http://youtu.be/m-HpQpeE4IY
| Previous Post « Final Move |
Next Post Pacific Rim » |
Nah, you got somethin’, Vern. Always have.
What am I missing?
Vern, why u no review Pacific Rim yet? here I am eager to post my thoughts and now I got movie opinion blue balls
guess I’ll have to save it for the review
Man where’s Dave Chappelle when you need him. What the fuck.
I was in 6th grade when Rodney King’s assailants were all acquitted, and I’m never going to forget any of that— the scariness of the grainy videotape, the weird wrong feeling of the verdict, the surreal dread of watching the riots on TV, King’s flustered plea for us to get along. Thinking about it now I can also remember the nationally-encouraged dialogue of healing, of sincerely trying to understand what had happened once the fires were out. I also remember Edward James Olmos out in the streets of L.A., sweeping up the wreckage with a pushbroom.
The cops who beat up King weren’t the first cops to gang up on a guy and beat the shit out of him. I’m guessing they weren’t the first ones to go to trial over it, either. But they were the first ones to be caught on a videotape that forced people whose most dramatic interaction with the police was a speeding ticket to understand just how brutal and inhumane the police can be.
And yet when I compare those cops to Zimmerman I find myself saying, “At least those cops were on a government payroll to be thugs.” Obviously I’m not saying they were just doing their job. I’m saying, if you let the state pay somebody to think of themselves as a superior authority to all other human beings, you set up a fucked-up dynamic where advantage is going to get taken in little ways and big ones.
I have few doubts that this Zimmerman character is cut from the same cloth as the cops that beat up Rodney King. But there are two key differences. The first is that Zimmerman didn’t just beat the shit out of somebody. He killed an underage kid who was doing nothing but walking home from the damn store with some candy and some juice. An 8-year-old wouldn’t have done it any differently. He wasn’t driving drunk, he wasn’t high on anything, he had his fucking hood up because who knows. Sometimes I put my hood up just because I like the way it feels, or it’s raining, or I want it to do the thing where it flattens down my hair.
The second difference is that Zimmerman decided he had the right to do this on his own, with no institutional weight behind him. He had no state saying “This is your job, do it how you gotta do it; you’re the cop and everyone else is the not-cop; if someone doesn’t do what you tell them to do, they’re giving you permission to force them to do it.” You can’t blame the culture or the values of the institution he was working for because he wasn’t working for an institution. If you asked him, it seems to me like he’d say that he was working for the safety of his community. That, for me, is one of the most fucked-up things about this case. The way the trial shook out, he was being tried for why he pulled the trigger, when the question should have been why he felt that it was up to him to skulk around determining who was allowed to be where they were at the time he saw them there. And without an authoritarian institution like the police to contextualize his behavior, you’ve got to blame the culture of his community. Of his country.
I was listening to Amy Goodman’s radio show Democracy Now on Friday. After talking about the Zimmerman trial, she talked about how natural gas companies have hired former psyops agents to help discredit anti-fracking activists, and how those companies’ internal term for activists is ‘insurgents.’ Later she played audiotape of a woman being dragged off the Texas senate floor during her testimony on why abortion should not be severely restricted in that state. (The law she was testifying against passed anyway, because it was attached to a bill that was primarily about motorcycle safety.) And now this verdict is handed down. Paranoid liars everywhere can now feel a little more permission to be their own one-person police force.
I still believe this country can be brought back from the brink with the power of truth, love and reason. But man are we living in some bleak times.
My girl Samhita Mukhopadhyay said it best: “The fundamental danger of an acquittal is not more riots, it is more George Zimmermans.”
This case was lost in voir dire and jury selection. And it was a jury of scaredy imbeciles and at least 2 gun owners. And zero black jurors.
GZ is an angry Failure Man. He’s a pussy, a liar, a killer, and a criminal. You can tell it by the facts of the case. You can tell it by his gesticulations during that bullshit CSI video walkthrough. You can tell it by his lies & his double-talking in response to that weakass local police interrogation. He lived in a community that had zero history of violent crime (Burglary or B&E is *not* a violent crime, and I have my doubts most of those break-ins were even real.) until he decided to shoot a 17 year old.
You don’t want to arm these pussies. Nothing good comes of it.
Anyone else remember being a boy and wanting to swordfight with sticks or broom handles? Or, better, did you ever get a plastic He-Man sword for your birthday or something? What was the first thing you did with that toy? You went around swinging it at shit — a tree, a stool, a dog, preferably another young boy who also had a plastic sword. If you got your hands on a pair of nunchaku, then you started swinging it around, emulating Michelangelo & Splinter and Bruce Lee. If you went to a cool uncle’s house and he had a real sword mounted on his wall, then you really fuckin’ wanted to get your hands on it. If you had a friend whose dad was a cop, maybe you were trying to get him to let you hold his firearm. Not trying to kill somebody, but trying to put the weapon to use, to feel & wield its power, before the temptation to swing it around becomes frustration that there’s nothing to fight it with, and before you get bored of it. (This also might apply to some girls when they find a gun, as seen in a manipulatively suspenseful scene in THE BLING RING.)
This is what happens with Failure Man when he gets a gun. He becomes a boy with a toy (some would call it a metallic penis extension), and eventually he has to use it.
My plastic sword & I behold an oak tree; we conceive it as a Skeletor substitute, and I heroically chop at it, trying to defeat the imaginary evil.
GZ & his gun behold a black kid in a hoodie; he re-conceives him (or “it”) as a violent criminal somehow attacking nearby innocents, endangering the neighborhood GZ unofficially swore to protect as a wannabe fake cop, and the only solution is to be the hero, to finally put the gun to use, to defeat the evil of black youths in your neighborhood where they don’t belong (Emergency personnel instructions to not pursue action be damned), or else what was the point in even buying the gun?
What was the point of his MMA fight training, which he failed so spectacularly to see to fruition or to apply in the one fight he finally picked with a confused 17 year old (who was on his cellphone, in the rain, trying to get back in time to see the basketball game — wouldn’t you be pissed off some dude is stalking you, delaying you in the rain when you ain’t got an umbrella, just a damp hoodie, inconveniently butting in when you’re trying to chat with a friend on the phone)?
GZ thinks: “Goddamn, I paid all that money to spar at the local mats, and the guys there don’t respect me because I’m soft and a shitty fighter, and people don’t respect me because I’m not a real cop because I’m too pussy & unqualified to actually become a real cop, but my gun is real and now I’m going to prove them wrong and scuff up this black thing in the hoodie. . . I’ll just cover my ass by calling 9-1-1 first — that’ll be an important part of how I get bestowed my hero-citizen award from the Homeowners’ Association & the Mayor later. (***“We don’t need you to do that.”***) And I’ll bring my loaded gun, too, just in case. He’s not walking away from me, goddammit. Fucking punks. These assholes, they always get away.”
Maybe I’ve been lucky in my life experience, but I’ve never had problems with black Americans. The only time I’ve been scared of a young black man/child is when he’s blocking my lay-up or going over the back on me for a rebound.
I live in fear of itchy fight-instigators and vigilante redneck fake wannabe rent-a-cops with guns every fuckin’ day.
They wear their Failure in the form of metal toy accessories holstered in their waistline; their rage at their inadequacies & perceived victimhood rests in the gunpowder, and that shit’s explosive.
I’m sad & angry. This version of America disgusts me. I’m embarrassed for my country. I’m fuckin’ glad I don’t own a gun.
Yesterday was a shitty, shitty day.
When the defense lawyer told the jury that the concrete that constituted the sidewalk was Trayvon’s weapon, the judge should have immediately laughed him out of the court.
An ABA panel should have rushed to the courtroom steps and had that defense lawyer disbarred on the spot.
Instead, that nonsense stood, and the cowardly idiot jury actually fell for it.
When the defense showed “scary” photos of a living Trayvon (months before half his blood had exited his body, thus emaciating the victim), that was a replay of exactly what happened as prelude to many Old South lynchings of blacks. “We have to kill him because he’s scary-looking, doesn’t belong here, threatens us with his physique, and might try to do something to our helpless white women & property-owners.”
oh, that’s what this is about? I’m sorry for even bringing up Pacific Rim guys, I didn’t mean to be inappropriate
so, Zimmerman was found not guilty eh? I figured that this was gonna happen, because this is America, “land of the free”, where this kind of shit happens all the time, I wonder if there’s gonna be riots?
“I still believe this country can be brought back from the brink with the power of truth, love and reason. But man are we living in some bleak times.’
yeah and maybe leprechauns’ asses will shoot rainbows, let’s face it, if things in America are ever gonna change it’s not gonna be by playing nice, it’s too late for that
I got nothing as well, but for decidedly different reasons.
Larry, if you got some kinda white power racist bullshit to say, say it.
Damn, I’m glad I’m not an American right now. Honestly I’m ashamed to be part of the same SPECIES as the jury members who acquitted this racist thug.
The thing that disturbs me the most about this whole farce is the fact that “trial by jury selection” is even an issue. The fact that they had no trouble picking twelve white people who would exonerate this white guy of killing an unarmed unprovoking black child, out of what I presume is a random selection of votors from that county. What the fuck, guys?
This guy’s poor family. Now they’re pretty much guaranteed to never get any justice. And while I would never support the death penalty or vigilante justice, it’s a measure of how fucked up this entire situation is that their best chance of getting any kind of rights here would be to get some sympathetic white guy to shoot Zimmerman on the street and have him use the “Stand your Ground” law for his defence.
reality fucking bites, it’s why were so obsessed with movies and stuff, because fuck real life, who needs it?
Slow down, Paul. Dude wasn’t a “racist thug.” He had an overzealous inclination to assume wrongdoing based on his profile of Trayvon, but it wasn’t necessarily hatred, just misplaced anger & stupidity & a testosterone-driven sense of gun-empowered self-heroism that masked his pussiness.
Twas a jury of 6, not 12, because Florida law is sad & cheap.
5 out of the 6 were white; one may have been Hispanic or some kind of brown.
GZ is half-Hispanic, or arguably Hispanic, though his family doesn’t identify that way.
The idiot prosecution team & vile defense team agreed to these 6 randomly selected jurors out of a pool of dozens/hundreds.
Civil court could prove GZ culpable for the wrongful death of the victim, which would result in a substantial amount of money going to the Martins. (OJ Simpson got hit by civil suits and had to pay the surviving families even after he was acquitted in the criminal trial.)
He claimed self-defense (gun vs. sidewalk, obviously), but not SYG was not at issue in this trial. GZ & the local police considered SYG when he was first giving his account of the killing, and again 6 weeks later when he was finally arrested, but by the time he was indicted & had consulted his lawyers, SYG was abandoned in the arguments & in the trial’s coverage except by some lazy media figures (though it’s still an outrageous statute).
Griff: Compassion is the only option this country has. Anything else plays right into the hands of the people holding the keys to the cash registers and the prisons.
Mouth: Well said.
This was a case of the prosecutors overreaching. They had a clear cut case for manslaughter, but decided to go for murder, which was a much tougher charge to prove. And, not only did they fail in proving murder, but their argument in trying to do so allowed the defense to make enough of a claim of self-defense that the lesser charge of manslaughter couldn’t stick.
This wasn’t overreaching, this was a scam.
Zimmerman’s father was a well respected judge in Florida with mad behind the scenes connects.
The Prosecution sucked on purpose.
ON PURPOSE!!
Are we to believe that the same prosecution team that sent a black woman to jail for 2012 years because she shot a damn ceiling standing her ground against her abusive husband couldn’t get one charge on Zimmerman?
