Being “racially privileged” doesn’t mean you were born a trust fund baby with a free ride. It firstly means that you’re statistically more likely to be based on race alone. But it also means that for a given income level- your race can give you certain benefits compared to other people. The fact you have never noticed the cases where your privilege has helped you is part of the whole thing about privilege. A very attractive person often doesn’t notice the subtle ways people treat them better, give them better service or other bias because of their looks for example- unless they temporarily or permanently lose those looks and get to see how people would treat them without them.
... Or, ya know, if that adult male stranger with a loaded gun had chosen not to run after a teenager and kill him in the process. Just saying that's another way...
He called the nonemergency number to report a suspicious person casing houses in a neighborhood that's had numerous recent break-ins. He followed the suspect to report his bearing to the dispatcher until he was told that wasn't necessary. He said "Okay" and attempted to avoid contact. He was then tackled by the 6 foot 160 lb suspect who bashed his face and proceeded to slam Zimmerman's head against the pavement. Repeatedly. He shot the suspect in self-defense.
He was charged with murder and crucified by the media, but after an extensive investigation and trial a jury of mixed races ruled the shooting entirely justified, and ruled Zimmerman not-guilty of all crimes.
He's neighborhood watch. Aside from that, he thought he was witnessing someone preparing to commit a felony (spoiler alert, he was), and as soon as authorities told him to back off, he did. Then he was assaulted and battered.
What's it matter? He didn't draw his weapon until his head had already been split open. On top of that, no free person is obliged to run from criminals or leave someplace they have every right to be. Like a public sidewalk.
You're clearly well-researched about the case. What really happened? What do you know that a nationally scrutinized investigation and jury don't?
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· 5 years ago
If he was trying to avoid conflict he would have stayed in his vehicle. But since we are now aware of his habit of violence and hyper aggression through multiple incidents it's fair to say he was seeking conflict. He did not back off.
He left his vehicle to help direct dispatch. Nobody said anything about avoiding conflict. No free person is required to avoid conflict. No free person is required to bow down to or run away from criminals or anybody else.
You'd prefer to live a coward? To grab your ankles and say "thank you, sir", or to do nothing while your neighbors are at risk instead?
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· 5 years ago
Hyper aggression, fascism AND homophobia. What a toxic cocktail!
The most solid evidence we have of what happened is Zimmerman’s testimony. There were two people involved, one is dead. The trial itself wasn’t a declaration of innocence- the facts didn’t CONTRADICT Zimmerman’s testimony in any ways found meaningful, and the one person who could have cast serious doubt is dead. The DA didn’t want to take the trial because there wasn’t enough evidence to make a case. The ruling was that there wasn’t enough evidence to convict- not that there was no crime, but that IF there was, it couldn’t be proven beyond all reasonable doubt.
On those grounds, in the eyes of the legal system Zimmerman can’t be held responsible. How we got into a deep discussion of this case I do not know. It’s somewhat irrelevant. We know Zimmerman shot the kid. He admits that. We know the kid was followed etc. we know that know violations of civil rights occurred. That DOES NOT mean there was no racial bias or motivation. That’s not something easily measured- but to the original post in this thread- there is a valid question of wether Trayvon Martin would be alive if he were white.
As to famousones comments- instead f picturing yourself as the gun toting vigilante, picture yourself on vacation or visiting family, just walking home minding your own business- and then some guy starts following you. You try to run away and he chases you. He corners you. As far as the case goes we don’t know what happened next and how it came to blows. Conflicting witnesses and other testimony, questions about the legitimacy of testimony etc. abound. Who started the fight? Was Martin attacked, defended himself, and got the better hand then was shot? Was Martin the aggressor? Did he feel the best “defense was a good offense” when being followed and cornered by a strange man?
Who knows. We have one guy to tell us what happened and a bunch of flakey witnesses. Eye witness testimony is notoriously unreliable. Polygraphs are notoriously unreliable and subjective. What happened isn’t particularly important to the topic at hand though because it still doesn’t answer if there was racial bias involved.
Ultimately, no shots were fired until after SOMEHOW Zimmerman's face was beat, and his head bashed against the pavement, and that investigators could not prove any crime occurred, racially motivated or otherwise.
There is a difference between an act which is racially motivated and an act which is racially biased. What’s more- the question of wether Zimmerman would have found Martin so suspicious at all, or if he would have followed him aren’t resolved because they aren’t strictly material to the case. The details we have say Zimmerman shot in self defense. But we don’t know how we got there and the original post was questioning that aspect- not wether the man was innocent of a crime or not, but wether race was a factor in the outcome.
