Fight against epidemic and protest

Freud’s wailing that "I can’t breathe" is intertwined with the historical echo of Martin Luther King’s "I have a dream", which makes American minorities feel deeply hurt. However, the problems in the United States are not as simple as racial discrimination and police brutality. The pandemic should have been an opportunity to put aside differences and show unity, but it further deepened political polarization.

"To be or not to be" is not only the ultimate question in literary classics, but also a realistic choice faced by many Americans. It is too difficult to fight the epidemic and survive, so we have to protest against the decompression. George Freud, an African-American man, was killed by police violence, just like a spark, which ignited the "dry wood" of anger in the United States. The protests have not subsided, and it is far from a day’s work to eliminate social problems such as systematic racial discrimination.

It is no accident that Freud’s incident triggered the great protest in the United States. Before his death, his plaintive cry of "I can’t breathe" was intertwined with the historical echo of Martin Luther King’s "I have a dream", which made American minorities feel deeply hurt. However, protests have quickly turned into beating, smashing, looting and burning in many cities, which reminds the world that the problems in the United States are not as simple as racial discrimination and police brutality.

People have become accustomed to some strange phenomena in the United States.

The epidemic is prevalent, but I dare not go to see a doctor. Only one test in Covid-19 costs thousands of dollars, and intensive care costs as high as tens of thousands of dollars. Many Americans without medical insurance usually delay seeing a doctor after they get sick, "not because they don’t want to recover, but because they have no money at all".

The great recession caused a sharp increase in unemployment. From March 15 to May 23, in just over two months, the number of people applying for unemployment benefits for the first time in the United States totaled 40.8 million, and wage earners first experienced the pain of economic recession caused by the epidemic.

Forbes News reported on May 7 that the survey showed that by the end of April, more than one-fifth of American families were facing a food crisis; Among American families with children under the age of 12, the proportion facing food crisis is as high as two fifths.

During the demonstration, thousands of protesters crowded the streets. The American riot police and even the National Guard went into battle with all their weapons. Tear gas, flash bombs, pepper spray and rubber bullets were flying all over the sky … Social opposition became increasingly serious. Even many white policemen joined the demonstration, but there were still no specific ways to reform police law enforcement. Some states just announced in a hurry that police were prohibited from using "lock throat".

Moreover, under the background of the election year in the United States, controversial topics such as whether to remove Confederate memorials and signs that maintained slavery during the Civil War have heated up again, which has become "ammunition" for some American politicians to start election campaigns, highlighting the polarization between parties and public opinion. Some politicians said that the names of military facilities such as US military bases named after Confederate generals who maintained slavery during the Civil War should not be changed, because "these memorable and influential bases have become part of the great American tradition". Some politicians immediately countered and called for the removal of all the statues of Confederate figures in the Capitol, calling them "a tribute to hatred, not to tradition."

The parade also swam, and the demonstration also showed how much it seems that "American democracy" pays attention to the people’s right to express. In fact, after the excitement, what it used to be is still what it is now. Some American politicians are selfish, short-sighted, willful, inefficient and irresponsible, and are still brewing more tragedies. Francis Fukuyama, a famous American political scholar, wrote that the pandemic should have been an opportunity to put aside differences and show unity, but it further deepened political polarization. Politicians regard the epidemic as an opportunity to seize power and party interests, at the expense of countless ordinary American lives. Although some of the scholar’s predictions are unreliable, this comment is still to the point.