So I was out at the Brooklyn George Floyd protest tonight and it was beautiful and powerful... until it wasn’t. And I saw it fall apart.

There was a march from the Barclays Center up Flatbush toward the bridge around 8. Thousands of people. Shut down that big street. Totally peaceful. Really powerful and enlivening to be in this huge crowd of people standing up and agitating for a better future.

That march went onto the Manhattan Bridge & another huge group came off of the Brooklyn Bridge. Thousands marched up Flatbush toward the Barclays shutting down traffic again. At Flatbush and Dekalb everyone took a knee and a leader with a mic affirmed it was a peaceful protest.

I don't know the leader's name and he seemed full of passion but he was not quite as captivating a speaker as you'd expect from a leader. This would become important later.

At about 10pm the big group was back in front of the Barclays. A line of white people formed a barricade between the crowd and the police.

Around 10:30 or so things started to turn a bit. The leader arranged for a photo op where he and the leadership of the police on site were kneeling together. The idea of police and protesters kneeling together was offensive to many in the crowd who were loud about their feelings.

To many people, the police are the problem and the solution is not simply to form an interpersonal bond with them. We need to fundamentally reform American policing. So talking about how we can both treat each other better is obscuring the real issue—policing needs to change.

It's not just that there's a few bad apples, there's a system of policing that is inherently unjust and there's tactics that police use that are incredibly problematic. Chokeholds are legal in many places including NYC. There's not enough de-escalation...

There's no duty to intervene if you see another officer breaking the law. None of this is about cops and the community being nicer to each other. This is about changing the way policing functions in America. And by kneeling with the cops you're taking the focus away from that.

That moment of kneeling angered several people in the crowd and then the leaders gave the mic to a police officer and let him address the crowd. Wow. His speech was anodyne—as long as you protest peacefully I will support you—but why is a cop getting the mic at all?

Again, that falls to 'let's have a nice relationship with the cops, can't we all just get along' rather than what fundamental changes do we need to make to American policing? Cops who murder citizens need to go to prison. Every time. Giving nice speeches drives us away from that

So by this point the crowd is getting restless and losing faith in leadership. And it's very dangerous to have the attention of a thousand angry people and not focus that attention properly. Because something will happen. And it did...

Leadership tried to rebound by giving some speeches while a phalanx of cops stood behind them. Terrible optics but whatever. The speeches were impromptu but that's really no excuse—these people did not know what to say to the crowd.

Four people tried to address the crowd but they all were ineffective at saying compelling things that would hold the crowd's attention. It's really hard to address a big crowd and in this moment they were unable to do it effectively. So...

So now it's late and you have a large, angry, unfocused crowd and a huge group of cops standing in front of them. Leadership did not realize it's time to give the crowd something to do. If you don't direct the crowd then some fringe members of the crowd will direct it...

So a few people started throwing water bottles at the cops. Not many, I saw like four go flying toward the phalanx of cops. But then I saw groups of cops moving quickly toward pockets of protesters who had not thrown bottles. And people started sprinting out of there...

I couldn't see what people were sprinting away from but when I see several people running as fast as they can, I think I should go even if I don't know what they're running from. And as I walked away I saw at least ten police cars and vans racing to the scene, sirens blaring.

If a cop feels that they're in danger they'll push a button and everyone in the vicinity is supposed to drop whatever they're doing and rush to the scene. And I'm sure they were ready for tactical backup to race in at a moment's notice. That backup was rushing in.

I don't know what happened after that because I left but I can't imagine that after the police presence in the arena doubled, things got better. So maybe 15 minutes after cops and leadership were kneeling together and literally holding hands, the cops were in attack mode.

Which bolsters the argument that leadership should not have aligned with cops in that way. It's like the frog who asks the snake to take him across the river. When the snake bites the frog, the frog says why did you bite me? The snake says, you knew I was a snake.

We know that they're cops. We know what they do. They didn't *have* to get aggressive because a few bottles were thrown but then again, they do because that's who they are and that's what their regulations, their leadership and our Mayor affirms.

The crowd was angry about aligning with the cops and humanizing them in that way and moments later they were proven right. If we're there to protest police behavior we need to demand meaningful reform, not hold hands with the police.

Did holding hands with them make them say hey let's give this crowd a second chance, they're just bottles, we're tough we can take a couple of bottles because these people are angry that one of our guys murdered someone and we know he screwed up and we get it? Fuck no.

Cops have an aggressive mentality—I must prove that I'm in charge at all times. They don't drive in reverse and outwit you. They drive over you. How dare you get in my way. I'm the police. We saw tonight that even if you hold hands with them, if you provoke them, they'll strike.

And a beautiful protest devolved because leadership made several critical mistakes that put everyone there in jeopardy. They've gotta do better than that. The cause deserves better than that because it's incredibly important.

End of thread.