628 Comments

Thank you for including his photographs. Just too sad for words...

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I never want to read these words again: after a routine traffic stop. They’re always preceded by the same multiple choice madness again and again and again.

But humanity reveals itself too, which in this case are Tyre Nichols’s photos that HCR so wisely links to so we grasp the life stolen.

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For Heather to set aside her deep desire to share her words about the things that matter and allow Tyre to speak through his art is yet another demonstration of her humility, respect, and grace. Thank you, Heather, for letting Tyre speak for himself. Jim

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On this Holocaust Remembrance Day, I would like to offer something entirely different to remind us all that courage and bravery and love also exist in a world alongside unspeakable horrors: https://twitter.com/G_S_Bhogal/status/1618928782588669952?cxt=HBwWgMDTrc_Jy_csAAAA&cn=ZmxleGlibGVfcmVjcw%3D%3D&refsrc=email

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The police unit SCORPION is an acronym for Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods. How can anything named after a scorpion mean Restore Peace?!! Do you know how to disarm a scorpion? My little Papillon dogs (all of six pounds) instinctively disarm scorpions by biting the scorpion at the base of the tail breaking it at that point making the tail limp and useless. So I never have to worry about my little dogs encountering scorpions. Why were five cops addressing a mere traffic violation!!!? I'm thinking it might work to have each beat cop be paired with a psychologist trained in deescalation and non-violent techniques. Thank you, Heather and Joyce Vance for providing a link to Mr. Nichols photography in your newsletter this evening! What a loss of a beautiful human being!

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Sometimes there simply aren't words...

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I'm a photographer, and I get paid to do it. Tyre D. Nichols calls himself an "aspiring photographer." There's nothing "aspiring" there - he IS a photographer. And a very good one. And all that will never be, because five oxygen thieves, who would have made the world a better place if they'd never been born, decided to act out their fucked up insanity.

God damn those five worthless pieces of shit. I don't believe in the death penalty, but if I was on that jury, I could be convinced.

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Thank you Heather. Sending much love to his family and friends. Yet another heartbreaking moment in this sometimes painful journey we are on. Saying his name with all of you tonight, Tyre Nichols.

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Yes. Powerful. His photography feels peaceful and lovely.

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I looked at each of his photos. That was a brilliant way to honor him, Heather. If the NYT had done that instead of the video, it might have touched people deeper with what was lost rather than the horror. I'll continue to refuse to view the horror.

Thank you.

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Thank you for sharing his art. He saw the beauty in the world.

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He signs, your friend. Our eyes now are his eyes and his eyes ours. The wonder of what his life could have been. A damn loss to his child, family, friends and humanity. Each soul lost through this violence is a loss to us all. 💔💔💔

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I'm glad you shared the link to Tyre's photographs, Heather. I tried staying off line once I logged off work today.

I can't watch another police snuff film.

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Powerful. Thank you for the link.

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I saw additional officers--more than another six or so--at the scene. They may not have beaten Mr. Nichols, but they certainly did nothing to stop the five who beat him or to assist him while it took an ambulance nearly half an hour to arrive at the scene. At least a dozen officers need to have their guns and badges taken away, charged, and prosecuted to the max, not least for callous indifference to life.

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Jan 28, 2023·edited Jan 28, 2023

The facts of this case are freely available on every news outlet tonight.

Let's cut to the quick. Let's say what we really know happened. What we feel in our churning core is really "what happened," and not the dry recap of the attack.

What happened was a bunch of sadists with a God complex decided to pick on an innocent person, proving their own importance by causing terror at random, as they are paid and socially sanctioned to do. When this fellow human being did not submit to their brutalism to a submissive enough degree, and instead gave in to the pure instinct tearing through his body to run away from those threatening that same body and towards the woman who birthed it, the sadists decided that causing fear was no longer enough, instead pain and the ending of life was more appropriate and desirable.

It is was they wanted to do, and it is what they did.

"I hope they stomp his ass."

"Mama!"

We owe one thing to that man's soul, looking down on his destroyed body. We owe one thing to his son, sleeping in his bed, probably with a toy that Daddy gave him, unaware that of that moment Daddy's stable love will no longer be available during the rest of his time on earth. We owe one thing to his mother. How will that woman have another nightmare-less sleep again? We owe them one thing, and it's a biggie, but let's be honest, it's perfectly proportionate.

And that is to reevaluate our entire fucking society.

Because, you see, in a society which values "toughness" to such a degree, this depravity is simply the devestatingly unavoidable endpoint. Well, an endpoint that never ends, except for the lives of those murdered in the name of "that'll show 'em." Crime is roughly at a 30-year low, and yet crime is still somehow a potent election issue. The police kill many-fold more innocents than criminals kill the police, yet local police still have some of the highest approval rates of any arm of government. We don't want to enable people by paying for weak, soft things like social workers, we want to show people what's up by turning every cop car into a tank. We are so afraid of anyone getting away with anything, we give the monsters among us the green light to get away with everything.

It's so we can stay safe, RIGHT?

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