Trayvon Did Not Die in Vain

Trayvon Martin did not die in vain.

His death was important.  It has touched something deep inside us all, both  black and white.  It is something that will last.

Technically, racism had nothing to do with Trayvon’s death.  Racism did not come up in the trial, and neither the judge nor any of the jurors has been shown to be a racist.

Still, we all know that racism was deeply involved, if only somehow.

Black people see the trial as just another in the never-ending line of injustices that have been committed against them since their ancestors were slaves. 

But it has touched white people, too, in new ways.  Many white people are being forced for the first time to really see -- and hopefully take responsibility for -- the many indignities we force on black people every day. 

Unlike the riots of yesteryear that resulted from perceived injustices, the Black response to Trayvon’s death has been calm, purposeful, focused, and persistent. 

One of the movement’s primary demands, especially by Trayvon’s family, is that all states vacate their so-called Stand Your Ground laws.  

Let’s hope they win.  Stand Your Ground  is a stupid law.  Civilized societies have forever been based on the principle that it’s better to retreat from a death threat than to “stand your ground.” 

White gun-totin’ racists who like these laws need to remember that black people have many more opportunities to use them against whites than whites do against blacks, and courts these days are trending toward listening to minorities with more respect. 

The movement’s leaders could be demanding the Stand Your Ground principle be strengthened so they could use it as a defense in court. Instead, they are demanding its end.  Power to them.

-Skip

Zimmerman Jury Had No Choice

Like most everyone else I know, I was shocked and disheartened when the Zimmerman jury returned its not-guilty verdict.  

I felt certain that Zimmerman would be -- and should be -- convicted of manslaughter, at the very least. 

But the more I read about the trial, the more I realize the jury really had no other choice.  The prosecution didn’t prove its case.  

Under our constitution,  a person is innocent until proven guilty.   Many of us who followed the trial on television saw what we thought was proof.

But therein lies the problem.  Actual jurors see trials differently than armchair jurors do.  A judge can order actual jurors to ignore a witness’s testimony,  but that doesn’t stop us armchair types from giving the testimony full weight.  

Add that to the fact that the jurors had to deal with some very specific and complicated law, they did all they could. 

CNN’s Anderson Cooper interviewed one of the jurors, known only as juror B37, and her explanation of what went on in the jury room rings true.

She said that, based on an early survey, three of the jurors wanted acquittal, two wanted manslaughter, and one supported second-degree murder. 

But the more they sifted the evidence and considered the judge’s instructions, the more they realized that, legally, there was no proof, so they had no choice but to find him not guilty.  Some of the jurors wanted to convict him of something, she said, but legally there was nothing.

And so a 16-year-old boy who was doing nothing wrong is shot to death and no one is held responsible.

The NAACP is pushing the Justice Department to file wrongful death charges against Zimmerman.  I was among the first to sign its petition.

-Skip