Trayvon's Problem? Only Being Worth 3/5 Of A White Man

[IdaBriggs]

Last edited Sun Jul 14, 2013, 06:25 AM - Edit history (1)

I wanted to be surprised by the verdict - honestly, I expected manslaughter - but I am not.

I am angry, but I am also angry that Texas just screwed with medical care for women, too, and I am REALLY TIRED of being angry all the time.

I started three posts on this, deleted them all for rudeness, and will be fussing about it on Facebook where I bitterly declared, "when you can't get justice from the system, you make your own" and then wished Trayvon's parents will see justice for their son soon.

No, this call for "vigilante justice" isn't subtle or even veiled. It is what happens when you know that "justice" will be served no other way because either you are the wrong color, or a female who has been raped.

I am not a Libertarian - frankly, I find most of their beliefs to be the opposite of what is required for a civilized society - but honestly, I am hitting the "enough is enough" category.

I have teenage girls who are raped threatened with jail time for posting the names of their rapists (who get probation!) on social media, black teenagers with candy still in their hand shot to death by gun nuts, and white men running around shopping centers with AR-15s strapped to their backs because they can weeks after a score of kindergartners are killed in their classroom.

Meanwhile, Congress has created more agencies seeking "terrorists" than anyone can count, which means they have everyone's phone records, but local police didn't know who Trayvon Martin was on the phone with minutes before his death until his parents got their cell phone bill. Oh, and when multi-million dollar natural weather disasters strike, I can't even get unanimous agreement from Congress to help out because they all make "symbolic stands" against it UNTIL their region is hit.

I don't know how the southern black people tolerated the KKK and the lynchings back in the day when they had access to guns. If "everyone" knew who was causing the problem, why not just take care of the problem? There must have been a reason people were willing to live in that kind of fear, and accept being treated like dirt, but honestly, I don't get it. And Trayvon Martin's death - undoubtedly not the first or the last - feels like a public lynching, and it feels like he was targeted because he was black.

I am a civilized white woman. I don't own a gun, and I generally "trust" the police. If I were black, I couldn't say the same thing.

I don't expect anything to change after the "outrage" fades; we are all too busy playing whack-a-mole with the problems in our own lives, but I am getting tired of it - the double standards and the pious preachings of people who think their entitled attitudes about their faith gives them the right to dictate the medical care of other people. Yes, I am conflating Texas and Florida issues - they feel the same - like OPPRESSION.

I don't like being oppressed. It pisses me off.

Yes, yes, vote the bums out - whatever. That has been working real well - NOT.

Maybe we need a separate justice system for the women and minorities in this country - something "separate but equal." We can have "minority only juries" for minority victims, and women juries for women victims. Over on the other side the white men can have their white men only juries when they are crime victims, too, so it will be totally fair.

Our side will be busier, but it may be the only way rape victims and the families of murdered minorities see this mysterious "justice" whose ideals we all cling to so dearly.

From the text of the Original Constitution:

http://www.earlyamerica.com/earlyamerica/freedom/constitution/text.html

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons. The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct. The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative; and until such enumeration shall be made, the State of New Hampshire shall be entitled to chuse three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations one, Connecticut five, New-York six, New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five, South Carolina five, and Georgia three.

[BainsBane]

1. Ida

I think you need to edit the first use of "raped" in paragraph 6. I'm guessing that's not what you mean.

[IdaBriggs]

2. Doh! Edited for clarity!

No, that is NOT what I meant - argh! Hope it makes more sense now.

Too early to be posting; no caffeine.

Thank you for pointing it out before someone started knocking on my door! Lol!

[BainsBane]

3. Much better!

[MH1]

4. "local police didn't know who Trayvon Martin was on the phone with"

Maybe I've watched too many NCIS episodes ... or looked at my own landline account on the web too often ...

but these kind of things, like not bringing up the cleanness of Trayvon's pants (how was he on top grounding and pounding???) and many other things, convince me that the police AND the district attorney's office DID NOT CARE. They had NO interest in prosecuting this case, and when forced to, had NO interest in winning it.

Anyone with responsibilities for these failures should be voted out if possible. If not, maybe a NON VIOLENT picketing of the Sanford police station (or other, if more appropriate) until someone is FIRED.

[Deep13]

5. Juries are drawn from the suburbs...

...and tend to be white.

Going into a trial they tend to see black persons as part of a criminal class from the start. They tend to cut white victims and defendants a lot of slack while being unduly skeptical of any explanation a black person might offer. It is similar to DWB, being black is itself a cause for suspicion. Or Mexican, Arab etc.

[merrily]

6. Trayvon Martin's problem is that Zimmerman killed him.

Zimmerman's problem is that he made assumptions based on skin color and maybe gender.

It is both true and untrue that the Constitution was the problem.

Trayvon Martin was never a slave. He was a free teen, about to be a free man. As a free man, he would not have been "3/5 of a person" under the Constitution.

Even in 1789, there were free people of color; and they, too, would have been counted as persons, not "3/5 of a person."

Slavery and indentured servitude existed in this country long before the Constitution and in other parts of the world before this country was settled. (Sadly, slavery exists in the U.S. and other parts of the world now, although, thank heaven, it is no longer legal.)

The problem with the Constitution and all U.S. and state laws that embodied racism was not that they created slavery or racism, but that they legitimized and institutionalized it. And that is very significant, IMO.

So, yes, the Constitution and all racism in laws were part of George Zimmerman's problem. and the problem of Trayvon Martin's friends and relatives are that they must live with George Zimmerman's problem for the rest of their lives.