The Hall of Famer and former Dallas Cowboys WR spoke with Rich Eisen about the recent protests and his own brush with racial profiling.
During extraordinary times, ordinary people invariably look to their heroes for reaction. Those with fame or wealth or power or status are, at a core level, of course, no different than anyone else. But right or wrong, it has become second nature in today’s world to look to celebrities, actors, comedians, filmmakers, artists, musicians, and athletes for their opinion on matters that touch everyone.
Maybe it’s a way to gauge whether that person we admire is worthy of our admiration. Maybe it’s a way to feel a closer connection with that larger-than-life figure, to hear they feel the same way we do about this issue or that story.
Speaking Wednesday on The Rich Eisen Show, Cowboys Ring of Honor wide receiver Michael Irvin echoed things that many are feeling in the wake of the George Floyd killing.
“We need law enforcement for our protection,” Irvin said. “What we do not need is black men being persecuted and executed. We need law enforcement, and there are a great number of great people out here that do their jobs and do it well. But we’ve got to stop the persecution and certainly the execution.”
The Playmaker shared his thoughts on law enforcement in America, and shared a story about a recent run-in of his own.
“I can tell you over the past few months, I bet I’ve been stopped a couple of times. I even film them. I got stopped driving in Addison, Texas, right up the street. I was just driving around, and the guy stopped me because I did a U-turn… I asked, ‘Why are you stopping me? I didn’t do anything wrong.’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you were in a turn lane and didn’t turn on your turn signal.’ I said, ‘Are you joking? C’mon, man…’ I was in the turning lane. He finally broke down and said, ‘Okay, Michael.’ He had found out who I was, and he said, ‘We had a phone call from people that said there was a suspicious black man in a G-Wagen driving around.’ We have to change the mentality… That’s the systemic issue that we have that perpetuates itself, that we’ve got to root out of this country.”
While the week’s protests have largely been viewed as citizens-versus-police, Eisen and Irvin went on to discuss how the necessary changes need to come on a higher level.
“Hey, [former Minneapolis police officer] Derek [Chauvin] felt comfortable enough to lay on this man’s neck for nine minutes,” the Hall of Famer and NFL Network analyst said. “That is insane that you feel comfortable enough to openly do this murder on tape- on film- and feel, ‘Hey, there’s going to be no repercussions.’ He did it thinking there would be no repercussions. So we have to root out the problem above the officers, not just the officers.”
Irvin alluded to another personal incident in which he almost posted the interaction on social media, but then didn’t after considering the potential blowback for that one particular officer. Irvin said a friend, an African-American state trooper, helped him see that the problem is about far more than the one officer who happened to respond to that one call.
“The issue rides deeper than that. The issue rides with the people that are even above them that we have to think out. The issue rides with the people, with us. The kids. Because we ultimately go to court, and you look at the list of officers that have gotten off over the last 10 years on things- even events that we’ve seen happen live- get off on those cases. The jury pool is coming from all of us. So we have to change the way we see all of those things, man. It’s an insane undertaking that we have to start walking.”
As of Wednesday evening, neither the Dallas Cowboys nor owner Jerry Jones had made any public statement about the murder of George Floyd or the resulting protests across the country.
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