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The Trauma Of Awakening To Racism: Did The Tragic Killing Of George Floyd Result In Cultural Trauma For Whites?, Angela Onwuachi-Willig
The Trauma Of Awakening To Racism: Did The Tragic Killing Of George Floyd Result In Cultural Trauma For Whites?, Angela Onwuachi-Willig
Faculty Scholarship
The act of witnessing the killing of George Floyd, a forty-six-year-old, African-American father, brother, partner, and son, at the hands of the police caused many white individuals to experience an epiphany about racism, specifically structural racism, in the United States. Following the horrific killing of George Floyd, many white people began to shift their thinking about the existence and prevalence of racialized police brutality, reconsidering the manner in which they had always viewed the world around them. Indeed, many white individuals began to recognize and acknowledge the varied ways in which whiteness worked to privilege them in our society, even …
Tear Gas + Water Hoses + Dispersal Orders: The Fourth Amendment Endorses Brutality In Protest Policing, Karen Pita Loor
Tear Gas + Water Hoses + Dispersal Orders: The Fourth Amendment Endorses Brutality In Protest Policing, Karen Pita Loor
Faculty Scholarship
Thirty years ago, in Graham v. Connor, the Supreme Court determined that excessive-force claims against police should proceed via the Fourth Amendment, which theoretically protects an individual against unreasonable seizures. However, the Court showed extreme deference to law enforcement’s use of force by using a permissive reasonableness analysis that bestows on police great leeway to make quick split-second decisions in tense and rapidly evolving circumstances. The result is a test that, from its inception, has been too forgiving of police violence and misconduct. This lax reasonableness standard, along with qualified immunity principles, has shielded police from § 1983 civil rights …