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What's wrong with the Trayvon Martin case

I have been watching the Trayvon Martin case unfold along with millions of other people.  This is a difficult case regardless of who is right or wrong.

Here are the issues I have with the whole thing. 

George Zimmerman had no right in chasing down Trayvon and hunting him down and getting in his face.  If you listen to the WHOLE 911 Tape, you will hear the police tell George to wait for the police to arrive.  Not to chase this person down.  George was armed and he knew he had the advantage in a confrontation. 



George wanted to be a hero.  George said "These assholes always get away."  George was not in any sort of danger until he chased Trayvon.  George went into this situation wanting to stop someone from getting away.  Even though Trayvon did NOTHING wrong.  He was wearing a hoodie, and looking around, George took it upon himself to find out what was going on.  Wearing a hoodie and having your hands in your pockets does not make you a criminal.

After the shooting, things went really wrong.  George's dad is a retired judge and George was not charged with any sort of crime.  Is that surprising?? A young black kid was killed, the shooter was there with the weapon and admitted shooting him, but George was not even held or charged.  How the fuck does that happen??  I guess this is where all the controversy starts.  Of course, if it was a white child that was killed, the shooter would be in jail.

Of course, George is claiming self defense.  Again, if you listen to the other eyewitness accounts of the 911 tapes, you can hear someone screaming for help.  It was obviously Trayvon.  Anyone would be screaming for their life if they were stopped by someone carrying a gun with intent to shoot and kill.  Self defense would imply that his life was in danger.  If I had a gun, and the other person did not, my life is not really in danger.  Also, if I had a gun, I could just shoot someone in the knees or shoulder, I don't have to put one in the chest near the heart.  Again, the intent was to kill.  There is no self defense argument here.

Now, since the incident has happened, lots of other crap has happened.  Spike Lee tweeted the wrong address to his fans.  Thousands of people harassed an elderly couple thinking they were George Zimmerman.  What an asshole.  Spike did not "Do the Right thing."  I understand the outrage regarding this issue, but tweeting some one's personal address is not the solution.

Where I stand on all this is very simple.  We live in a fucked up society where kids are being killed needlessly and assholes are getting away with it.  Is it a race thing?  I am not sure I would call George a racist.  Actually, George is an asshole with a gun looking to stop criminals from getting away.  When you have someone who is so misguided with a loaded gun, these are the things that are going happen.  When we have a child killed in cold blood because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, something needs to be done.
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30 comments:

  1. I said the same thing. It's about a guy who wanted to be a hero, and it's hard to do that when you are just an asshole. This is why we leave enforcing the law up to those who are actually trained to do it...trained to inflict the least amount of harm necessary.

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  2. I agree with you 100%. This just shouldn't have gone down the way that it did.

    http://rantingsofamouthybitch.blogspot.com/

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  4. You put it perfectly. All the other arguments are beside the point when he was specifically told not to follow him and he chose to do it anyway. You can' claim self-defense if you are chasing someone.

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  5. That is what I said from the beginning. 911 told him to STAY IN HIS CAR and he didn't listen, so he has to live with himself now. It doesn't MATTER if the kid had weed in his system, or that he was black, or ANYTHING ELSE. GZ should have waited for the cops and stayed in the damn car.

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  6. Omg...THANK YOU! I'm so glad someone else said it. Sadly, Zimmerman will probably get away with murder. That makes me horribly sad.

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  7. I hate that the prosecution has so thoroughly fucked up their case, which should've been a slam-dunk. Jeeeeeeez.

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  8. My dad and I disagree about this every time we discuss it. I think George is an ass that needs to be in jail. I think about my children and yes, Trayvon struggled and was in a gang or whatever but at this time when he was walking thru the neighborhood with his hoodie on he wasn't doing anything wrong and had his life taken way too young because of a wanna-be cop.

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  9. THANK YOU!!! I'm so tired of hearing everyone standing up for Zimmerman, saying horrible things about Martin. Was he a teenager who smoked pot sometimes and took ridiculous pictures wanting to look tough? Yep. Every asshole high school kid acts like that. Does that mean you should vilify an innocent teenager who was shot for doing nothing more than walking in a sweatshirt? Nope. Zimmerman is a thug who obviously has some serious control/authority issues he needs to deal with...in prison.

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  10. I agree with you completely!!

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  11. Thank you for telling it like it is, even though you live in the middle of Whitemanistan. Appreciate your willingness to speak your mind publicly. GZ deserves to be punished, and even that is not enough for the horrible crime and sin he committed.

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  12. How does a person get to claim stand your ground as the aggressor? Didn't TM have the right to stand his ground when he was approached with a gun?

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  13. " If you listen to the WHOLE 911 Tape, you will hear the police tell George to wait for the police to arrive."

    Misinformation. The 911 operator is not the police. They have a set of scripts they use to advise callers but are not the police.

    You can be as upset as you want about Zimmerman's actions, but the fact remains that the witnesses are conflicting, the DNA is conflicting and all that remains is Zimmerman's accounts and the fact that they line up with the forensic evidence. It doesn't matter that he didn't follow the 911 operator's advice, not one bit. He was attacked by Tyronne, he felt his life was threatened, and he shot. Under Florida law this is acceptable whether we like it or not. BTW, it was not "Obviously" Tyayvon screaming on the tapes, even their parents couldn't figure it out.

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  14. On the whole, I agree with you, but you must concede that you are making some wrongs assumptions here...
    1. It is NOT obvious that Travon is the one screaming for help. Upon hearing the tape the first time, even his father wasn't sure it was Travon. Only with coaching from the prosecution has he adjusted his story on who he thought it was screaming.

