Guns and Tears, Part 3-Rush to Judgment

It occurs to me that there is a great deal of commentary regarding the Trayvon Martin case, much of which has been described as race baiting and a rush to judgment.  In the month since this killing took place, there are numerous details, some contradictory, which have become part of the public discourse.  "The facts" are never going to be fully known.  There are some however that are clear.  Trayvon Martin is dead, his crime being only that he was a black male, walking through an apartment complex wearing a "hoodie."  His killer was George Zimmerman.  He has not been arrested to date.

In America, we have a system of laws and law enforcement, which for the most part, works.  We have a court system which also works pretty well.  And as citizens, we all have rights.  If we are involved in a crime, theoretically we are subject to law enforcement and the judicial system.  Here is another fact for the Martin case portfolio.  As of this writing, the law enforcement and judicial parts of our system have malfunctioned.  Ultimately, this may change, but I wonder if that would be the case if there had not been so much public attention.  I think not.  Since Trayvon was killed, there have been 16 killings, attributable to race, which have not received any amount of public scrutiny.

I sympathize with Trayvon's parents, and can never truly understand the underlying fear that parents must have for the safety of their children if they are poor, minority or of some other group that might be targeted.  But as I have already said, the white middle class is not immune, and if the conditions which allow such killings are not controlled and eliminated, we may be hearing about killings in revenge, but with no relation to the kids who are killed.  They will be declared as random or unrelated, but we will all know that the reason was simply a response to our failure to demand justice when we know that it has been ignored.

I don't know what happened when Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman met that night in Florida.  I do know that Zimmerman admitted the killing.  I also know that were the roles reversed, Trayvon would have been arrested.  Period.  No question.  Only through a court process will the events be presented and judged.  I don't know what the outcome will be.  But I have studied history, and there are many examples of institutional failures which led to the end of civilized society.  We have seen it before and we have today a much more rapid means to let the world know what is going on.  The social media has helped to end the regime in Egypt.  It has described the situation in Libya and in Syria.  It has expanded the "99%" movement, and has a major role in political activities here.  The use of the ether can be a source to change our social interactions for the benefit of all, or it can be a source of creating warring factions which will destroy what we all want to consider a civilized society.

There are two common factors that connect unrest with uprising.  The first is a fertile environment; the second is guns.  And without the second, you can grow flowers.

Thanks for stopping by.