I just put the finishing touches on an e-mail blast that will be sent out to the alumni club membership in 5 1/2 Hours. There are some things they need to know about and they have deadlines. (There's something else, something big, but I need to hold off on announcing that until I get the complete story.) But, in communicating those things, I had to talk about George Floyd and the protests. This is Minneapolis-St. Paul, after all, and yes, like so many companies and organizations (and universities such as my alma mater), I feel compelled to also denounce racism and police brutality and call for change.
And I slaved over what to say about for the past, oh, 90 Minutes. I was worried about blowback -- partially from people who would say that I didn't go far enough, but mostly from people who essentially think, "No, Floyd's a criminal ... and how dare you speak for me and say we need to defund the MPD? And who are you to tell me I'm racist?" As president of the club I have to worry about the comity of the membership. But in the end, even though I'm not quite sure if I used the right words, I need to be on the sides of not being racist and no, the police cannot beat people protesting. I can't be neutral on this, and I certainly can't just ignore it.
So I talked about it. At length. And I invited people to reach out to me if they wanted to talk more about racism and police brutality. Which makes me nervous, because shoot, I don't want to talk about race and corrupt law enforcement. But it's time to get off the fence and pick a side. And if it loses me members, hey, it loses me members.
Besides, I might be losing members anyway because I might be losing the club anyway. That's that "something else" I alluded to above. Watch this space.
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