I usually avoid commenting on stories such as the Florida trial of George Zimmerman for shooting Trayvon Martin. I am not going to go into the details of the case; there is no sense trying to compete with the superb job being done by Legal Insurrection.
There, however, is one issue that increasingly has bothered me. That is how the media and the broader liberal establishment determine racial categories. We have become an odd sort of faded copy of the old South African apartheid system and its obsession with racial classifications. The South African system placed individuals in one of four groups: "Native", "Coloured", "Asian", or "White". Thanks to the liberal obsession with race we are getting into that mode, as well.
Let's do a little mental experiment. Let us say that the man walking around the Sanford housing complex had been George Zimmerman instead of Trayvon Martin. Let us say that Zimmerman had been shot by somebody who looked like, oh, I don't know, let's say, uh, he looked just like Governor Rick Perry of Texas. How much do you want to bet that Zimmerman, who has an Afro-Peruvian grandmother, would have been declared "black"? Since, however, Rick Perry's doppelgänger was not available, and it was Zimmerman who shot Martin, and Martin is darker than Zimmerman, then Zimmerman is "white" and Martin is "black." If Zimmerman had used his mother's maiden name or adopted a hispanic version of "George," what would the press have done with this story?
The more I read about this, the more of a travesty of justice I see.
UPDATE: Read the interesting interview by the Sanford police chief in, of all places, CNN. He says the investigation got highjacked for political reasons.
WLA
I'm getting fed up with racial classifications, too.
ReplyDeleteAfter the Foreign Service, we lived many years in the southern end of Illinois. One day, my elder son came home from school with a paper that asked for his racial classification. I told him that I was white, his mother was Asian/Pacific, so he should mark two boxes. Since my Jewish father had some claim to a bit of Sephardi mixed in with his German and Austro-Hungarian ancestors (via the Netherlands and Balkans), I was tempted to tell my son to mark "Hispanic" as well, but held off.
Well, I got called in to the school office and told that my son could claim only one race--never mind that he looked mixed--and I would have to re-do the form. I then asked the principal which parent he wanted my son to deny. Oh, did I ever get the Evil Eye for that!
And, had "other" been a category, I would've told them that "other" means people who don't know where their ancestors came from, but that I had already taught my son about his "national origins", as they used to call them. I see no reason why people shouldn't feel free to acknowledge a varied heritage, if such is the case--especially since this is true of more and more of our young people.
I concur with your assessment of media coverage of the incident (I will let the courts and lawyers do their works before I see this as either 2d degree murder or self defense). It was so biased and slanted in the early stages that I think the country will be lucky to escape riots if Zimmermann is acquitted; even if the chips fall out that such would be the only just verdict.
This is a no-win situation. It seems lots of people are ready to riot if George Zimmerman is found not guilty. How this is supposed to help the Martin family I cannot begin to guess. If Zimmerman is acquitted he is in danger from fanatics who judged him guilty from the first moment the story got out and if he is found guilty he will be in even more danger from the populace of whatever prison he is sent to.
ReplyDeleteWelcome to this year's show trial. As this one concludes (or not, depending on the verdict), get ready for the next one...Ft Hood shooter. And btw, what or who is a "white Hispanic"? In their need to interject race, the race hustlers (Sharpton et al)had to come up with that term with they discovered that Zimmerman (who appears "white")has an Hispanic mother.
ReplyDeleteThe prosecutors were handed a case that should have never seen the interior of a court room and have proceeded to make mush of it. If they did not have a friend in the judge, they'd have no friend at all. The judge seems to have made several reversible decisions to date and another big one due this morning.
Most likely the Zimmerman trial will be the last appearance of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence in a serious trial. Soon trials will be conducted according to the standard of Social Justice jurisprudence, with the proper weight given the race, class, and gender of the plaintiff and defendant until the adversary system of justice itself is discarded in favor of magistrates of social justice who have the power to investigate and punish crime
ReplyDeleteA news commentator called this case "media pornography." I agree. The whole thing is a load of trumped up nonsense by the race-baiters who rely on such actions for their career success (e.g., Liberals).
ReplyDeleteBroward County has already started running "Please don't riot" PSAs. It's disgusting.