Fuck outta here…
http://www.businessinsider.com/florida-woman-gets-20-years-for-firing-warning-shot-2012-5
I hate the human race a little more every day. Billions of years of evolution and this is the best we can come up with? This mockery? Our essential nature is corrupt and unnatural. We’re a cancer on this planet. No wonder it’s trying to kill us.
“Slow down, Paul. Dude wasn’t a “racist thug.” He had an overzealous inclination to assume wrongdoing based on his profile of Trayvon, but it wasn’t necessarily hatred, just misplaced anger & stupidity & a testosterone-driven sense of gun-empowered self-heroism that masked his pussiness.”
This point of pure semantics is noted. In the UK a “thug” can be of any age, the key character traits I would associate with that word being arrogance, cowardice, and a propensity to unwarranted violence. All of which this guy demonstrated in spadefuls.
“The idiot prosecution team & vile defense team agreed to these 6 randomly selected jurors out of a pool of dozens/hundreds.”
That’s kinda my point, actually… how much of a fuck-up must there have been in the jury selection process for this to happen?
I actually read that it was six women on the jury, but dismissed it as editorial inaccuracy, because what jury has only six people? But you’re saying that’s actually true?
As for the ineptitude/ corruption / racism of the jury / prosecution, I’ve read the newspaper accounts of the trial. How the hell else do you explain the verdict that they came to?
Pretty shocking. I foolishly thought this one would be a slam-dunk. I only hope this dickhead lives out every one of the rest of his days in the shadow of this one appalling act.
Jesus, guys. I don’t think this represents the bottom of human society. I think we’ll be ok. It was a bad case with little real evidence. It happens.
It’s just another drop in a bucket that’s already overflowing, Chopper. In truth, it’s not even the worst thing that happened this week. That’s the point.
Plenty of real evidence:
-GZ’s paranoid phone call with Emergency ended 2 minutes before Trayvon’s casual phone call with his friend ended, indicating that GZ clearly was the one who got out of his car for no reason, pursued, followed, and confronted the dead kid. There was no ambush or provocation from Trayvon (hard to be stealthy while chatting with a girl on the phone), and even if there was, Trayvon was still the one acting in self-defense. GZ lied about this and was caught lying about it. The physical evidence & body layout/positioning does not support GZ’s story, and by “story” I mean the 2nd or 3rd revision of his story (which is made even more murky by the police’s initial refusal to pursue an investigation/arrest for 6+ weeks, which, perversely, actually aided the notion of “reasonable doubt” in favor of the killer).
For some reason GZ’s bullshit walkthrough-video was admissible but he wasn’t required to take the stand in court. He could claim self-defense without ever being questioned about the shakiness & lies of his one-sided story of self-defense. When the only other witness to the “self-defense” killing is he who is dead, this is the definition of injustice.
The defense didn’t even bother to post a RASHOMON-style narrative of confusion in their “self-defense” argument; Florida law, the stupidity & cowardice of the jury, and the incompetent prosecution didn’t force them to do so.
-And a little-commented-on aspect of this killing that pisses me off is the fact that it was around 7 p.m. when GZ’s amateur, untrained, unauthorized crimebusting spidey-sense went a’tinglin.
7 p.m., not 3 a.m..
Who the fuck gets suspicious of a kid on the sidewalk at 7 p.m.? It was just dark enough to conceal GZ’s crime and to cast doubt on & in the eyes of any possible witnesses.
Everything about this is poison. Time for Florida to hire some new prosecutors.
Past time for the 2nd Amendment nutbags to finally *lose* on an issue; they never do, though. Deep-seated redneckism & cowardice always prevails, enabled by the courts and supported by the fearmongers & profiteers who feed into the nonsensical pussy-with-a-gun-for-peace-of-mind zeitgeist.
These people have wet dreams about occupying the threshold of their front door and timing the “click-click” of a shotgun in their hands with the footsteps of an imaginary home-invader on their front porch. They dream of surprising a young black hoodlum with firearm justice just as the fucking punk is trying to crawl into your neighbor’s daughter’s bedroom window to steal something. They don’t think Dirty Harry is dirty at all.
They hate it when this stuff doesn’t happen in real life; like a soldier who has to spend an entire war doing logistics in Alaska, they get gun-owner quasi-vigilante blue balls.
GZ is now their hero. “Holy shit, you got to use yer gun on a real [barely-]human target and the law said you were right, justified, hyuk hyuk, jes’ like the stories my greatgranpappy told me from growin’ up in Texas. We don’t need no interference from the gubmint jackboots so long as we can pack heat at all times.”
Gun laws & gun-related legal precedents during my lifetime have always moved farther rightward, with the rare exceptions of modest reforms in NYC and maybe a couple other cities. 2nd Amendment freaks obviously don’t care about losing American lives to their precious metal toys, but they never lose on the issue of their “freedom” to kill (which I was going to type as “‘freedom’ to hold in their hands the means to kill” but actually after this the real issue is that a gun owner can kill, with impunity, as long as the shoot-ee is dead (and preferably black) and no one steps up with 100% eyewitness evidence that confirms the guilt of the shooter).
psychic_hits – what I mean is people need to start getting fucking angry, some “mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore” style business, what we is more OWS style mass protests and less willingness to let cops beat the shit out of and pepper spray said protesters
Mr. Majestyk – maybe next thing the Earth will start sending giant monsters our way
Agree with Physics_hits. Compassion.
Some people are saying justice wasn’t served and I can’t disagree more. It was perfectly blind, as it should always be.
The jury selection was weird, and I agree on the over-reaching. I always felt that a manslaughter charge seemed reasonable – but we don’t know what happened, regardless of how many hundreds/thousands/millions of people there are wearing hoodies in solidarity or carrying angry signs about skittles.
The prosecution’s case came down to 2 basic questions:
a) who started the fight (and how?)
b) who was the one screaming “help?”
…and they couldn’t determine who based on the evidence, nor could they prove Zimmerman didn’t reasonably fear for his life. In fact he had cuts, a broken nose (Martin’s body was comparatively undamaged, aside from the bullet wound which killed him), witnesses saw them fighting and some saw Martin on top, etc.
“BUT THE DISPATCHER TOLD HIM NOT TO PURSUE!!
Irrelevant.
“WHAT?? BUT HE’S A RACIST, FAT, FUCKFACE!! ARE YOU SERIOUSLY SAYING HE SHOULD WALK??”
Ok, good point. I forgot that black people had it rough once, but hey, I’m white, so you gotta respect that. Plus they (blacks) probably don’t commit as many crimes as we think they do. Like assault, for example. Because, again: RACISM. If George Zimmerman had instead been knocked over the head and robbed at gunpoint that night (by, say, a black man) then it would be a wash because of his bigotry, right? Because black criminals only target racist white people, you just made me realize.
Anyway, type up a response I can’t wait to read it.
Shocking that the 2 out-&-out right-winger dipshits (Rogue4 would make it 3/3.) who post here are in alignment in favor of the killer in this case.
GZ was not and is not a racist or bigot. But he is a pussy posing as a hero, empowered by his little gun, a vengeful justice-seeker in search of a need to seek “justice.”
From what I have read about this, I think that the racism issue was blown out of proportion and that this is more of an issue of why someone with firearms is allowed to patrol a neighborhood on neighborhood watch. Coming from someone who is not from the US, I will never understand the laws of a country (or state) which allow people to carry firearms and be allowed to use them on the streets.
I guess that’s just a holdover from the frontier justice era of nation building. The 2nd amendment gun nuts are the ones who are holding the country back.
Mouth, given your lack of understanding of the principles this country was founded upon and your anti-freedom rhetoric, should you really be calling others “dipshits”?
Yeah, I really should study the proto-Constitutional basis of how “No Taxation Without Representation,” the Stamp Act, and anti-royalist farming/fishing tendencies instigated, inflamed, and essentially instituted the nation that we now know & recognize as the greatest democratic experiment in the history of humankind.
(Native Americans are excised from this flippant remembrance.)
It was so irritating when I looked toward my right shoulder to grab a piece of beef jerky from beneath the American Flag that The Man inexplicably made us wear and I didn’t understand why I should care about 13 stripes & 50 stars. Cuz I hate freedom and don’t understand the country on which such freedom depends.
Why can’t I grasp that GZ is a fuckin’ hero, just defending himself at the scary hour of 7 p.m. in a gated community from that dastardly bag of Skittles & a hoody compartment full of iced tea?
And that deadly concrete sidewalk. Can’t forget about that shit. The defense made a big deal of that in their prosecution of The Beast Trayvon Martin.
Who gives a fuck about a government, about rule of law, about equality, about judging one by the content of his/her character rather than by the color of one’s skin? Fuck that, just let the strong or lucky or wealthier or more strongly race-congealed citizens have all the property rights,
let them have all the guns & ammo,
let them have the natural racial preference of the law enforcement officers & institutions of justice
(including a “We won’t arrest you until 6+ weeks later after public protests” get-out-of-jail-free card),
let them have gated communities with fake but well-armed amateur “cops,”
and the rest will take care of itself. How could anything possibly go wrong?
In fact, let’s outright *arm* as many people as possible,
especially the most bitchass among us,
especially those who were too soft & too pussy to make it as real cops
or real soldiers
or real Marines,
per the NRA ethos, ensuring via our current justice system that any temporarily inconvenient fatal shootings of unarmed 17 year olds are dismissed as “self-defense” in the meanwhile, and the race-based piffling will surely sort itself out.
Fuck you, I got mines! Bang-bang! America!
There shouldn’t be a right wing/left wing angle to this. A guy fucking got scared of a young kid, followed him with a gun and killed him. How are you for this? As someone who believes that people should have the right to carry guns and can use them responsibly you HAVE to be against this. As a human being who doesn’t like human beings to be killed, you would of course be against this. It’s hard to think of another explanation other than you don’t consider a black kid’s life to be important.
Even if you’re pro gun, pro vigilante patrolling, pro suspecting that a black kid doesn’t belong in the white gated community, STILL there’s no way around this other than this is a horrible tragedy, an unfortunate consequence of these things you believe in, and hopefully something like this can be avoided in the future, and you try to figure out how. You don’t make light of it, you don’t smear a dead child and his family and his race and get upset at how hard it is to be white. Those who have done that (not necessarily you Christof, unless this is you), who are you fooling? You really believe yourself, that you’re not a racist? How do you do it?
I want to to tell you to think about what you just did there, your sarcasm about “oh yeah, I forgot that black people had it rough once,” IN A DISCUSSION OF A BLACK CHILD WHO WAS MURDERED FOR STICKING OUT IN THE WHITE NEIGHBORHOOD HE WAS STAYING IN. Ha ha, you think they had it rough? Once? But you can’t think about it, because you don’t have it in your brain or your soul to comprehend how despicable that is, otherwise you wouldn’t even think to say something so fucking foul. It’s a problem, man. I just can’t imagine you ever fucking getting it in your life, and you’re one of the smart ones. Imagine all the knuckleheads we gotta deal with.
But I don’t know, I have some hope that some of these pushes against blacks and gays and women going on lately are the last gasp of these backwards bigots as their people die off and their power slowly slips away. Eventually most of ’em will be gone and the rest of us can fix this broken system. I hope.
I STILL hate Lee Greenwood.
Oh.
For a moment I thought it was a movie-off, Spike vs Quentin. Over who is allowed to use the “n-word” and who is not. I know who I’d pick in that contest! But I guess this is actually about something else far less interesting. Worthy of discussion? Maybe… but I have reasonable doubts. Right?
Hiyooooooooo!
Too soon?
Uh oh, Vern’s got… something.