    2. "Of course, if it were a white kid, the shooter would be in jail." Again, a HUGE assumption. I DO think you are correct that George not being arrested or charged has a LOT do to with his father being a retired judge. I'm not so sure that the victim's race is the reason.

    3. Yes, George had a gun, but he did NOT know if Travon was armed, so to assume GZ KNEW he had the advantage is false. There was no way he KNEW he had an advantage. If GZ profiled Travon, which he most likely did, he ALSO assumed that Travon was probably carrying a weapon of some sort, so he probably felt the justification of self defense would be valid.

    Now, for full disclosure, I'm a white female, and I've been watching this case develop as well. I agree that this case is completely FUBAR'd. Should GZ be found guilty of murder? I don't think so. Manslaughter? Definitely. Murder implies intent, and I don't think it was his intent to kill Travon. Regardless of the charge, he's certainly NOT innocent.

    Should Travon's behavior be brought into evidence? Perhaps. If his parents didn't know he was in a gang and smoking pot, it appears they did not know their son as well as they think they did. There are no winners in this case. A young man, who did nothing illegal is dead. An overzealous man with an ego and a gun crossed the line, and didn't have faith in law enforcement to do their job. Using a gun should be a last resort, not a first line of defense, and in that error, he is definitely guilty.

    In the end, I hope Zimmerman is convicted. I also hope that we all take a look at this as a society and realize that there is more to a person than the color of their skin, or the hoodie on their back. There are many lessons to learn from this case. I hope as a society, we do.

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    1. You say on one hand he deserves to be charged with manslaughter but the charges against Zimmerman are 2nd degree murder. Then you state that you hope he is convicted. That's a contradiction. There is a huge difference between the two charges and the sentencing that comes with.

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    2. I couldn't agree with you more, Maureen. And, when the case goes to the jury to deliberate, manslaughter, according to CNN yesterday during their live coverage, is automatically an option for the jury to decide on if they don't convict for 2nd degree murder, whether the prosecution asks for it or not. I agree that murder is not the proper charge here, as it goes to malicious intent.

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  15. Thank-you for these comments. Cogent, articulate, and devoid of the hyperbolic emotion I see in too many pieces.

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  17. One of the first things wrong with it is the media keeps showing a picture of Trayvon when he was 13 not 17 and there's a world of difference between the 2 photos. I can only remember seeing the picture of him at 17 one time and the other every time a picture is put ip. Just another way the media wants to manipulate opinions.

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  18. You say you have been "watching the case unfold" but you clearly have not watched any of the trial or read any of the testimony. You are wrong on so many counts. First, Zimmerman was a volunteer neighborhood watchman and there were many recent robberies in the neighborhood. He saw someone with his face hidden (some burglers hide their faces! shock!) "looking around" & acting funny (there was pot in Trayvon's system). Zimmerman called 911. The police told him to stop following Trayvon asked where he was. He went to check the street sign to give the cops a location & Trayvon jumped him, got on top of him (by all accounts) and began slamming his head into the ground. Many people (including Trayvon's DAD initially)says the screams are Zimmerman's. You ascribe a lot negative of motives to Zimmerman & you have no idea who he is (he tutored African American kids -- did you know that?)or what you are talking about. Your race-baiting rants make you feel good & superior, I assume, but they have no basis whatsoever in fact. You should have done some actual research.

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    1. I agree. I have been following it as well. bad situation but life because the media and OBUMMER-hyped it.. no way.. both families will never forget this and maybe some policies need changed. but ... racist no way... that is just the latest and greatest trend...Thank YOU biased Media... there are so many killed in CHICAGO- GUN FREE Chicago everyday and those families never get OBUMMER saying looks my son..

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  19. You took the words right out of my mouth with this post but I just wanted add that Zimmerman's act of profiling Trayvon was inherently racist. He saw a young black man and assumed he was up to no good. That is racial profiling and that would equate to Zimmerman have bias or prejudice against young black men.

    And to the comments that it has not being charged or the handling of this case has nothing to do with race, please, look at our justice system. Please compare the number of young black men that are murdered and the number of cases brought to justice compared to young white men. It's shocking. Here you have a defendant that admits to killing an unarmed young man who isn't charged for over 6 weeks?! That is racial bias folks, open your eyes!

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    1. Unfortunately, most of the murdered black men are murdered by other black men. nothing racist there.

      If you live in a "gated community" and you have experienced and number of break ins so you have to organize a neighborhood watch - you might be suspicious of a black teenager. There may not have been any black families living in the neighborhood - I honestly don't know. Zimmerman is a Mexican American and may have experienced racism himself. I don't know his story. But I do know he wasn't arrested right away b/c he claimed self defense. He may not have been arrested at all if Trayvon had been white.

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  20. The media wanted to turn this into a racist thing and it's been blown out of proportion. How many murders happen in the country? And we never hear one word about it unless it happens in our area and the local news covers it. I don't know how this became a national news story.
    The prosecution has bungled the case. Never ask a question unless you know what the witness is going to say. Some of their witnesses have helped the defense more than the prosecution. And why is this a Murder charge in the first place? That means they have to prove premeditation. This should be manslaughter. I think he's going to walk. And we can blame the media (and from what I just read, possibly some others who organized hoodie marches, etc) for putting too much pressure on the local DA's office. And then we'll have some riots. How fun.

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  21. I disagree. And honestly the only people that know what really happen are George and Trayvon, and no ones knows how George felt or what he was thinking.

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  22. From what I have learned about this case, I agree with your assessment completely, except I doubt someone the likes of George Zimmerman would have been quite as suspicious had it been a white kid in a hoodie. Race definitely came into play.

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