Well now that's just going into the weeds. Was he suspected because he wore blue, and the other guy hated blue? Did the shooter see a butterfly a few minutes beforehand and think about hurricanes and so react aggressively because of an ancestral tendency to kill others to appease the wind gods?
I'm the sort to say that when the suspect bashes a man's head in, it stops mattering why he was initially suspected.
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But I digress, probably the suspicion was borne from a hooded figure casing out houses.
We have the benefit of hindsight. We can say with almost certainty he was not casing out houses. We know that he was staying in the area, we know the final altercation took place outside the place he was staying- his home, which he ran back to when he saw a strange man watching him and following him. Zimmerman may not have known that but we DO know that. Which means any suspicious signals Zimmerman got were not from actual nefarious activity but because Zimmerman assumed looking at Martin that Martin was doing something suspicious. So if Martin was just a normal person going about their day- what exactly raises suspicion?
We could say that it was the fact Zimmerman didn’t recognize Martin. But.... is that normal? To see someone you don’t recognize and chase them with your car and then on foot? Not really. Unless you live out in the country where there aren’t but 7 people in 20 miles- we see strange people every day. So it’s hard to swallow that Martin simply being there- existing- alone would be “just cause” for suspicion- and as said- from hindsight we know there couldn’t be just cause because Martin wasn’t doing anything wrong.
So SOMETHING about the situation beyond a human being existing triggered Zimmerman to feel he needed to follow Martin, needed to chase him by car and by foot, and ultimately needed to get close enough to Martin that a physical altercation could take place.
Now- as for some other things you’ve said- again, flip the script and put yourself in Martins shoes. Some guy you don’t know, who isn’t a cop, has no badge, has followed and chased you when you were minding your own business. You’re now back at your home with your family inside. This guy to you seems crazy doesn’t he? Dangerous likely? So you commented earlier that Zimmerman had a right to defend himself or others, doesn’t Martin? Some weirdo is driving around the neighborhood stalking people, followed you home? Is it not reasonable that he would try to defend himself and his family?
Personally wether he’s guilty or not I see Zimmerman as a wannabe and a pussy. He wanted to play cop. He wanted to chase down a kid who he had NO proof was doing ANYTHING wrong because for some reason we can’t really seem to know- he felt that kid was such a pressing danger that a vehicular and foot chase was warranted? He got in a fight. He got his ass whooped. He wants to play hero but at the end of the day, if he didn’t have that gun he’d have been made a bitch. Easy to be a big man when you have a gun and the other guy doesn’t.
So being the little bitch that he is, I sincerely hope for everyone’s sake in the future he stays his little bitch ass at home, or at least stays in the car and uses the phone because he has no business being involved in such things. Not because he’s a private citizen. Because he’s a punk. He got himself into trouble without the gun, and couldn’t get himself out without a gun. If you’re that limp wristed then you should stay out of trouble because your weak ass already knows that you’ll need to shoot somebody to get out of it. So guilty, innocent, racist, not- he’s a little punk and that’s the only verdict I need to cast on him.
So for the 7th time- the particulars of the case aren’t in dispute. The question is wether race played a role in his decision making process. It very likely did on some level, as numerous studies can back racial bias and the like. We all know that. We can argue all day- but we all know damn well that each and every one of us has at some point been influenced to some type of bias because of race. Allowed race to form conceptions about a person before we had a chance to get to know them, or made decisions based in some part on race.
He shot that kid. Plain and simple. Justice, civilized and fair justice, doesn’t condone sentencing one innocent man to potentially save more from possible danger. We can argue over wether a home burglary while no one is home is worthy of a death sentence- but when there is no evidence that a person has committed a burglary? Of all people I would think you would be against the idea of conviction of a crime before it is even committed. He “might” be a burglar?
Zimmerman said, on the recordings: “I’m tired of them getting away...” I doubt he meant minorities- but he could have. But I’d certainly believe that he was frustrated that in all his super trooper patrols he’d never gotten a “JR. deputy” Star and a head pat for catching an actual criminal. I severely doubt his intentions were purely noble and think he just wanted the excitement. Wanted to be a hero. And he killed a kid who until he was chased by an armed psycho was only guilty of... walking home and not being Facebook bros with Zimmerman?
The man should be ashamed and remorseful. He’s no hero, he’s the exact type of person who shouldn’t be allowed to have a gun until he’s been properly trained and has some life experience and growth under his belt. But... we don’t know all the facts. We can’t really cross examine Martin. So who knows? But regardless- we can’t rule out racial bias, just that not enough evidence exists of criminal intent to prosecute.