Sorry for my too-easy, too-cynical right/left shorthand rhetoric on this. Everything I posted is valid, though.
Anyone who looks at & listens to the facts of this case knows that GZ is guilty of manslaughter at the least & easily 2nd degree murder if you’re not willing to bend to the defense team’s meretricious bullshit about Trayvon using a weaponized sidewalk (!!!!!!!!!!????????????!!!!!!) & the fact that he was a scary black athletic kid/footballer who wasn’t a runt compared to the “self-defense”-ing, armed
(with loaded concealed weapon & with the prestigious false imprimatur of amateur “neighborhood watch rent-a-cop” who once allegedly maybe was offered a set of yellow lights to place upon his car’s roof but turned it down (or had it turned down to him on review of his criminal, creepy record) because that would be a slap in his heroic face because it would just bring attention to the fact that he wasn’t a real cop)
protector of white women who have property that should never be looked upon by
fucking punks, these assholes,
angry, always-calling-911-for-no-reason-until-one-day-he-had-a-chance-to-use-his-gun-thank-god-for-2nd-amendment-and-Florida-law-in-favor-of-the-gun-carrier-and-against-the-dead-guy-especially-if-he-is-black, MMA-trained, older, heavier would-be quasi-vigilante GZ as a weapon.
******************************************
I can remove race & politics & perceived politics from this whole ordeal, and I can simply apply math & probability via a historical understanding of criminal law outcomes, arrest records, sentences, national conviction likelihoods, & local sentencing likelihoods,
and I see clearly that something is very very fucking wrong about this outcome. This is injustice in any way you view it; the liar/killer GZ knows this as well as anyone.
Don’t have much to say here but just feel terrible for the Trayvon’s family
Imagine your kid getting shit dead for no damn reason, and the man that did it gets away with it
If that’s blind justice, then maybe it’s time she took off the blindfold
* that should be shot dead, not shit dead, sorry
Thousands of black youths killed with guns each year…. Absolutely tragic and no one gives a shit. Then a kid gets killed under just the right circumstances and the media turns it into a sensation. The tragedy here is that there is so much illegal gun violence and the ineffectiveness of gun laws is completely overlooked. Instead it’s a lot of race baiting nonsense in this case. Zimmerman clearly did the wrong things and is no hero but given the circumstances and given the law, this verdict is no great miscarriage of justice. Sorry, it isn’t. There is a lot wrong with this country but let’s not pretend Zimmerman represents the secret desires of “White America” (heard that a lot lately) to kill black people…. Nah. I mean Zimmerman is Hispanic but whatever, don’t let facts get in the way of your narrative. Innocent people are dying every day and no one cares because it doesn’t fit the agenda they are trying to push. Ugh.
The thing is, regardless of the level of ass-hattery clearly on display, I don’t think they’ve proven he is guilty of anything illegal, within the context of the laws in play (no matter how fucked up the laws might be).
All Mouth’s points about his attitude and dickbaggery may be – certainly seem to be – correct, but they don’t constitute a violation of any law I know of.
Only the actions that occurred during the confrontation do that, and the prosecution failed to disprove reasonable doubt – at least in my mind – and clearly the jurors.
> It’s hard to think of another explanation other than you don’t consider a black kid’s life to be important
The consensus around here is that a) it’s a horrible, senseless tragedy, b) Zimmerman is an asshole and seems like a pretty awful human being, and c) he should not have been convicted of murder.
A lot of people either believe Zimmerman’s story or believe that we can’t say for sure what really happened, and that alone is enough to mean that we can’t convict him. I think this is what clubside meant by principles — the principle that we will only send people to jail when we are really, really sure they’re guilty, even if means we sometimes have to let innocent people go free.
The state couldn’t prove that Zimmerman’s story — that he followed Martin, but that he only got of his car to see where Martin went, and when he turned around, he was jumped — wasn’t true. And with self-defense, the burden of proof is on the state.
So I think a lot of people view this as a kind of sad but necessary upholding of the ideals of justice; a reminder that sometimes people who really seem guilty have to be set free, because we value keeping innocent people out of jail more than putting guilty people in jail (though I think it’s also pretty questionable how often we really apply those values).
Then I see something like this and, just… ugh. Maybe we could make an exception this one time?
You got it tugboat. If it was me on trial, I would want the jury to be DAMN sure before putting me away for 30 years.
If dude didn’t have >$300,000 of legal support from undeniably racist anti-black patrons who responded specifically to his “Fuck Trayvon, yay 2nd Amendment amirite!?!” initial missives, he wouldn’t have had more than a barebones, single-personnel state-mandated defense.
Dude managed to get a hold of a zealous team of lawyers (important multitudinous plural) who were anxious to split up the Florida-Sunlight-Law-Public-tv time among them and were glad to split up the CNN/FoxNews airwaves equally. Everyone involved here smelt a book-deal months ahead of time, I promise you. (This is not a left/right statement. This is simple Capitalism.)
Now that I think about it, the Zimmerman apologists are right — just now, when I was getting a box of Cap’n Crunch from my cabinet, my niece spastically flung her spoon in the direction of the cereal box, and she almost hit me in the face. I only outweigh her by 120 pounds. She’s only 24 years younger than me. It’s time to teach this fucking punk a lesson in my opinion.
I could easily follow her one night, preferably in the scary darkness of 7 p.m. (“The Criminal Hoodlum Hour” according to my gated community customs) of early spring, get her to scrape my facial tissue before I of course shoot her in the heart, punch myself in the face & scrape my head on the sidewalk just enough to draw a milliliter of blood (take picture before it dries up or is washed away with the first hint of humidity), and confess/lie to the police on my way to an acquittal and a multi-millionaire existence as a neighborhood hero fake cop. Honor!
If it is true that he couldn’t be convicted under Florida’s self defense laws, then Florida law is the miscarriage of justice. Even accepting Zimmerman’s story at face value it is not reasonable to consider it self defense to shoot an unarmed child that is wrestling you. At worst Zimmerman could’ve pointed the gun at him. That he instead killed him is something he must be accountable for. “Sorry, I got scared, honest mistake” or “you know what, I bet he was a drug dealer” may be good enough explanations for Florida law, but they are not good enough for humanity.
And I hate to pull out the fucking A TIME TO KILL here but you simply cannot tell me that this jury would’ve acquitted if it was a black guy who stalked and shot to death an unarmed 17 year old kid buying candy. You know this in your heart. So even though I still think it’s an outrage without the race part of it, it would be dishonest to take the race out of it. I think alot of us feel like naive chumps for having faith that something like this would have to be punished. As white people we have the luxury of believing that.
How would you feel about the world if you knew you could’ve been Trayvon, killed for no reason walking back to your dad’s house? And then getting blamed for it yourself! There’s an entire generation feeling that. That’s why, although yes there are tragedies every day, this one is more impactful than many.
Mouth, I stopped reading your comments at least three years ago.
Oh, I’m not kidding; I make a point to ignore them. Even today I didn’t read the ones on this thread until after I posted. I see your name and that cute little avatar of yours and I s l i d e my mouse wheel right past that stuff. I’ve missed all your great points. I’ve barely read a single paragraph of your progressive, well-thought-out, thoroughly-researched, self-important rants. I bet you’ve spent SO MUCH TIME ON THEM. I bet you’ve had DEEP, WONDERFUL insight. You must be SO PROUD.
(FYI, I pretty much just read Vern’s posts and the parent posts to Vern’s comments and also Renfield’s and if a post looks well-composed and concise I might give it a stab if it’s a movie I care about, so don’t feel too bad, Mouth)
But hey, tonight I broke my own rule and discovered I’m still a bona-fide right-wing dipshit! Congratulations and Thank You! So tonight – and only tonight – you get a response from me. Just so you know I’ve also been called a faggot, an asshole, a balding white fuck, the ugliest guy in town, that I ‘need to smile more’, a shitty worker with no personality, plus the cops have been mean to me a few times and I let a girl string me along for 3 years in my late 20s without so much as a handjob (usually the cops are awesome, though, prob’ly cuz I’m white and have that Bush/Cheney’04 sticker on the back my red F150. Or is it the “NObama” sticker? Hmm…)
However, I should clarify to Vern that I was not baiting a response from him. Seriously, I wasn’t. I mean I’m not surprised you did, Vern, and am flattered as always, and just wanted you to know that I am, for the first time ever, writing a longer response to your comment. I don’t think I’ll finish it tonight because I got up at 8:30AM and was in the sun for 9 hours and need to wake up in 6 hours. My white, balding forehead is pretty burnt. But I wanted to start by saying Whoa, I didn’t realize I came across so bad! I mean I know I can come across as a sarcastic asshole, but “despicable?” Hey, I’m not making these comments in front of the Martins, nor would I.
Well . . . maybe if I would if the Martins and I were trapped in a grocery store in Wisconsin surrounded by zombies and I was drunk. Then – IF the subject came up – I might start throwing the sarcasm. Maybe. I don’t know. I’d have to be pretty pissed off because usually when I’m drunk I turn soft & try to make connection (see Above with Mouth).
By the way, Spike Lee? Can I just say that he loves to throw the race card and that it gets annoying? The guy fucking complained about FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS not having enough black people! I know I’m “right-wing” and also white but does that automatically make my position illegitimate? It’s not like I go around not hiring black people and saying “nigger.” In fact, I had some in my driveway earlier today (black people, not niggers, and also some Mexicans) and charged them the same price for my stuff as the whites. And ALSO (just another FYI) by FAR the ethnicity that has annoyed me MOST in life is White people. There’s really no contest. There are a LOT of us and we can be VERY stupid. But then again I don’t generally see race. I just see a selfish, stupid fat person with bad taste in clothes who thinks they’re entitled to whatever they want while driving a vehicle that’s at least twice as big as it needs to be. I’m not judging them because they’re white, but by their behavior and/or the content of their character. It’s by far the BEST way to dislike someone, which is why I don’t bother being racist with the other kinds of races. Black people are obnoxious when they’re loud and they don’t tip you, but then so are whites. You really think I hate the black ones more??
But Vern, I gotta say that I think you’re ignoring certain things about this case. Even in your version of the events you skipped something between “followed a black kid” and “Killed him with his gun.” That something you skipped is really the crux of the case. Plus, it’s not like the whole comment was sarcastic; I made a couple good arguments there. You may may ultimately read my stuff, imagine me as a person, and choose “heartless” – but then I think/hope you believe there’s more to me than that.
Anyway I’m composing and have more to say and will try to say it soon.
I agree with tugboat, and with Vern. These laws are garbage, whether it’s Stand Your Ground or the Castle Doctrine or whatever, but they are the law. That scares me more than any race talk or right/left bullshit.
“Then a kid gets killed under just the right circumstances and the media turns it into a sensation. ”
Under the right circumstances? Jesus, Chuck.
I don’t think this verdict is a miscarriage of justice, but I do think Zimmerman’s a creep and I can’t get behind these vigilante laws.
I’m with you Christoph – the discussions on this topic tend to start with two very unappealing points:
1. Latino douchebag with a gun follows a black kid.
2. Black kid got shot.
In between is a whole bunch of shit that the state failed to definitively prove.
I’m not convinced there was enough of a case there for him to get a murder conviction (as has been said, that kind of case is VERY difficult to make for a good reason, you wanna be damn sure before you put someone away), but it’s absolutely insane that he didn’t get slapped with a manslaughter conviction.
You initiate a situation that leads to violence (after disobeying a 911 operator), then panic and fire your weapon in self defense, you are absolutely responsible for that death.
