by Mike Ely
The story is not complicated, and most of the court details were raw diversion.
This racist asshole wanted to confront a black teenager walking through the neighborhood. He went with a loaded gun, without a safety, with a bullet in the chamber. He drove around stalking Trayvon and then got out of the car.
It doesn't matter what happened in the fight. Trayvon had every right to smack that asshole to protect himself. And Zimmerman had no right to shoot this young man through the heart after stalking and terrifying him.
Almost all the babble and micro-details in this trial are irrelevant.
If I pick a fight with someone, and they whup me, I don't get a right to shoot them.
And more: No one has a right to hunt a young man (like an animal) just because he fears and loathes black people. And then force a confrontation, and then shoot that young man.
The right and wrong here are not complicated all. This was murder. Racist murder.
* * * * * * * * *
At some basic, psychic level, it has been believed by white people (especially in the Deep South) that they have a right, a need and a responsibility to control the movement of Black people.
It goes back to slavery, and then the Jim Crow-era Black codes. No one else has to "explain themselves" when they go somewhere. But all through the history of the U.S., "What are you doing here, boy?" are the opening words of the authorities.
Zimmerman thought he had a right to pursue that young Black man, with his gun loaded -- as if Trayvon was an animal, an inherent threat, an automatic suspect.
It is not just "racist assumuptions" it is also murderous intentions. This mindset, in America, has always been associated with with lynching, with castration, with brutal remorseless killing.
There is no crime in this country more intolerable, more embedded, more prettified than racist murder.
It goes back to slavery, and then the Jim Crow-era Black codes. No one else has to "explain themselves" when they go somewhere. But all through the history of the U.S., "What are you doing here, boy?" are the opening words of the authorities.
Zimmerman thought he had a right to pursue that young Black man, with his gun loaded -- as if Trayvon was an animal, an inherent threat, an automatic suspect.
It is not just "racist assumuptions" it is also murderous intentions. This mindset, in America, has always been associated with with lynching, with castration, with brutal remorseless killing.
There is no crime in this country more intolerable, more embedded, more prettified than racist murder.
Time's up. It's been up. Let's end it, together. Power to the people.
* * * * * * * * *
Some questions need to be posed sharply:
* Can a racist vigilante stalk, confront and execute a young black man without punishment?
* Can anyone with a heart tolerate a legal system that cannot provide the most simple justice?
* Can the political channels of this system even pretend to offer us a solution to all that abuses people every day?
* Is it impractical to want to shift real power into the hands of the powerless, or is it exactly what is needed by any means necessary?
In a few days, we will know the answer to the first question.
Then we will discuss those other three questions.
* Can a racist vigilante stalk, confront and execute a young black man without punishment?
* Can anyone with a heart tolerate a legal system that cannot provide the most simple justice?
* Can the political channels of this system even pretend to offer us a solution to all that abuses people every day?
* Is it impractical to want to shift real power into the hands of the powerless, or is it exactly what is needed by any means necessary?
In a few days, we will know the answer to the first question.
Then we will discuss those other three questions.