“Not enough evidence..” is a long road from “not guilty.” So it is a bit in the weeds. It’s pretty much 70% speculation which is a large part of why he is free today. There are lessons to be learned here, hopefully we learn the right ones.
Ok Punisher. We can leave it at that. I’m not here to debate your fundamental world view, but I would caution against binary thinking in a world which is demonstrably non binary.
We aren’t discussing the law. He had a trial. He could not be found guilty of any crimes based on available evidence. Saying a person is “innocent” of any wrong doing because of a not guilty verdict is probably wrong- as demonstrated by any number of cases where a person was found innocent but later proof solidified they committed a crime. Likewise, by any number of people found innocent of a criminal act but guilty of the same or related civil charges. What’s more, being innocent of a crime does not make one innocent of “wrong doing,” just that their actions were not criminal.
The distinction is critical in that we can’t send a person to jail unless we are certain beyond reasonable doubt of their guilt. Being proclaimed innocent of course does not mean there isn’t a POSSIBILITY of guilt, merely not enough PROVABLE guilt at the time of trial to warrant taking a persons freedoms. What we are discussing isn’t wether he was guilty of a CRIME, it is wether he was guilty of bigotry or bias. Currently, bias or bigotry ALONE cannot get a person thrown in prison and it would be a rather sad day if it could. So the discussion hinges not upon his court room guilt but upon issues not fully explored in his trail as once a motive cannot be established base on race, those details aren’t generally held pertinent to a case.
Interestingly though, since we touched on the subject, Trayvon Martin was ALSO not guilty of any crime. Trayvon Martin did not receive a presumption of innocence from Zimmerman, who chased a man walking home down like a hunting dog chasing a rabbit. Allegations of assault exist, but there was never a trial to PROVE Martin assaulted him was there? There wasn’t... say it with me... enough evidence to say wether Martin committed and crime at all, nor was it explored thoroughly because... the defendant and a key witness in that case are dead.
So we can say that Zimmerman is “innocent” and we can say Martin is “innocent” under the same burdens of proof and the same standard that “one is only guilty or innocent on the results of a trial.”
You’re a military man. Is there an “oopsie”? When something bad happens, when harm is done and we look around and there’s no one blatantly “wrong” for what happened- does everyone shrug and say “well, oppsies happen?” Or is the accident traced to a cause of failure? If we trace the accident back- Martin was in an area he had access to. Martin was not violating any laws or rules. Martin was not acting unsafely or in a manner that any reasonable person would believe they were at risk of being shot. Zimmerman was instructed to cease pursuit by an agent of the organization in command. Martin did not heed this instruction. A man was killed. A man was killed that didn’t need to be killed, that otherwise wouldn’t have been killed, if you remove the gun, or remove the shooter. Responsibility falls on Zimmerman.
So he didn’t break any laws, there’s no legal grounds to lock him up. He is at fault. He did escalate the situation. He did not have probable cause- and the issue at discussion here is wether or not the cause he self justified his decision upon was based in substantiative whole or part upon the race of the man he would later gun down, most likely in self defense, and possibly in defense against an altercation Zimmerman started, certainly in defense of an altercation Zimmerman is the root cause of.
Trump sure. Now where did "incelvolk" come from? You'll have to forgive me, I don't speak Baseless Insult, and I'm only somewhat familiar with Obscure.
Sigh... can't believe I still have to explain this...
Being white doesnt mean you're gonna have the world delivered to you. Means that your race is not an issue to anything you chose to do in life. You dont have this handicap. Failing while being white means that you failed on the easiest level in life.
A white person would not last a month if they could suddenly switch places with a POC. It's like you're already struggling in life on easy mode and think that you'll do better if you try Hard, or Nightmare mode.
He was charged with murder and crucified by the media, but after an extensive investigation and trial a jury of mixed races ruled the shooting entirely justified, and ruled Zimmerman not-guilty of all crimes.
What's it matter? He didn't draw his weapon until his head had already been split open. On top of that, no free person is obliged to run from criminals or leave someplace they have every right to be. Like a public sidewalk.
You'd prefer to live a coward? To grab your ankles and say "thank you, sir", or to do nothing while your neighbors are at risk instead?
I'm the sort to say that when the suspect bashes a man's head in, it stops mattering why he was initially suspected.
.
But I digress, probably the suspicion was borne from a hooded figure casing out houses.
Being white doesnt mean you're gonna have the world delivered to you. Means that your race is not an issue to anything you chose to do in life. You dont have this handicap. Failing while being white means that you failed on the easiest level in life.
A white person would not last a month if they could suddenly switch places with a POC. It's like you're already struggling in life on easy mode and think that you'll do better if you try Hard, or Nightmare mode.