But that’s Florida for you…
Christof, I disagree with all kinds of things Spike Lee says (note that he refused to watch DJANGO UNCHAINED, also above), but DO THE RIGHT THING is an American classic and speaks to how I feel right now. And it’s sad to feel right back at that place a quarter of a century later. It seemed like things had progressed more than that.
I appreciate you answering my post more respectfully than I did yours. The thing you did that I called despicable was to make light of the entire idea of racism in this country, laughing it off. The legacy of 400 years of slavery, and the war that was fought over it, is in the way Zimmerman saw that kid in the hoodie, the segregation of that neighborhood, the way the right wing rallied behind Zimmerman as a hero, the laws in Florida, the makeup of the jury, the differing views of this case in different parts of the country, everything. To brush it off as this silly thing that black people like to complain about that is just completely ludicrous and ignorant, but it’s offensive when it’s in the context of this kid being killed and his murderer going free.
I hate this kinda shit. I feel like I need to write something for a catharsis, but I just feel worse after arguing about it like this. I don’t want to be insulting to people who read my stuff, but also I don’t want to think people who read my stuff would see the world that way. It just bums me out.
And I can’t even say “can’t we all just get along” because I’m pretty sure then you’re gonna defend the fuckin Rodney King beating and I’m gonna consider just shutting down the websight and going to live in the mountains looking for injured birds to heal.
the whole idea of a Neighborhood Watch is fucking retarded to begin with, why go looking for trouble? aren’t the police enough if something does go wrong? do we need random dudes prowling around at night carrying a gun to “keep us safe”? it sure wouldn’t make me feel safer knowing there was a vigilante with a gun wandering my neighborhood at night
if you go looking for trouble you’re bound to eventually find it and Zimmerman did, the whole mess could have been avoided if he hadn’t been such an idiot
yeah, in some cities there are people who dress up as Super Heroes and walk the streets at night, that’s pretty idiotic too, but at least they don’t carry guns, meaning they’re only endangering themselves
Yeah, I guess it maybe wasn’t clear, but I think Zimmerman is a horrible person, it’s disgusting that he is undoubtedly responsible for Trayvon Martin’s death and shows no remorse whatsoever (and in the video I posted, he specifically says that he doesn’t regret what happened), and I really don’t believe his story for a second. I would never defend anything he did.
In England a Neighbourhood Watch basically boils down to people nosing out from the safety of their own windows and calling the police about any suspicious activity. Prowling the streets with a gun looking for “suspicious activity” is just a bad idea and can only result in a tragedy like this case.
Having only really read about all this yesterday it seem apparent that if GZ had listened to the 911 operator then the worst thing that may have happened is that Martin got stopped and possibly searched (oh those dangerous sweets!).
If some guy was following me around and being incredibly sketchy then I would, like Martin, get freaked out and react. I have to admit that I would not confront my stalker in that situation, but I cannot blame Martin for doing so, though I wish that he hadn’t. My heart goes out to all of America and I just hope that A) the civil rights case gets GZ convicted, and B) there is no escalation of violence for anyone.
Well, Rodney King was a hero! He only got arrested for assault like three times in the years following his beating.
Sorry, I’m tired, Vern. I need to go to bed and sarcasm is a reflex for me. I just wrote a big thing that I proof-read and in it I talk about Jesus and Mel Gibson and explain my world view – which I promise is not hateful but may be a bit cynical for your stomach. I won’t say it’s epic, but it was, as you say, cathartic to dump it all out. I’m gonna sleep on it and perhaps post more after work tomorrow.
I’ll sign off with this food for thought, explaining partially where I come from:
I think it’s safe to say that the majority of people think O.J. Simpson killed his wife with a big, sharp kitchen knife. This majority includes some famous black people, including Damon Wayans and Chris Rock. I don’t know what happened for sure but there seemed to be some pretty goddamn good evidence he killed someone (cut on his hand, blood in his truck, the strange behaviour prior to his arrest, etc.)
When I watched the news – many years ago now – on the day he was found innocent, my local station showed a clip of a black church reacting to the verdict. They all stood up from their pews and cheered.
I will never forget it. I was shocked, frustrated, and angry.
No, I don’t know what it’s like to be a black person. But if that’s true, then blacks don’t know what it’s like to be a white person, either. Whose opinions – whose feelings – matter more? Which of our two races shape this country more? Is it one more than the other, or is it both equally? Personally, I feel like I’ve been getting the same message shoved down my throat my entire life – and to hear people talking in light of this verdict, things don’t seem to have gotten any better! So maybe it’s time the other side got some time in the spotlight and I’ll try to do some of that tomorrow.
“The other side,” Christof? You’re really gonna go down that road? I’m kinda glad you didn’t post your original thoughts.
Yikes. So Rodney King getting arrested for assault afterwards justified his beating? I welcome differing points of view, but I can’t imagine the rant you had stored up being anything helpful.
But you have to remember how shocked, frustrated and angry he was with black people when one black celebrity getting acquitted upset the peaceful equal black-white balance we’ve always had.
I think everyone might be losing sight of the fact that Zimmerman is Latino… not white. Zimmerman’s voter registration record lists him as Hispanic and a registered Democrat.
Douchebags can be any race, and Zimmerman clearly is that – but it’s a left-wing/right-wing thing to try to frame this as a black/white race issue. Even the prosecution didn’t try that.
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/files/2012/04/whiteHispanics.jpg
Anyway, self defence: If you have to shoot, and I mean absolutely have to, point the gun at a fucking foot. I can’t swallow the ‘it’s an intense situation so you must neutralise the threat by fucking killing it’. A 17 year old probably doesn’t have the pro-wrestler moves required to leave you no choice but to aim the weapon at a kill point.
Jimbolo: Not to defend Zimmerman, but if you’re in a situation where you actually need to shoot someone, you also need your shot to not miss. And firing a pistol accurately in a stressful situation is not exactly easy. This is why people are trained to aim for the center of the torso, so even if your aim is bad you’re still likely to hit your assailant. Deliberately non-lethal “disabling” shots are pretty much a fantasy.
Meant to add: This is why the ideas like “widespread gun use will make people safer” or “an armed society is a polite society” ring so false to me. In any situation where having a gun would make a difference, the most likely difference is to make it exponentially more likely that someone will get killed.
Everyone knows Rodney King the individual was kind of a shithead. In the pre-internet era, it didn’t make the video of his beating any less of a spark to the tinder of pissed-offness that had been brewing among thousands/millions of brown people who knew the real, daily skewed injustice of police tactics & who had told each other the stories of being unlawfully fucked with by the LAPD & other Cali agencies.
Marcia Clark fucked up. Mark Fuhrman really fucked up. (After being revealed as a proponent of a rather offensive racial slur, he was convicted of perjury; he now works with Fox News.) Everyone knew OJ probably did it. That kind of explains why the Brentwood & Los Angeles police were hot on his tail as soon as they suspected him. There was a car chase and everything.
No waiting 6+ weeks, no waiting for your local community to erupt in peaceful outrage after the confessed killer didn’t even get investigated or arrested like in the case of Trayvon.
GZ pursued and killed Trayvon Martin with intent to not let the “fucking punk” “get away” like so many of “these assholes” in his gated community had done before, in his opinion, in his self-conception as a fake cop volunteer neighborhood watch crimebuster with metal justice itching at his backside.
He had a history of calling 9-1-1 whenever he sensed the possibility that he could justify being close to real policework. His neighborhood had zero history of violent crime. His neighborhood had zero history with law enforcement intrusion/interaction except for the comical number of times he contacted law enforcement.
GZ so could’ve stayed in his fucking car for a few minutes and let police come and investigate his paranoia again, but maybe he realized that this time, the 40- or 50somethingth time he called police for such piffling fake-crime & petty concerns, they would be slow to react to his cries of wolf. The fucking punk would get away, and the MMA-trained fists at his disposal and the gun in his waistline would be faster than the police’s response time to his heroic suspicion of the hoodied fiend in the suspicious dark of 7 p.m..
Also GZ for years had been a resident in this community that only contained like 3 or 4 streets and had street addresses & numbers posted on every building & corner, but he was confused & unsure about what street & what address he was on. (Yeah, that’s the ticket…)
These are facts. No straw men about an unrelated thing that happened 20 years ago. No arguments about slavery.
And here’s my reasonable interpretation, based on those facts, of what happened:
GZ went Travis Bickle on a kid one evening because it was, in his twisted mind, the logical end of a pattern of suspicion & fruitlessly bloodless gun ownership; he was sick of cops not having dealt with all the black youths that had had the gall to loiter and possibly commit other crimes against the affluent neighbors of that gated community, despite GZ’s many calls to those cops. He was sick of being the neighborhood watch guy with no interesting stories to tell his wife except how many heroic-but-feckless phone calls he had made that week versus the fact that there was allegedly another nonviolent break-in. He had to use his gun to bring “justice” to somebody, to justify his existence as a fake cop, his status as a gun owner who “belonged” in a gated community where certain people did not.
That he managed to lose a fistfight to a child the same night he murdered that unarmed child is no surprise.
This is what Failure Man does.
Darth:
“In between is a whole bunch of shit that the state failed to definitively prove.”
Maybe they did. Maybe some people can believe that some kid walking home from the shops, while on the phone to his girlfriend, decided to randomly mug a man. Maybe they can believe that this man, having somehow sensed this two minutes before the mugging actually happened, somehow got beat up by said kid. Maybe they can believe that this kid didn’t notice, during this entire time, that the man had a gun, or was so out-of-his-mind (presumably driven that way by the horrific pressure of buying a packet of sweets) that he didn’t even care about the gun. Until, y’know, the man shot him.
…Maybe some people can believe that. I sure as hell don’t.
I think Vern put my general feelings better than I can.
As for the racism issue… Zimmerman had expressed racist feelings in the past, and now he stalks and kills a black kid for no other apparent motive. Lord, maybe Zimmerman WAS just a power-hungry bully with a temper, and Martin’s death was nothing to do with his colour. All I can say is it seems unlikely to me and it sure as heck won’t matter to the Martin family.
It depresses me that this even happened.
It depresses me more that a law like “Stand your Ground” exists, so that people like Zimmerman can take advantage of it in cases like this to commit hate crimes and get off scot-free.
It depresses me even more than that that his defence was able to convince a supposedly impartial jury that such a law should be applied in this case.
But most of all, it depresses me that the Martin family will never see one of their own again, and won’t even have the satisfaction of seeing his killer locked away in jail.
But, Gabe, I get aim-for-the-main-mass… when it’s absolutely necessary, but in a tussle? You just shoot a gun NEAR someone and it will stun them.
Help me understand where you get the racism claim from?
http://www.wnd.com/2013/07/fbi-no-evidence-zimmerman-was-racist/?cat_orig=us
I am bummed by this happening as well as you guys but looking at it from the opposite extreme, in Italy people go to jail all the time for shooting home invaders in the dark, which is a travesty. So in a way I understand where stand your ground is coming from. What I don’t understand is how we can just acquit someone who I admit MAY have eventually found himself in a position where he needed to defend himself (at which point I also admit it’s pretty difficult to have the cool-headedness to distinguish between a warning shot and a lethal one) but who on all accounts WENT LOOKING for that situation. I’m not calling it murder as so e of the other guys here are but the guy has got huge responsibility in what happened. He went out looking for a fight, got one and used excessive self-defence when it looked like he was going to get an absolutely epic ass-whooping. I don’t know of that’s called murder or manslaughter or what, but it certainly ain’t called “walk off Scott free” in my book.
Jesus, Darth, don’t like to WND if you want to be taken seriously.
I get 100% that not everyone is going to agree with me, being a Marxist and all, but the right could do better in this country than WND and the racist bullshit we’ve had other people link to in the past.
