The unfortunate passing of George Floyd at the hands of the police turned him into a national hero and a symbol of police brutality. Since his passing monuments have been built in his honor, and far-reaching police reforms passed in cities across the US. As such it was not unexpected that the iconic image of George Floyd’s face would find its way into the NFT space. But is there a George Floyd NFT that has been released?
Is there a George Floyd NFT?
Thus far, the George Floyd family does not have any plans to release an NFT in his honor. However, that has not stopped some from attempting to cash in on the iconic images of Mister Floyd. One of the most notable projects released, trying to imply an association with George Floyd was the Floydies NFT collection, which made its way to the OpenSea NFT marketplace on December 7, 2021.
Details of the Floydies NFT Collection
Unfortunately, many people rightly pointed out that the NFT collection had racist undertones to it. For instance, they noted that the 22 images in the collection consisted of deliberately crudely drawn pixel art that caricatured George Floyd.
The art gave him bloodshot eyes, amongst other unsavory features. Despite this, the creator managed to make over $5000 from buyers before the collection was pulled down from OpenSea. Other egregious depictions of Floyd are one of him in police uniform and another of him at the gates of heaven with a pixel halo over his head.
Capitalizing on Tragedy
The aim of releasing the collection was to capitalize on the tragedy of Floyd’s passing. They were released a week before the murder of Floyd was back in the headlines after the accused officer in his death, Chauvin, reversed his not guilty plea for violating Floyd’s civil rights. Their goal seemed to be only to outrage people following up on Floyd’s death and subsequent trial.
For the most part, the creator of this collection seems to have succeeded. There was massive outrage on social media regarding the collection. To further stoke controversy, the creator behind the collection went on to release a special edition Floydie, which was a Floyd image crossed with a Chungus meme on December 15, 2021.
Summary
While there have been NFTs released implying some association with Floyd, the official foundations associated with his family have never ventured into NFTs. Perhaps they feel it would cheapen his memory by turning it into an NFT art collection. Thus far, the Floyd family has never commented on these NFTs.
One important point from the entire saga is that the NFT community eventually managed to have the project delisted from Twitter as well as from OpenSea. After it became obvious that the entire collection had racist undertones, it was widely reported by ordinary users of the platforms, and these platforms took action.
What is disheartening is that those behind the collection still managed to make money from the NFTs. Additionally, since they are on the blockchain, the creators could still sell them to anyone at any time, although that would be harder without the exposure provided by a major platform such as OpenSea.
