero tolerance policing during the ’90s, where there was the saturation of police in low-income communities and color. It was a pavement of the policy of stopping and frisking that was targeted to the blacks and the Latino communities (Andersson, 2018). The aggressive policing was a result of increased police officers in the streets. There was slashing of the spending on the essential services as the funding of the police was increased. Olive featured Dave Grossman, who was an expert in killology. There was specialization of warrior styled police training.
References
Andersson, E. (2018). Credibility in Comedy is No Joke: A multimodal study of the credibility of, and communication campaign manifested in, the political satire program Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.
Herman, T. (2020). The Phallus, Excess, and” Lack” in Police Brutality.
Lumsden, E. (2017). How much is police brutality costing America. U. Haw. L. Rev., 40, 141.
Video: Police: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)