Wednesday, March 28, 2012

The Third Rail of Current Events

This post is likely to piss you off or annoy you or upset you; if you are not in the mood to be upset, annoyed or pissed off, then I recommend you stop reading. I have to weigh in on the case of Trayvon Martin; what I have in mind will be very unpopular with most members of the herd.

It's difficult to find a good starting point here. I will not preface my remarks with either some [what would be for me] less-than-sincere expression of how tragic Trayvon's death is or some watered-down expression of how tragic the death of any young person is in general. I will not express a desire to see justice for Trayvon. I'll leave that to the fools, apologists, breast-beaters and rabble-rousers out there. I will start with a round condemnation of the media, which have distorted reality almost beyond recognition in this case.

My heart does bleed for the mother of the unfortunate soul, Trayvon. I chalk it up to her grief that she still harbors the nostalgic delusion of Trayvon as a sweet, innocent and harmless child. That the media have taken up and run with her delusion to create a similar illusion for our consumption is scandalous. Many of the stories have been little more than propagandistic race-baiting of the worst kind; fiction and fairy tales do not qualify as serious journalism.

I heard one of the race-baiters say that Trayvon was guilty of nothing but "walking while black in a gated community." If eyewitness accounts are true, he was guilty of assault with intent to maim George Zimmerman. I have heard many people calling for "justice for Trayvon." Again, if the eyewitness accounts are truthful and accurate, Trayvon got his justice at the business end of George's gun. Skittles and a cell phone did not break George's nose, Trayvon's fist did.

Some people have pointed out that because George had called police numerous times in the last however many months, he was gung-ho and looking for trouble. I instead find that fact to be exculpatory; he did not shoot any of the however many other people. Something different happened in this case, to wit: Trayvon Martin attacked George Zimmerman and was trying to beat him to a pulp before he got shot. He picked the wrong man to fuck with and paid for it with his life. Sorry for your luck, dude.

If George had intended to kill Trayvon from the get-go, why would he let him lay a finger on him? Rope-a-dope? Are you kidding me? Letting someone bash your face and head in is not a good strategy for killing him. George was fortunate to have been armed that night and lucky to have been able to get the shot off.

* * *

President Obama himself weighed in with his comment that if he had a son he would look like Trayvon. He has neglected to note that his hypothetical son might also look like one of the teenagers in Kansas City who recently doused a (white) kid with gasoline and set him on fire (for being white). My question to him is: Irrespective of how he would look, would your son behave like these thugs?

There were dozens of shootings on the south side of Chicago the weekend of St. Patrick's Day; over a dozen people died as a result. Many of them were genuinely innocent; where's the outrage and the outcry? I saw an interview with a pastor from that community. When responding to the question of why these young black men were committing all those shootings, his response was a poignant one--the harshest indictment possible of President Obama's failure to deliver--"They have no hope..."

Meanwhile, the atheists are marching in Washington, DC. Bless their hearts.



5 comments:

willSIX said...

There is so much wrong in this post that I hardly know where to begin, except to express my sadness that it has even appeared on my beloved Captain's blog.

If I understand your argument correctly, we should simply assume that Zimmerman's statements to the police and the purported "eyewitness" account of his pal are true and then come to the conclusion that Trayvon deserved to die. Of course, recent footage from the police station shows Zimmerman entirely free of injury, blood, grass stains, etc. Of course, the police instructed him not to stalk Trayvon in his SUV. Of course, Trayvon's girlfriend, who was on the phone with him up until approximately 5 minutes before he was shot recently told the media (because the police by that point still had yet to contact her for a statement), that Trayvon was concerned and nervous because some guy was following him around in his car. Of course, a neighbor called 911 because she heard Trayvon screaming "Help!" over and over before he was shot. Oh yeah, and, unlike Trayvon, Zimmerman has a history of violence.

But, according to you, we should set all that aside, because Zimmerman, his buddy, and the police report (contradicted by the video taken at the station) give a conflicting account. Good luck with that. Zimmerman's story fails to add up, and it will continue to fail to add up, because it's absolute nonsense on its face.

As far as the rest of your thoroughly offensive rant regarding other awful crimes committed elsewhere against innocents, I direct you to the fact that the perpetrators of most, if not all, of these crimes were ARRESTED, rather than released within hours after having killed another human being, and they will, god willing, face justice in the Courts.

George Zimmerman shot and killed an unarmed 17 year old kid that he was following around in his car, against the advice of the 911 operator, while playing junior vigilante/minuteman/Batman. Blaming the victim in this situation is every bit as offensive as blaming the victims of other crimes.

Oh, and lastly, do you, honestly and forthrightly, believe in your heart that if Trayvon Martin had shot and killed an unarmed Zimmerman under similar alleged circumstances, he would not have been arrested that evening? That he would not have been questioned for hours without an attorney present in the hopes of drawing out a confession? Because if you do, you suffer from even greater delusions than those made evident in this unfortunate screed.

P.S.- I'm not exactly sure what the fact that some atheists chose to exercise their First Amendment rights has to do with the killing of Trayvon Martin, unless you are making at attempt at irony, since the free press (ostensibly the target of your bile) is also a right conferred by the Constitution. But, somehow, I doubt it. Regardless, I'm an atheist, so congratulations on having hit the trifecta of bigotry, ignorance, and intolerance in a single post.

Sean said...

If there was a scuffle, I'd put it more towards Trayvon defending himself. A man in a car is stalking him; police told Zimmerman NOT to get out of the car and he did anyways... he deserved to get his ass beat for that. Then he approached Trayvon.

Let's think about this for a second. Say Little B was out buying some skittles, coming home, some stranger yells at him from a car. The guy then gets out of the car and runs up on Little B... would you not want your son to maim this guy if it's his own last line of defense?

Zimmerman is a bully. He got shoved once, and pulled his gun and shot Trayvon to his death. The outcry in this matter, is that the police let Zimmerman walk on his word that he was defending himself... that doesn't happen, anywhere (except this instance apparently).

Peter said...

George stopped following Trayvon; the video does show marks on George's head; the eyewitness is credible; George had no racist motive; I am color blind when despising the despicable--including myself when I'm an asshole; misuse of the overused word ignorant is itself ignorant; blessing the hearts of atheists is not intolerance. Obviously there is no tolerance for giving someone the presumption of innocence in Will Six's world, nor is there tolerance there for someone else's (ignorant) beliefs; that seems rather narrow-minded and bigoted to me. Physician, heal thyself!

Christopher Hitchens said...

Here here, will6. Shame on you, corky for letting the likes of dim witted Peter ruin your fine blog.

annergizer said...

WELL SAID!!! ( and also very very true)