Read the Scenario below and then answer the questions given in 2-3 sentences. Many off you may be familiar with the protests and riots taking place with the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. This has sparked unrest throughout cities across the U. S., some of which are peaceful and some of which are quite violent leading to a lot of confusion over what is actually happening with regards to the protests in actuality. Overall, there are some parallels that have been drawn, particularly by the protesters, to the various protests lead by the colonists leading up to the American Revolution. So that is what we are going to be looking at with this unit and you are going to be looking at the protests and whether you think that the protests are comparable to the American Revolution as we talk about the different factors that led up to the revolution. For today, we are going to be talking about the start of the George Floyd protests as well as with the American Revolution. The George Floyd Protests were sparked by the death of Mr. George Floyd, a black man who had his death video taped and released to social media over the past summer. Initially, all anyone knew was the video released to the public which seemed to show Mr. Floyd arrested by the cops at gun point before being taken to a police care, not resisting, before once again being taken out of the cop car and laid on the ground and restrained by Derek Chauvin with Officer Chauvin's knee on Floyd's neck for about 9 minutes. Floyd was then picked up in an ambulance and rushed to the hospital where he was pronounced dead. Derek Chauvin and the 3 other officers with him were then arrested several days later at the request of protesters who believed that Derek Chauvin had not only killed George Floyd with 3 cops just watching, but he was also being let go for it. To many of the protesters, including a prominent group known as Black Lives Matter, this was an example of racial prejudice they believe is currently present within the U. S. government, particularly towards African Americans. There are more facts to consider here regarding the death of George Floyd, but these were the facts known at the time. The reaction to this was a massive condemnation of the actions of Derek Chauvin across the U. S. among the two major U. S. parties (Democrat and Republican) as well as calls for various levels of reform. For the main groups of Black Lives Matter, however, they wanted not only for Derek Chauvin to get 1st degree murder (Murder that is planned out before hand rather than done in the moment) as a charge of crime rather than 2nd or 3rd degree murder which would be accidental murder or murder that happened in the heat of the moment. There were also calls for major restrictions, if not outright removals of the police force in the United States. The American Revolution however started as a matter of taxation and acts such as the quartering act that was deemed unreasonable and infringing on their rights given to them in their colony charters. So, some similarities between the two protests: both were started in order to protest some sort of civil rights violation being committed by the government and both could get violent at times. Differences: The death of George Floyd was originally shown as the actions of one group of cops who were enacting racism and shown as evidence of a larger pattern of racial discrimination despite the removal of all race based laws within the U. S. (with a few highly debated exceptions such as whether or not affirmative action is racist or not). Meanwhile the American Revolution was based more around specific Government action in the form of taxation without representation. Also, while both could get violent, the George Floyd riots tend to be more indiscriminate attacking nearby businesses and have spread to areas far outside of Minneapolis where the killing took place while the American Revolution largely targeted British officials and soldiers. It is also important to mention that the protesters are calling for the minimizing or removal of a function of law (in this case the police) while the revolutionaries wanted to be elevated in the form of representation allowing them to partake in a function of law. QUESTION: Do you think the comparison to the American Revolution is appropriate?