A society that lives amongst artificial and arbitrary institutions and relationships, that are simply conjured up by predatory charlatans, is a fragile one indeed. The reality of who and what the real world actually is, understood through the loaded word "discrimination", is ignored at our peril.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering if his name were "Jorge Zimmerman" how much media circus there would have been...
ReplyDeleteJust thinking out loud (or typing as the case might ... well then, is) I experienced a loss of altitude, or a sinking feeling - choose as best suits - when
ReplyDeletethe media first picked up the "story" and treated us to what was plainly a picture of an eight or nine year old (at which age I'm guessing Stalin himself maybe'd appeared) cherubic and innocent.
It didn't matter whoever the reporter was, the words "a seventeen year old" - which the photo negated - there was gonna be as Justice Thomas might've said [loosely] "a technical lynching." And that's what it appears is happening, a lynching, technically speaking.
Arkie
I have increasingly believed the abhorrent judge's improper and tempermental, emotional, improper behavior, the exceeding early biased involvement of the hussein regime, "his little boy" indeed, along with holder and DOJ involvment mentioned by Fox today, in at least two ways, is defining a kangaroo court, n'est-ce pas? Plus that irresponsible biased media, too boot. Self defense is the only just verdict, fat chance, first go.
DeleteA "lynching" court indeed, Arkie!
Jack
What's disturbing is the judge. She asked Zimmerman FOUR times today if he was going to take the stand in his own defense in front of the jury which was very unusual in its timing and repetition. It smacks of her trying to prejudice the jury by hammering that he decline. (IMHO he's smart to refrain from taking the stand in such an inflammatory media driven environment. Nothing good can come from it.)
ReplyDeleteColor me paranoid and cynical, but, you know damn well that Holder's DOJ has sent word on down the line that they want Zimmerman convicted. We'd be full Stalin/Putin show trials here if our fascist liberal weasels could just get around our pesky Constitution better.
Penny
Commenters on the NRO post on this indicate that the jury was NOT present. Not that that makes it better; it's still undue pressure, and it is now public (of course, the jury is NOT reading any press; of course not.)
DeleteIf I had to, I would predict a hung jury split about 4-2 not guilty. If the prosecutor declines to try the case again, the DOJ will then likely swoop in and try to file a civil rights violation case.
DeleteThanks for the update.
DeleteI too agree with your tally on what'll likely happen with the jury.
But having read that I'm wondering if the former chief (when the DOJ acts) might find himself charged as a co-conspirator?
Ark
I absolutely guarantee that this would barely have made the local news if Zimmerman had a Hispanic first and last name. I remember the day that this first hit the news, there were two waves of racism - one knee-jerk reaction to "a white guy killing an innocent black kid" followed by a blast of creepy anti-Semitic ravings. If HOA watch guy Jorge Rodriguez had the same run-in with Martin, it would've been a complete non-incident.
ReplyDeleteThis situation is worse than random confusion about assigning race labels. Our own government is deliberately pouring gasoline on the flames - they want rioting. The CRS of the DOJ has been involved in community organizing Trayvon's brownshirts since the very beginning.
ReplyDeleteThe NAACP national convention starts Friday - this Friday - in Orlando, a mere 25 miles away from Sanford.
One of the "attorneys" (I use that term loosely) involved in representing the Martin family was also involved with the Pigford cases. Also same PR guy used with St. Skittles as in Pigford - Ryan Julison.
Every. Single. Detail. Orchestrated.
BTW, did anybody catch the pics of "Fruit" - Trayvon's daddy - he was trying to help his innocent little son buy a handgun. That's why the judge didn't want Trayvon's texts in - they show far worse than vile misogyny (can't repeat what he said) - they show Tracy Martin involved with guns too.
Lots of info - way too much (in a good way) - at The Conservative Treehouse. If nothing else watch the video from last night - stunning. Judge walks out on defense atty Don West, who tries desperately to make a stand for the U.S. & Florida constitutions.
Fascinating that he MSM has taken to describing Zimmerman as a "White-Hispanic." A category never before used.
ReplyDeleteAs for the potential of riots...since the riots usually happen in the general neighborhoods of those rioting, Let them. They only hurt themselves.
Althouse has noticed a change in the way the media is addressing the issue:
ReplyDeletehttp://althouse.blogspot.com/2013/07/martin-was-black-and-zimmerman.html