Vern and others have said as much, but this shouldn’t be a political issue. That it is says more about those that defend Zimmerman than anything else, and how awful and vile their politics are. Do these people watch Taxi Driver or Observe and Report (Zimmerman seems indistinguishable to me from Seth Rogen in that movie) and think of the main characters as good guys?
I guess that’s my problem here. Best case scenario is that Zimmerman stalked a black kid because he looked suspicious (and you’re dishonest if you think that is for any reason other than Trayvon being black) and started an altercation (despite being told not to by 9-1-1) that he could not finish. Maybe that’s not illegal, but it’s fucking wrong and fuck all of you for trying to defend it.
As a white dude I very strongly believe that one of the most subtle and insidious forms of racism is the insistence that only white men can identify other people, that people can not choose to self identify as they see fit. Too many white people get upset at the term “African American” or whatnot. Maybe Zimmerman is a Latino, but I know several people who went to highschool with him who all said he postured and otherwise was white. Even if he was Tito fucking Puente it wouldn’t absolve him of the possibility of racism. Hell living in Puerto Rico for four years taught me that white Puerto Ricans were much better off than black Puerto Ricans, even more so than is true in America.
Also, not to be overly pedantic but Zimmerman was not a member of any Neighborhood Watch type program. They have strict guidelines and rules for how one acts in those programs, and not only was Zimmerman never part of any such organization but he would have broken every rule those organizations have. He was a vigilante looking for trouble. He was a shit person, and the refusal of those on the right to even admit as much is fucking terrifying.
My perspective here is that libs typically ignore all the evidence that supports Zimmerman, and conservatives ignore the Trayvon evidence. Then there’s the unsubstantiated claims of racist remarks – the closest I can find evidence of being the reference to coon, which was subsequently debunked as cold.
My point is – everyone here – myself included – are drawing conclusions based on whatever the media is presenting. I’d like to see someone here read the court transcripts and comment on, you know, the actual evidence, instead of the media’s interpretation of the evidence.
Darth, fair point.
1) I’m not a liberal.
2) I get that racism is a serious charge and needs solid proof, but we shouldn’t get too stupid to think that Zimmerman was suspicious of Trayvon Martin for a reason other than race. I mean, fuck.
3) This is a bigger conversation than what simply went on in the court room. Like I said before, the best case scenario is that Zimmerman is a piece of shit. Are conservatives still upset about OJ Simpson or butt hurt they ran Romney against Obama that this is the hill they want to fight on? Seriously?
4) Better article, and one that doesn’t quite jive with the WND one you linked to. Good job, I guess.
5) Even CNN, who those on the right accuse of wanting to lynch Zimmerman because REVERSE RACISM, still does this fucking shit: “The 28-year-old neighborhood watch volunteer…” which implies that he was a member of a neighborhood watch organization, one that you could volunteer for. He was not. He was a vigilante.
Well Casey, since you apparently know more than the investigator on the case, who actually you know, interviewed people, I think we’re going to have to agree to disagree.
Though I will give you the Zimmerman as a piece of shit argument.
Question, if you’re walking alone at night and see a group of black men and get uncomfortable does that make you a racist?
It’s not that I know more than the investigator, but that words have meanings that can sometimes be subtle. Is racism a binary distinction, or are there shades of it? Does Zimmerman have to be a racist to view Trayvon Martin with more suspicion because of his race?
Your problem is that you read these words and think of them as being used in a very iron clad way that simply does not exist.
Pretty sure the words “believed that Zimmerman’s actions were not based on Martin’s skin color, rather based on his attire, the total circumstances of the encounter and the previous burglary suspects in the community,” don’t leave much room for ambiguity.
I’m just glad we found one FBI Investigator to put this matter to rest, what with his secret ability to look into Zimmerman’s heart and see the goodness and light within :)
Sooo….
Pacific Rim any good?
:)
Fucking Christ. The contortions motherfuckers have to go through to justify this awful bullshit perpetrated by a racist pussy who went out of his way to create a situation where he got to shoot somebody and feel awesome about it afterward. It’s dishonest and disingenuous to claim that a dude who called the cops dozens of times about completely innocent African Americans in his neighborhood suddenly became color blind when Trayvon Martin showed up. It’s disingenuous and dishonest to claim that this case would have turned out exactly the same way if the races had been reversed. But for some reason, some people would rather rally around the team of people that just happen to have a similar amount of melanin than the team of people who aren’t racist pussies who shoot kids for no reason. But you’re not racist, you’re right. We got rid of racism in the sixties, didn’t you hear? I’ve personally never been racist to a black person to his face so therefore racism is a myth. #truthbomb
while on the topic of racism, I remember one of the things I found the most shocking about the internet when I first got it in 2006 was all the damn racism, it was fucking everywhere you looked
in my pre-internet years I knew racists still existed, heck I even knew there was such a thing as racist websites, but I assumed it was a small minority, that the only racists left were old rednecks, never in a million years would I have assumed that so many people of my generation would still be racist, I naively assumed that racism was largely a thing of the past for young people, that even if you weren’t particularly into hip hop or hip hop culture (like me) you still thought black people were cool (as I do)
boy, I had a LOT to learn, the first thing I noticed was on the imdb message boards pretty frequently you would see racist posts on boards for popular movies, whether or not it had anything to do with the movie, I remember seeing one guy starting a thread about how much he hates Mexicans on the Fast and the Furious Tokyo Drift board,…..a movie set in Japan no less and then on the Spiderman 3 board when it was revealed that Spidey would have his famous black suit in the movie someone asked “why have they turned Spiderman into a nigger?”
sure, some of this was just stupid trolling, but most of it was not, but as I learned that was just the tip of the iceberg, next thing I knew I started seeing it all over youtube and 4chan, basically what I learned is anytime you have a website visited by a large number of people with loose moderation, you’re gonna see racism everywhere and that’s a fucking sad fact
so anybody that thinks “racism is over” is dead wrong
Yeah, Darth, there’s really no way that Zimmerman wasn’t racist. His black neighbors were so intimidated by his constant profiling / harassment and his fixation with guns that they didn’t feel safe walking around their own neighborhood. That article quotes one of his neighbors saying he would drive downtown if he wanted to go for a walk at night.
And another thing. Let’s say that there are black people out there who cheered when OJ was let off, and who still defend him even after the interviews and “If I did it” and the rest. My response is: so what?
I understand that it’s a popular argument among a certain class of people, who no doubt consider themselves very fair-minded, who make the point that “if the blacks / hispanics / Asian-Americans / other minority of choice want to have equal standing with everyone else, they need to accept the same responsibilities / limits.” And they turn this into a way to justify opposing things like “affirmative action” bills, low-income tax relief, and legislation generally aimed at making life easy for the poor or ethnic minorities. Now I fully admit that I’m writing from a position of comparative ignorance here – I’m not an American, I’m going purely on what I’ve seen on the Internet and read in the newspapers. And a lot of that is biased or inflamatory stuff.
That aside, I understand that there may be very sound reasons why a particular bill may be unsound, impractical, or unconstitutional. But the quote I just made sure as hell isn’t one of them. If the Zimmerman case, and others quoted by people here, have made anything clear, it’s that any scenario that includes blacks having “equal standing” is an extreme hypothetical. I would LOVE to live in a world where everybody has an equal opportunity to make something of themselves. The sad fact is that that’s never been the case, and it’s certainly not likely to change any time soon. People can be noble and righteous. They can also be petty, small-minded, and bigoted. That, also, is never going to change. The best you can do – or any society can do – is to try and minimise the damage caused by the latter group.
Ok, I think I’m done.
Fucked up? Yep.
Surprised? Nope.
Ashamed of my country? Most of the time.
Christof, I would like to throw my vote in for you NOT posting your Jesus/Mel Gibson/Give-the-Whites-a-Chance piece.
That’s some appallingly ignorant shit.
Majestyk: Didn’t you hear? GZ is Hispanic, or something, and since his bloodline isn’t 100% pure Aryan, race can’t possibly be a factor.
Christof: If that weird OJ digression is anything to go by, I think that maybe you should pull the eject and not post your epic think-piece. I suspect it’s going to be fifteen paragraphs of “I’m not racist, but…”
I guess I would identify myself as a politically conservative Christian, but Lord Jesus can we stop with all of this “poor white man O.J. got off minorities get scholarships why do I have to select a language at the ATM slavery was a long time ago why do black people get their own TV station and dating websight” bullshit? It’s as bad as all of these Christians who say gay marriage is going to send God over the edge and kill us all (because slavery and genocide weren’t enough to piss God off, it’s the two dudes in love that’ll finally do it). It is a privilege to be a white man in this country. We are not oppressed. People who have never experienced oppression seem to be mistaking it with mild annoyance. It’s embarrassing.
Interesting question: suppose Martin, during the fight, had actually fractured Zimmerman’s skull or something, causing him to die. Considering Zimmerman was armed and Martin definitely had reason to believe his life was in danger, would he have been acquitted too? Or does it only count as standing your ground if you’ve got a gun?
Honestly the douchebaggery on both sides of the argument is staggering here. I’d have expected to see more reasoned perspectives from the guys on this site. Both sides are willfully ignoring any elements that support the opposing perspective, and the truth is somewhere in between. And not one of us has actually looked at the FBI reports (though at least I skimmed those) or the transcripts, but instead rely on our media of choice to inform our opinion. Hands up anyone who’s read the official documentation?
Was Zimmerman a dick, and acting inappropriately? Absolutely. Did he do anything illegal up until the confrontation that not one of us was there for? No. Did he initiate the confrontation? I don’t know, I wasn’t there. But the fact is the state failed to disprove reasonable doubt in the minds of 6 jurors. Did he lie about Trayvon going for the gun to bolster his self defense story? No doubt. No fucking way he saw the gun in the dark, on his hip, under a jacket.
Can I see Trayvon confronting the guy following him? Absolutely. Tell me you can’t see some wanna be badass kid who thinks he’s invincible, and grew up on action movies and gangster rap, or heavy metal or whatever, thinking he’s going to go jump the clown following him. Cause I would have done that shit at his age, and so would about 40 percent of my friends. And of those 40%, there’s only about 3 of us that would have actually been genuine badasses, so most of them would be ineffectual. And don’t try to tell me he wouldn’t jump a guy with a gun: he almost certainly didn’t see it until it was too late.
The bottom line is this is not as black and white as some of you guys are making it out to be, but the wilful ignoring of data points from the other perspective is unconscionable, and how Texas continues to sentence man-children to the death penalty for shit they didn’t do. It is not a black and white issue (no pun intended) because there were no witnesses who saw the thing. Anything we believe to have happened in, and leading up to the confrontation is speculation. It’s that simple. To claim otherwise, is to argue reductively about a complex issue.
We have a justice system designed to prevent that kind of reductive simplification. Does it fail sometimes? Yes. Did it fail here? Maybe. We’ll never know for sure because we weren’t there.
I don’t have enough of an opinion either way to state definitively – BECAUSE I WASN’T THERE. But I’m at least aware enough to know that there are valid data points for both camps, regardless of how tragic the actual outcome was.
What are you mad about exactly? Regardless of whether George Zimmerman is legally culpable for the shooting, it’s undeniably true that a kid is dead and it’s his fault. And it’s also undeniably true that Zimmerman is a piece of shit who has shown zero remorse for it happening and would gladly do it again if he had the chance. So fuck him, nobody should waste their breath saying that pile of human garbage deserves the benefit of the doubt.
