Sharing his thought on the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers, the Oscar winner voices his pessimism that the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests will lead to change.

• Jun 2, 2020

AceShowbiz - George Clooney is calling for a "systematic change" in law enforcement in America as part of a powerful new essay, published on Monday, June 01.

The Oscar winner was appalled by the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers last week (May 25), and unlike many other celebrities he's not convinced the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests will lead to change.

In his essay, published by The Daily Beast, the actor writes, "There is little doubt that George Floyd was murdered. We watched as he took his last breath at the hands of four police officers."

"Now we see another defiant reaction to the systemic cruel treatment of a portion of our citizens like we saw in 1968, 1992, and 2014. We don't know when these protests will subside. We hope and pray that no one else will be killed. But we also know that very little will change."

He adds, "The anger and the frustration we see playing out once again in our streets is just a reminder of how little we've grown as a country from our original sin of slavery. The fact that we aren't actually buying and selling other human beings anymore is not a badge of honor."

"We need systemic change in our law enforcement and in our criminal justice system. We need policymakers and politicians that reflect basic fairness to all of their citizens equally. Not leaders that stoke hatred and violence as if the idea of shooting looters could ever be anything less than a racial dog whistle."

Calling the tide of racism in American culture "our pandemic," he adds, "in 400 years we've yet to find a vaccine."

He rages, "It seems we've stopped even looking for one and we just try to treat the wound on an individual basis. And we sure haven't done a very good job of that... just remember we created these issues so we can fix them."

African-American Floyd was killed by asphyxiation when a white cop kneeled on his neck while he was lying face down on the ground for almost nine minutes. Floyd lost consciousness at the scene and was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital.