Last year, I posted on here about Trayvon Martin. I recently wrote up a piece for Neon Tommy reacting to the George Zimmerman verdict. The opinion column can be found here. My reaction:
I’m thinking that a lot of points are being missed with the reactions to the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin “not guilty” verdict. Honestly, it’s not all that surprising that Zimmerman was able to walk free. Florida law is screwed up, and has been for a while. This is the same state that gave us Casey Anthony, hanging chads and the Stand Your Ground law that more or less allowed Zimmerman to not be arrested for another six weeks (and yet locked up Marissa Alexander). Logically, it is what it is. A prosecutor wasn’t able to present a strong enough case. Zimmerman is free, but he’s not really free (even if he gets his gun back, his quality of life will never be the same). A guilty verdict would have just sent a hollow message that made that clearer. Nobody was going to “win” anything here.
But this is not an “O.J. repeat,” an irresponsible reaction from folks trying to parallel race into the verdict. This is not about rehashing past debates about why we have a legal system (as opposed to a justice system). This is not simply about one young man’s death and another man’s trial. This isn’t about your right to bear arms. This is about a nation understanding the circumstances of young people of color in America. Back in 1990, Ice Cube released AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted, his first solo album after leaving N.W.A. There is a track called “Endangered Species (Tales from the Darkside)”, featuring Chuck D of Public Enemy.
The track itself is awesome, because it bought a West Coast gangsta rap legend (Cube) together with an East Coast political rap legend (Chuck), and because the tone of the track is set immediately by a mock sample of a news report talking about young black teenagers as an endangered species. Only, in this case, no one is out to protect these youth.
Two decades later, it is still a chilling experience to listen to that track, see what’s going on in Chicago and feel the emotions of protesters all over the country try to make sense of how an unarmed teenager can be profiled and shot to death by a vigilante who will walk free. The track still resonates with me, a relatively young black man from Philadelphia who occasionally wears a hoodie. I know what it’s like to be stereotyped and profiled, but I’ve never had a mortal conflict related to it, and that’s what’s scary about this country. Take a look at some Web 2.0 comment sections; there are a lot of people who sympathize with a man’s right to shoot a teen, convincing themselves that the circumstances that led to the conflict are less important. “So what if there’s no justice for Trayvon Martin? Kids die every day anyway…” Or so the attitude goes.
One day, I’ll have to address future children (mine and those of my brothers) about Trayvon Martin’s death, George Zimmerman’s trial and American society. People fear what they do not understand, and I hope that we as a country progress with the reality that severe inequalities still exist in the world in which many of our youth of color are brought up. This case is a great example of the inconsistencies in the state of Florida and, by extension, in our country. We can focus on what happens in the courtroom, but we had better build and strengthen our communities and value the young lives in it, regardless of race or class.
-1SKILLZ