If you’re mad because you support the legal outcome of the case but everybody’s trying to act like it means you’re the president of the George Zimmerman fan club and donated your life savings to his legal defense, that’s understandable, but don’t take it personally, emotions are running high. I’m sympathetic to the idea, but then I try to read something like the transcript of George Zimmerman’s 911 call and my heart just sinks into my stomach, there’s no way I can even fathom that this guy is less than 100% guilty.
And maybe there’s a lot of armchair pop psychology analysis going on, and Mouth seems really intent on convincing everybody that this 7pm thing is tremendously meaningful and important, but I don’t think anybody is ignoring the facts or intentionally distorting the narrative. It’s just that when one story seems to be overwhelmingly likely to be true, it’s hard to accept that that’s not enough for the legal system. And like Vern said in response to my own post earlier, it really is utterly baffling that a guy can cause the death of an innocent kid and we just have to shrug and say that our system is not equipped to handle it (or, more likely, as Mouth pointed out, that our legal system is designed to let rich people skate around the law just so and avoid being convicted as long as they’re not black and have a convenient narrative with even a vanishingly small chance at being true).
A mistake I realize I made was that it’s just not appropriate timing to jump in and defend anything about what happened, even it’s just to defend the broad legal principles that might make you support this decision as a sad necessity even if every bit of you hates the fact that Zimmerman the person is just walking around free right now. There’s just no way to do it without looking like you’re eager to excuse or justify some part of the tragedy. At best it looks like contrarianism for its own sake, at worst it looks like you’re reveling in everybody’s pain and misery.
Also I think the trap you’re falling into now is letting yourself actually argue on behalf of Zimmerman when I think all you’re really trying to do is say that you understand the ruling. You don’t have to imagine scenarios where Zimmerman is less morally culpable or try to convince people that Martin could have attacked Zimmerman (which is pretty hard to read), and you don’t have to admonish people for making conclusions, which they’re free to do and doesn’t impact what I think you’re trying to say.
Sorry if none of this makes sense, I haven’t slept in a while and am probably delirious and rambling. Oh well, I hope there’s something helpful buried in there.
> Interesting question: suppose Martin, during the fight, had actually fractured Zimmerman’s skull or something, causing him to die. Considering Zimmerman was armed and Martin definitely had reason to believe his life was in danger, would he have been acquitted too? Or does it only count as standing your ground if you’ve got a gun?
Mouth mentioned it somewhere above, but the stand your ground thing was only briefly floated as a defense and had little bearing on the trial (though it did impact the instructions the jury were given regarding self-defense).It seems kind of weird that they would ever have considered stand your ground, because stand your ground just means that you aren’t obligated to retreat before using deadly force, but Zimmerman’s story doesn’t even give him an opportunity to retreat so I don’t understand where it comes into play.
I’d like to imagine that Martin wouldn’t have been convicted, for the same reason and based on the same principles that Zimmerman wasn’t — the prosecution would need to establish that Martin attacked Zimmerman, and that he couldn’t reasonably have been in fear for his life. I think maybe that speaks to what Darth is trying to say and what I was trying to say earlier, which is that it’s disgusting and horrible that Zimmerman got off, but under different circumstances I wouldn’t want that standard to be lowered.
Realistically, like a bunch of people have said, it’s hard to imagine that if the races were reversed, it would have been anything other than a conviction, though.
This site has the instructions the jury was given. Martin would have needed to believe he was in danger and would have needed to believe that using deadly force was the only way to avoid that danger, so if he were to say he saw Zimmerman reach for his gun, I guess that would satisfy it? The law doesn’t differentiate between different types of deadly force, so it doesn’t matter whether it’s a gun or a concrete sidewalk.
Assuming the same witnesses, same evidence, etc., you’d hope that Martin would have been acquitted based on the fact that there’s a reasonable self-defense narrative (much more reasonable than the one Zimmerman got away with) and no witnesses or evidence to contradict it. I think?
I’m just frustrated that THIS group of all groups is the one that trashes anyone with a different opinion. I guess I expected better.
You’re right to an extent – I’m just trying to say that neither position is 100% right, but both groups seem to have adopted the mindset of “if you’re not for me, you’re against me.”. I expect that on AICN, but this is typically a more nuanced crowd, whose discussions I normally enjoy reading.
But when have you ever heard before “Well, he killed him, but he said it was in self defense, and nobody else saw it, so we have to take his word for it.” That is not a thing. But people keep saying it like it’s a well known part of the American justice system. If the jury really were just following the limited instructions they had, as people keep saying, then that’s what’s so fucked about it. It’s one thing if 6 dumb assholes make the wrong decision. It’s another thing if the system is set up to require that decision.
Everyone who defends this verdict talks about Zimmerman’s right to self defense, then uses Martin’s actual attempt at self defense as the thing that Zimmerman had to defend himself from. If a guy is stalking you with a gun, and you fight back, that should be the self defense right? Everyone claims to have these principles but then they have to figure out some weird way for the principles to support a guy seeing a kid he didn’t know, assuming the worst, and murdering him.
You’re right, there are many complicated issues surrounding the event. But the main thing at the core – that a fucking idiot who kills an innocent kid on the street because he made stupid assumptions about him shouldn’t be able to get away with it – couldn’t be simpler.
Darth – you seem to be under the impression that what was really needed in this case was a witness. Based on what, exactly? I’ve read about the case, I know the essentials. There’s no doubt that Zimmerman shot Martin. There’s no question that Martin was unarmed (except for “the concrete” apparently). I find the idea of Zimmerman’s actions being justified by any fear for his life to be completely at odds with some of the facts that I’ve read, and nobody seems to be claiming that those facts are wrong. So where exactly do you think the ambiguity is?
And regarding this:
“I’m just frustrated that THIS group of all groups is the one that trashes anyone with a different opinion. I guess I expected better.”
Look, I get that you’re feeling beaten down here, but still… please don’t pull that shit. Just don’t. An unrepentant bully shot an unarmed kid and a jury acquitted him of the crime. Now the kid’s family will never get justice. That, I think, is the “opinion” that we’re all so eager to defend. I think most people have been very reasonable about it (a couple less so, but as Tugboat said, emotions are running high, don’t take it personally.) Not all opinions are equally valid. There are a lot of people who are of the “opinion” that vaccinations cause autism or that God’s existence is scientifically proven. I for one have been a LOT harder on those people than I’ve been on you.
Tugboat, that Media Matters link you posted is about how the media (and Mouth) are incorrect to say that Stand Your Ground had no bearing on the trial. It shows how the requirements for self defense in the jury instructions were drastically changed by the law. But even with those instructions I just don’t see how they can justify it. It requires that “the appearance of danger must have been so real that a reasonably cautious and prudent person under the same circumstances would have believed that the danger could be avoided only through the use of that force.” A reasonably cautious and prudent person would certainly not believe they had to use deadly force on an unarmed kid in a street scuffle. (Of course, a reasonably cautious and prudent person would not have gotten into the scuffle in the first place.)
Darth, our emotions are running high. It’s a little different from debating a movie. I try to be understanding and thoughtful, but how understanding can you be about the justification of killing a kid? We can all discuss every legal angle of the case and go to law school and do a remake of The Paper Chase, but at the end of the day a kid was still killed by a guy who is not being held accountable. What if that was a kid you knew – a neighbor, a cousin, a friend’s son? After he was killed for no reason, and the system endorsed his killing, how much room would you see for nuance?
Even O.J. didn’t get the murder weapon returned to him!
Sorry Vern, hadn’t read your post before I wrote mine.
I did a shit job of explaining it. I think this site explains better what the requirements are.
Zimmerman doesn’t have to be a racist for this to be a race-based killing. The issue is the larger, socially endemic racism that permeates America. This racism can be seen starkly in the fact that there is a debate over whether a well-dressed child walking in his own neighborhood could be viewed as suspicious. Yes, apparently there were some burglaries in the area that were attributed to young black men… But that doesn’t mean that these burglaries (if they happened at all, since there was no prosecution) were actually committed by young black men, or if they were just attributed to young black men because of preexisting racial bias.
And as a dude who has been followed by a car while walking in his own neighborhood, I can tell you that I completely understand trayvon throwing the first punch in self-defense. If the guy following me had stopped and gotten out of his car, well I had steel-toed boots and a pocket knife open and ready for him. And you can bet damn well that I wouldn’t have waited to see why he was stalking me; kick in a knee and aim for the throat on his way down. The car followed me for almost a mile, almost to my front door, in a neighborhood where I had been assaulted before. You’re damn right I was afraid for my life. You would be too. And if you’re scrawny like me, you know you’ve got about 5 seconds before you’re going to be overpowered.
That fight started the moment trayvon noticed Zimmerman stalking him. Stalking was the first blow. This is a fact that is very clear to women who walk at night but invisible to men (which I believe make up 100% of the commenters in this topic?)
Key differences here –
1) I’m white(Ish)
2)it was 1 am, not 7 pm
3) frankly, I was dressed suspiciously
4) there was a history of violent crimes in my area. I know, but I was the victim of one of them
Also, I’m not bloodthirsty or anything like that. I was just placed in a situation where I had reason to fear for my immediate safety. I’ve been attacked a few times, and each of those could easily have ended in my death (not exaggerating here), so the need to be prepared was not imagined. I do not start fights and haven’t been in a fight since the 10th grade.
> But when have you ever heard before “Well, he killed him, but he said it was in self defense, and nobody else saw it, so we have to take his word for it.” That is not a thing. But people keep saying it like it’s a well known part of the American justice system. If the jury really were just following the limited instructions they had, as people keep saying, then that’s what’s so fucked about it. It’s one thing if 6 dumb assholes make the wrong decision. It’s another thing if the system is set up to require that decision.
I chatted with a couple of lawyer friends about this because I thought it was astonishing too, but yeah, that’s pretty much how it works right now. You just have to claim self-defense and then it’s up to the prosecution to disprove it, you don’t even have to have any evidence to support your claim.
I reread the comments and you guys are right, there’s no way I can consciounably defend what I was trying to say earlier, because if this is the way the law is supposed to work then it’s horrifically broken. So I’ll have to think a bit more about it and why that was the first place I jumped to, but I appreciate the thoughtful, well-researched folks here setting me straight.
Vern, Zimmerman was held accountable; he was arrested, charged with a crime, and brought to trial.
“A reasonably cautious and prudent person would certainly not believe they had to use deadly force on an unarmed kid in a street scuffle.”
I appreciate you calling me smart, Vern. I think you’re smart, too. But I’m calling bullshit on this one. I think you’re wrong on this, or at least partially Brainlocked. I’m not gonna say Brainwashed, because I think that sounds worse and implies that you don’t have a non-partisan, non-agile brain.
If someone can prove to me that Trayvon wasn’t bashing Zimmerman’s head into the pavement, I will shut up forever.
Either way, you are all spared my essay on Mel Gibson & Jesus Christ (though I think my thoughts may have caught some of you by surprise).
–
I don’t like everything Obama said today, but I agree with and am glad for some of what he said.
Part of me hates talking about this stuff, too. Strange as it may sound, I’m not really interested in winning arguments on the internet. The anonymity can be both a blessing and a curse. Sometimes I wish we could all have face to face conversations over a bonfire, let all the facets & nuances play out organically, and find some truths together. Especially in cases like this. Alas.
I meant “agile” brain.
Stop teasing with the Gibson/Jesus essay and just deliver.
Christof – Sure, he is held accountable in the sense that he knows what he did and society knows what he did and he’ll have to leave the country and grow a funny mustache or something. But in a normal case where somebody fucks up and causes somebody else’s death they would be punished in some way, not just arrested a month and a half later after some complaints and then let off the hook and given back the murder weapon.
