The anguish and power of the George Floyd protests, in photos

Tuesday, May 25, marks the one-year anniversary of George Floyd’s murder at the hands of the Minneapolis police. Over the past 12 months, his death has served as a rallying cry for countless racial and social justice movements not only in the United States, but around the world. Here, Mic explores how inequality and injustice were brought to the fore in the wake of his killing.

Anguish is a powerful feeling. It can be overwhelming internally; it can dominate your thoughts and actions. When you're feeling so strongly, it can be hard to do much else. But oftentimes, in a country so obsessed with appearances of strength and decorum, anguish can be invisible. What's going on inside rarely spills out into the open — instead that energy is kept locked inside, channeled into socially acceptable virtues like "productivity" and "hustle."

That changed on May 25, 2020. After years of peaceful, persistent action by Black and brown activists — who were simply demanding that their right to exist be respected — the murder of George Floyd stripped away all pretenses. If a Minneapolis police officer could look a 17-year-old in the eyes as she filmed him killing a man in broad daylight on a crowded street, then the people could rise up, uninhibited, against him. They could be rude and forceful and passionate and crass and tearful and, yes, anguished in their calls for justice.

It's been exactly one year since Floyd was murdered by Derek Chauvin. It's hard to gauge, really, how much has changed since then. But when the history is written, May 25, 2020, will loom large as a day when America awakened, or perhaps reawakened, to its most insidious traits. Mic has rounded up some of the most powerful photos from the protests that broke out in the week after Floyd's murder. Take a look below — and let the images remind you that there is still much work left to be done.