Comments on: Justice for Trayvon Martin – Adjudication or community? (Part III)

By: Ray Timmermans

Ray Timmermans — Mon, 12 Aug 2013 15:39:03 +0000

Mr. Anderson, do you really think it will be possible to “create a space” for conversation where it is safe for George Zimmerman to be heard when 80+% of the African American community think he has been given a free ride by the justice system and the President of the US publicly identifies himself with Trayvon Martin? I hardly think so. This is being turned into a “cause” when the facts themselves are ambiguous. Should we dismantle neighborhood watch programs because of this? No one in the African American community that I have heard even seems willing to admit that Trayvon Martin may have had a role in his own demise. Everyone wants to demonize George Martin for following him when, in fact, he had a legal right to do so and as a neighborhood watch person, he may have had an obligation to. I’m not saying that shouldn’t have made Martin a little “creeped out” but it certainly didn’t justify being punched in the face (as was brought out in the trial). You say Zimmerman initiated this. But his action was wholly legal, as was Trayvon’s up until he confronted Zimmerman. In fact, it was Trayvon Martin who initiated the incident with George Zimmerman. Again I ask, Is George Zimmerman’s life worth less than Trayvon Martin’s? Who is defending Mr. Zimmerman’s right to be where he was legally? I believe it becomes “retributive” justice to want to “get” George Zimmerman on a civil rights violation–as many in the African American community have suggested–when a jury found he acted within the law. This is a typical attempt to “ex post facto” Zimmerman into a pseudo form of “justice” that the Founding Fathers anticipated and rightly took pains to ensure would not happen. Until such time as Jesse Jackson, Ben Jealous, and Al Sharpton stop stoking the flames of racism and instead concentrate on the facts in this case, this will continue to be a divisive matter. But lets face facts: Trayvon Martin was no Medger Evers or Martin Luther King.

By: Krishna

Krishna — Sun, 11 Aug 2013 18:30:48 +0000

At some point we do have to take personal responsibility for our actions. At the same time, it is understandable that some people don’t hold him responsible for having and then acting on his biases—because those biases have infiltrated the consciousness of each of us.

By: David Anderson Hooker

David Anderson Hooker — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 19:50:47 +0000

Mr. Timmerman,
I think that in many ways I dont disagree with you. I think that if someone is struggling for their life they often feel that they have to defend themselves. If you initiate a confrontation — following closely enough to have a conversation and not just “keep an eye”- and then you are deathly afraid of the results of what youve started, i think the circumstances have changed. Legally, there is a sense that you are responsible for all the results of an action that you set in motion, but this isn’t really a legal conversation. The sad thing is that the way the system was organized Mr. Zimmerman didn’t feel safe to tell his story in court and Mr. Martin didn’t live to tell his side. I am suggesting that a positive outcome for community to go forward would be to create a space in which everyone -including mr zimmerman- felt safe to speak and imagined that they would be heard.

By: Ray Timmermans

Ray Timmermans — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 18:16:02 +0000

Could it possibly be, just possibly, that a young unarmed black man, attacked a man he felt as uncomfortable around as the man felt about him, tackled and punched him until he felt he had to defend himself or die? Impossible? So what of that white looking man? Is his life meaningless? And how is it justice and peacemaking when his side of the story is wholly ignored to promote a cause–justice for Trayvon?? It is discrimination in reverse and the most perverse form injustice to ignore the fact that Trayvon Martin was on top of George Zimmerman, pounding his head into the concrete.