Martin was a kid minding his own business who was being followed on the street by an ARMED adult who was bigger than him and, as we know in retrospect, willing and able to kill him. If Martin did bash Zimmerman’s head into the ground as you say then he was inarguably trying to defend himself. He just didn’t succeed. If you believe in the principle of self defense you can’t also use this child defending himself as the reason why the armed adult had to defend himself. You’re so eager to justify the murder of a child that you’re willing to use Alice in Wonderland logic to convince yourself.
What would you tell kids to do if they were being followed by a stranger? Run, scream for help, but under no circumstances defend yourself, because then it would be legally and morally correct for the stranger to execute you on the spot?
I’m really glad the president talked about this and did a better job of articulating alot of the stuff I’ve been trying to say in these comments. He made a good point: if Martin had been old enough to legally own a gun, would you have wanted him to stand his ground against Zimmerman?
As I’ve been thinking about this more I realize that what we are legalizing here is killing people because they scare us. Zimmerman, if not a racist, is a total pussy who is scared of a kid and his sweatshirt. (Previously he called 911 on a “suspicious black male age 7-9.” Luckily we don’t have to find out whether or not you’d be behind him shooting a kid that young if he got scared enough.) But let’s take race out of this. Wouldn’t an ordinary, less sissy type person be justified in being scared if they ran into a grown adult who looked intimidating, say Tyler Mane, the Undertaker, Michael Berryman, Danny Trejo, somebody scary like that? All our horror movie heroes? Is it really every human’s duty to not seem scary to anyone who has a gun?
Shit, imagine what it feels like to be Tiny Lister. Black *and* actually scary looking. It doesn’t seem fair. Maybe this isn’t a good law, I’m starting to think.
How did I get singled out by someone as …controversial as Christof as the one respondent whose posts he reads?
—
Still waiting for a rebuttal to my complaints in the Jack Reacher thread, gentlemen. Take your time.
If Tiny Lister was beating the shit out of me, and I had a gun, I might just aim and pull the trigger. You can call me a racist for that, but you’d be wrong. I fucking loved his cameo in Dark Knight, and had a hard time rooting against him in NO HOLDS BARRED, and I was 12 years old at the time and also Loved Hulk Hogan (who hadn’t yet cheated on his wife).
“If Martin did bash Zimmerman’s head into the ground as you say then he was inarguably trying to defend himself”
And I still say you are brainlocked, Vern. Defend himself against what? A guy following him? Did GZ attack him?
Sorry, but listen to what you’re saying; I mean do you just PUNCH people who follow you? Should that be a legally allowed action? Look, I know there is some “vagueness” as far as what actually happened, but according to Zimmerman, Trayvon “jumped” him.
Fine, let’s consider race. And let’s say we agree that *one* punch (a “fuck off homie” punch) is justified. (which I don’t personally justify but lets just agree for argument’s sake).
Well apparently it went beyond one punch. I mean listen to that fucking 911 tape. I’m serious. Go to wikipedia and listen to the first one out of, like, 8 that they list. It’s a couple minutes long, it’s disturbing, and a woman tells “Justin”? to get down after the shot is fired. It’s haunting to listen to. And Vern, you seem willing to admit that Trayvon was doing the punching, so listen to that audio. Please.
–
Now, after listening to it, assuming that that is Zimmerman screaming for help, does that change your opinion at all? Does it form a *crack* even?
–
I gotta say, another thing that bugs me: this constant referral of Trayvon as being a “kid.”
Since when is 17 an age that predicates some sort of innocence? Kids that age and younger are occasionally charged as adults if the case warrants it.
Dylan Klebold was 17.
Trayvon was taller than Zimmerman, and though he wasn’t as heavy, could arguably have struck him to the ground and tried to keep him there, via punches and what-not (again, listen to testimony and audio and consider the physical evidence).
Also, Vern, you use the term “street scuffle” which I would argue is an attempt to minimize the altercation on Trayvon’s behalf. Personally, I’ve been in zero street altercations, but if I was getting my head bashed against the cement, I’m not sure how concerned I’d be about Stand Your Ground Laws, or about the age of the person attacking me, for that matter. What would concern me more than anything else is making sure my head was no longer striking the cement. Race be damned.
@ renfield, sorry, it’s just I’ve come to like your posts over the past couple years, for what movies I can’t quite remember.
@ Chopper, maybe I’ll share the Gibson stuff. I’ve got another busy week; we’ll see how much time I have after work.
There was no “head-bashing.” Dude had, like, wee nail-scratches on the top of his head
(frankly, the kind of minor wound that would have to be self-inflicted, because if a guy in the dominant mounted position actually successfully bashed the lower guy’s head, it’d be a hell of a lot worse — I’ve seen shitbag malingerers in the Army claim on the landing zone that they had a bad jump/landing in Airborne operations because they want to avoid follow-on training missions; they all come up with scratches on their cheeks, ears, & skulls (with their Gerbers/knives in a conveniently nearby pocket) and they claim to be concussed)
and a swollen nose that went away in less than 48 hours. Dude didn’t even have a concussion. And if he were really smart, he woulda faked a concussion, because the difficult-to-precisely-assess symptoms would favor his “self-defense I am a pussy who was trained in MMA but lost a fight I picked with a 17 year old that I had to shoot with my gun because my gun makes me a manly man” case.
The entire defense was catered to a cowardly jury of hand-to-hand-inexperienced cowardly women. This was not justice.
I would love for the Feds to confiscate & backdoor GZ’s computer and/or IP address and see if he googled “self defense” or “stand your ground” or “justifiable homicide” or “firearm discharge in gated community precedent” and such in the weeks leading up to the day he picked a fight with the child he murdered.
I don’t agree with all that Christof says, but I do agree that shooting a guy beating you is more legit than beating a guy following you.
That’s exactly what the NRA and gun-sellers want to hear, Chopper. Let’s just arm everyfuckingbody. You know, for “peace of mind.” Fear reigns.
Cuz if you’re man enough to scream like a pussy bitch while a scary 17 year old gets on top of your MMA-trained self and “bashes” you, then you’re man enough to have a loaded gun at the ready to end that boy’s life instead of waiting for the neighbors or cops to intervene.
I hope the Zimmerman family, the Zimmerman legal defense team, and all suspiciously right-wing defenders of the child-killer overcome their phobia of concrete, by the way;
I know it’s very difficult for them to exist in civilized society in the 21st century, and I so pity them, what with the fact that they are surrounded by lethal weapons every time they use a sidewalk or roadway or modern edifice.
No matter how much they outweigh the brandishers of this weaponized concrete (and don’t try to tell me it couldn’t be used & classified as a weapon just cuz it was tethered to the earth, libruls),
no matter how much older or more fight-training-experienced they are,
no matter the fact that they have the pussy crutch of a superior weapon – a loaded firearm – in their waistband,
I know now that they are traumatized by sweatshirts, too-dark brown skin, and concrete -– all elements, especially in the scary “nothing good happens” hour of 7 p.m., that surely send them (and the jury) into paralyzing shivers on sight
(well, not paralyzing enough to stop them from grasping a phone and calling 9-1-1 dozens of times,
and not paralyzing enough to stop them from ignoring Emergency Dispatch’s instructions to not follow children in their neighborhoods,
and not paralyzing enough to stop them from grasping a gun and squeezing the trigger),
and so I sympathize.
We’ll all understand if they must unload a full magazine every time they approach an interstate onramp, just to demonstrate their love of freedom and their unwillingness to be intimidated & defeated by the awesome deadly power of concrete.
Infinite, unfettered, jury-of-one’s-pussy-peers-approved self-defense — there’s the new Florida slogan, representing the new 21st century Wild West America in America’s Penis-appendage State, now populated by armed pussies instead of 1880s Clint Eastwood types.
Being a pussy thankfully isn’t, and shouldn’t be, a justification for being assaulted. I think Zimmerman is a creep for following the kid, but he certainly has the right to defend himself from being attacked. We can’t qualify it by size or age or any bullshit. Defending yourself from being beaten is better than defending yourself from being followed.
Ok, good, then the person with the gun is always in the right so long as he finishes the job and there are no witnesses. Got it.
You suck, Christof.
And Mouth, good on you.
Zimmerman was 100% wrong to shoot the kid to death. He was told not to follow him. He continued to do so. He is 100% the reason why this kid (yes 17 year olds are kids) is dead. It’s almost like you can kill anybody you want when you get into a fight and are losing.
I also found his brothers comments great because Zimmerman now deserves to feel what it was like for Treyvon Martin for the rest of his life.
“He’s a free man in the eyes of the court, but he’s gonna be looking around his shoulder for the rest of his life,” Zimmerman said. “There are people that would want to take the law into their own hands as they perceive it, or you know, be vigilantes in some sense, they think justice was not served, they won’t respect the verdict no matter how it was reached and they will always present a threat to George and to his family.”
Look, I’m not a Zimmerman apologist, but even if he was following, if Trayvon did jump him and throw the first set of punches, it wasn’t Zimmerman who started the *actual* physical altercation.
Taking the stalking out of it, if Zimmerman had been just a dude who happened to have a gun, walking along behind Martin, and Martin punched him for following and got shot, would the guy be at fault?
I disagree with a bunch of what Christoph said, but this one is pretty to the point:
“Sorry, but listen to what you’re saying; I mean do you just PUNCH people who follow you? Should that be a legally allowed action?”
Again, it’s clear Zimmerman is the instigator of the event, but not that he instigated the actual physical altercation, which in the mind of the jury (and obviously some of us) is enough to cast reasonable doubt.
Fair enough, though I still feel like that at least meets the qualifications of manslaughter, that his actions, his poor decisions, and his inclination to use a firearm brought about the circumstances that led to the wrongful violent death.
The frustration here lies in the fact that I would like a world with more Daltons, while the right wing crowd and the jury seems to want a world with more Paul Kerseys.
Sorry Darth, can’t agree with that one either. Zimmerman’s gun didn’t just materialise out of thin air the moment he made the fatal shot. In all of the time of the “incident” (which is several minutes) Zimmerman could’ve just shown Martin the weapon and told him to run. If, y’know, he actually wanted Martin to run. As opposed to wanting him dead.
Mouth — I think that’s pretty much the most important aspect here. We can argue all day long about exactly how racist Zimmerman is or what his motives were, but it really doesn’t matter. For all I know, Zimmerman is actually a nice guy who just made a series of terrible miscalculations one particular night. Even if that were true, though, those misjudgments lead to someone’s death at his hands. I don’t see how that can possibly NOT be manslaughter. Frankly, I thought second-degree murder was always a bit of an iffy charge given the evidence on hand. But it seems like if you end up intentionally killing someone because you mistakenly thought they were a threat… well, mistake or no, it’s still on you. That’s why we have a charge called manslaughter, to take into account the fact that you can make an honest mistake and still have been out of line and accountable for the harm you caused.
Darth-
“a dude who happened to have a gun” you say.
People just “happening” to have guns is considered pretty controversial by most of world…
Could it be that all the fine print and interpretive ambiguity underlying stuff like SyG and CD might be related to a fruitless attempt to make feasible a fundamentally untenable situation, namely one in which we let people own weapons that should be social-contracted out of our hands?
Whatever ambiguity you see in the Zimmerman ordeal, I don’t see anybody bending so far backwards as to argue that somebody is still dead if you subtract the firearm.
Christof – no need to apologize, I just didn’t realize I was such a visible participant to have my name dropped.
Probably true – but you won’t win that argument here in the US. If Sandy Hook couldn’t trigger a change in gun control, this won’t. Whereas NZ, where I’m from, requires you to basically provide an essential organ to the police to get a gun license. On the other hand, we get people dragged behind cars for a couple miles instead. We also have some fairly serious racism going on. We just don’t shoot people over it.
The depressing thing is the incredible media attention this has had, but three off duty cops can essentially beat a man with Down Syndrome to death ( http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2370989/Ethan-Saylor-case-Sheriffs-office-releases-investigative-file-Down-syndrome-man-26-died-handcuffs-floor-refused-leave-movie-theater.html ) and no-one gives a shit.
It all depends on your priorities I guess.
Christof:
Sorry, but listen to what you’re saying; I mean do you just PUNCH people who follow you? Should that be a legally allowed action? Look, I know there is some “vagueness” as far as what actually happened, but according to Zimmerman, Trayvon “jumped” him.
Are you fucking kidding me? You agree with the legality of a guy shooting and killing an innocent kid because he incorrectly thought he was in the wrong neighborhood, but you’re worried about this idea of somebody getting punched?
No, it is generally not “a legally allowed action” to punch somebody for following you, it could be considered assault. But in the end the guy who was wrong would’ve had a bruise. In your preferred scenario, the one that actually happened, the kid who did nothing wrong is dead and the guy who was wrong is your hero. Your system doesn’t work.
(a “fuck off homie” punch)
Yeah, race has nothing to do with your opinion here. You are colorblind. You liked Tiny Lister in THE DARK KNIGHT.
I gotta say, another thing that bugs me: this constant referral of Trayvon as being a “kid.”
Since when is 17 an age that predicates some sort of innocence? Kids that age and younger are occasionally charged as adults if the case warrants it.
17 is a kid because he could only drive a car for about a year. He couldn’t vote yet. He couldn’t join the military yet. He couldn’t legally drink yet. He couldn’t graduate high school yet. He couldn’t move out from his parents’ house yet. Because he looked like a kid. Because he was in kindergarten when 9-11 happened. Because a month earlier he could’ve gone to try to see UNDERWORLD: AWAKENING and been turned away. Young enough that you, Christof, have to pretend 17 isn’t a kid in order to avoid the shame of defending the execution of a kid.
I mean, if George Zimmerman had tried to hang out with Trayvon Martin people would’ve been suspicious, would’ve thought it was inappropriate, that he was a child molester. It would’ve been illegal for them to get it on. But don’t worry, he just killed him, it’s fine.
Dylan Klebold was 17.
Okay, I should look this up myself, but that guy used guns, didn’t he? Or did he go into a school and beat everybody up? It was my understanding that he used guns.
I guess it’s too bad the timelines didn’t line up so that Klebold had been the one whose dad lived in that neighborhood. Obviously since race wasn’t a factor Zimmerman would’ve seen him with his candy and thought he was a burglar and followed “this asshole” and approached him and got scared for his life and shot and killed him. And seeing one of the kids from the neighborhood dead on the street the police would’ve taken his word for it and not have arrested him for a month and a half, and the jury would’ve found him innocent, and the right wing would’ve celebrated his death and smeared his life and family, even without TIMECOP style foreknowledge of what he would’ve done later.
Trayvon was taller than Zimmerman, and though he wasn’t as heavy, could arguably have struck him to the ground and tried to keep him there, via punches and what-not
And this punching thing that even you will say “arguably” “could” happen, you think it’s a crime worthy of on-the-spot execution? Because that’s where we differ here, I think.
Seriously though. You are 17 years old. You are being followed by a strange man, for a while, long enough to call your friend/girlfriend and talk about it. That could be scary, right? Scarier than being a grown adult in a car with a gun seeing a young man in a sweatshirt walking home slow?
Forget all this stuff, it is just mindboggling to me that you can relate to an armed man following around a kid and then getting so scared he feels he is justified in killing the kid. That you have no problem understanding at all, you relate, you support it, you passionately argue for it. But a kid being followed around by a threatening adult stranger, if he were to use his hands to fight the guy, THAT is a crime you’re worried about, that scares you, that you understand killing somebody over.
I mean, we can keep going back and forth on this, but we’re not living in the same dimension. And I kinda want to call in the PACIFIC RIM robots to go down the portal and seal it up.
Vern, there are some fucked up people out there who have really scary thoughts on the subject of violence. They will support almost anything if it backs their twisted political views. Yesterday it was two years since Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people here in Norway, and every day since the massacre the survivors have had to read internet comments from sick individuals who support the killers actions. And if people are willing to see 77 innocent lives taken just because they’re against immigration, it puts everything else in a grim perspective.
All of this just comes down to fear, in the end. There is a significant minority of people in the US who are simply living in an a paranoid alternate universe which sees a world full of dangerous “others” against whom we must be constantly vigilant. To people like that, of course a “Stand your ground” approach makes sense: since the world is full of vicious enemies prone to unprovoked attacks, it would be ridiculous and disastrous to not give the decent people every possible means to defend themselves. Their mindset is, OK, so this one time maybe somebody misread a situation. But his actions and approach made sense, and we don’t dare punish him for fear that the next time somebody’s in a situation like this they might hesitate, and the punk might just get away.
Problem is, this isn’t the real world. This is a completely hysterical overreaction to a world saturated by scary headlines and implied villain, but which is in reality literally safer than it’s ever been in human history. For all our fear of a violent “other,” violent crime has been on a spectacular downward freefall in the US since the 90s, and is now at below it’s 1960s levels. Even around the world, pretty much no matter where you look you’re exponentially safer than you would have been a century ago. There’s not a statistic we can measure which doesn’t support this overall trend. And yet, people are actually MORE scared now than they’ve been as far back as we can measure it. People are so scared that they not only defend the logic of summarily executing an 18-year-old in a scuffle, but they fiercely defend the right to do it as NECESSARY.
Basically, there’s an alternate universe created by selected media which either wildly distorts or entirely misrepresents the actual reality reflected in the statistics. And some people are really, really fucking deep in that universe, to the point where I don’t know how you could get them out. Ironically, they’re the ones we ought to be most afraid of, because as this tragedy so obviously indicates, scared people make terrible decisions which can impact everyone.
A few relevant links to demonstrate how the world is becoming safer while people are becoming more afraid:
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/may/07/nation/la-na-nn-gun-crimes-pew-report-20130507
http://www.npr.org/2013/05/31/175619007/is-the-world-a-less-violent-place
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/22/world-less-violent-stats_n_1026723.html
http://www.psmag.com/culture/violent-crime-is-dropping-why-are-we-so-scared-59966/
For some reason my phone jerked me into here. I haven’t read a word since the day after I posted here.
AKA – Before Douches Invaded
Christof is a lost cause. Only himself can free his mind.
The asshole who brought up black on black crime has never, ever considered that whites and black kill each other at virtually the same rate (84% whites & 91% blacks).
So I guess he don’t give a shit about white on white crime? Fuck Outta Here, Son!!
The Z man should be doing time for manslaughter, the damn latina juror was tricked into thinking that intent was needed for manslaughter (it’s not) probably by the infamous B-37 who’s husband was an attorney and should have never been put on this trial.
Shit is done, son.
The Martin family will get paid off the (hopefully) upcoming civil case.
Nabroleon is right. You can’t help some people.
And anyone mentioning homicide rates in Chicago and wondering why we don’t talk about those are just being dishonest. The people bringing that up don’t give a fuck about black kids being killed in Chicago, they’re just trying to score a point because they don’t actually care about any of this. It’s like pro-life types concern trolling abortion clinics safety standards, or conservatives being concerned with the sanctity of the vote. They don’t fucking care, they’re just trying to win a petty argument so their ugly and destructive ideology can keep fucking up the world.
Talking of fucking up the world, it looks like the president has finally proposed one war to many. Perhaps this is the turning point we’ve all been waiting for?
Hey Buddy!
I’ve thought about this over the past few months but didn’t bother to click back in and see what I stirred up!
You and I have suffer from a disconnect, Vern. It’s just that simple. You choose to see this as the story of a racist guy who decided to shoot a block kid. I dare to imagine there may have been more to it than that. That it may have been simpler, and even more, that the kid who was shot may have been the aggressor.
“17 is a kid because he could only drive a car for about a year. He couldn’t vote yet. He couldn’t join the military yet. He couldn’t legally drink yet. He couldn’t graduate high school yet. He couldn’t move out from his parents’ house yet. Because he looked like a kid. Because he was in kindergarten when 9-11 happened. Because a month earlier he could’ve gone to try to see UNDERWORLD: AWAKENING and been turned away. Young enough that you, Christof, have to pretend 17 isn’t a kid in order to avoid the shame of defending the execution of a kid.”
You’re bloviating, Vern, and once again I call bullshit. And you’ve missed my point. My point is that a 17 year old is capable of performing a horrific, illegal act. That’s why I said “Dylan Clebold was 17.”
Mel Gibson = Trayvon Martin. Get it?
“No, it is generally not “a legally allowed action” to punch somebody for following you, it could be considered assault. But in the end the guy who was wrong would’ve had a bruise. In your preferred scenario, the one that actually happened, the kid who did nothing wrong is dead and the guy who was wrong is your hero. Your system doesn’t work.
I never said GZ was my hero. You said that. But either way we have a total, fucking disconnect. You are unwilling to submit that GZ had a right to shoot with lethal force even if he was being beaten. I don’t see how we can continue this discussion rationally. Maybe someday we will meet in person anonymously as friends, and I will bring the subject up, and attempt to melt your hateful, irrational heart. I probably still won’t change your mind but at least we will laugh to the sound of 80s music.
P.S. George Zimmerman certainly seems like a fuck up, doesn’t he? Pointing shotguns? Getting in arguments with his girlfriends? If the guy ends up doing time for domestic abuse I promise you I will not jerk off.
“certainly seems like a fuck up,” yeah, I guess so. What gets me is that other than that other incident we mentioned where he MURDERED A CHILD there were no real warning signs. But oh well, it wasn’t THE MURDER WEAPON THAT WE GAVE BACK TO HIM that he threatened his ex-wife and new girlfriend with. It was a more powerful gun that he also is legally allowed to use.
Well, what can you do, right? ha ha
“Mel Gibson = Trayvon Martin. Get it?”
No.
It should be a crime to call 9-1-1 for a non-emergency, for the sole selfish purpose of getting one’s story out there.
That’s manipulation & tying-up of a public service — a fuckin’ emergency service for people who are in danger or bleeding — just so you can get your lying voice on the nightly news since you know 9-1-1 is a public entity that the public & reporters can access. What a fuckin’ lyinass pussy asshole this dude is.
Anyone who lionized him or took his side during the trial should lock themselves in Carrie’s mom’s prayer closet for the next decade. At the very least, their views on firearms, firearm possession policy, & Florida law should be made invalid forever; their microphones should automatically zap them with several thousand volts whenever they start to invoke something supposedly related to the 2nd Amendment.
(I’ve already said many many awful things here about the character & judgment of the idiotic cowards of his trial’s 6 jury members; all my above words stand, and the sentiment behind them is sadly substantiated. There’s a lot of shame to go around.)
My country is inhabited by fucking animals.
Toss me a couple bucks a month, support the good shit, also get access to a bunch of exclusive writing. This is my primary source of writing money that has allowed me to cut down to part time at the day job. Thank you!
(NOTE: My ten year contract has passed on the Titan books, so I don't get residuals on them like I do WORM ON A HOOK and NIKETOWN, but I would love for you to read them because I'm proud of them)
EXTRA CREDIT: Review them on Amazon! That would really help me out. Unless you didn't like them, in which case forget I said anything.
July 14th, 2013 at 12:09 am
Well said, Vern. It may very well come to the likes of this if justice continues not to be served.