More on Trayvon Martin

In my last post I discussed the Trayvon Martin case quite passionately. Well, it looks like I'm not the only one with strong feelings about what took place when this innocent young man was killed. Trayvon's name is showing up all over the media, which is not surprising in itself, but people have had some very different responses, some of which seemed strange to me.

Various athletes such as the Miami Heat players have been rallying for the arrest of murderer George Zimmerman, wearing hoodies like the one Martin wore and writing messages on their sneakers to promote awareness. Protestors all over the U.S. are making a stand. Even President Obama has expressed his empathy for Trayvon's mourning parents, claiming that if he had a son, he would look an awful lot like Trayvon. As a parent, even the leader of our country can appreciate just how utterly sick it is that a teenage boy is dead through no fault of his own. If only everyone would take the time to understand this simple concept.

It is wonderful to see this cause getting the publicity it deserves. However, some people have no respect for the dead and are just being flat-out nasty. Newt Gingrich is criticizing Obama for bringing Martin's looks into the equation, saying that Obama would not care about this boy if he weren't black. Okay, Newt, we get it, you don't like Obama. Now, can we please quit it with the Democrat vs. Republican war for ten seconds and think about the fact that a kid is dead? Politicians these days only seem to care about insulting each other and often forget about the bigger picture.

Stories about Martin not being the perfect student are going around. Apparently he has been suspended for missing and being tardy to class and creating graffiti and has gotten into trouble for suspicion of marijuana possession. How true this information is is questionable, but even if Trayvon was a bit of a troublemaker, does that really change anything? The fact of the matter is that he wasn't doing anything wrong on the day he was shot, and even if he was looking for pot or a wall to spray paint, he obviously wasn't the type of person to cause someone else physical harm, and minor crimes like these are nothing to shoot a kid over. Besides, how would you like it if one of your loved ones was killed and the media was obsessing over every little thing he did wrong in his life? Well, that's what Trayvon's parents are dealing with right now, and if you're besmirching the image of their deceased son, you should feel pretty bad about yourself.

 Picture courtesy of AP Photo/Martin family.

Check out the following sites:

http://espn.go.com/espn/commentary/story/_/page/hill-120326/lebron-james-other-athletes-protest-trayvon-martin-shooting-show-change-agent-power-sports
http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/26/justice/florida-teen-shooting-events/index.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/23/obama-trayvon-martin_n_1375083.html
http://news.yahoo.com/gingrich-calls-obamas-trayvon-martin-remarks-disgraceful-001455842--abc-news.html
http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/26/10872124-trayvon-martin-was-suspended-three-times-from-school

People are idiots.

Apparently this is the face of a dangerous young man.

 I went to bed yesterday in a bad mood. Lately I've been thinking a lot about how, while I truly believe that humanity as a whole is good, the vast majority of those in power couldn't care less about the well-being of other human beings. Most of them only worry about money, and some of them don't seem to have any motivation at all for what they do besides some sick desire to entertain themselves in a sadistic manner. (Joseph Kony, I'm looking at you.) I think the reason everyone's so crazy about The Hunger Games these days is that it's a startlingly realistic idea of what America's future could be like. Honestly, I would not be surprised at all if, a couple centuries from now, the government maintains control by forcing innocent teenagers to slaughter each other like it's a sport.

Yeah, just because I act all cheerful and smiley most of the time doesn't mean I'm not a cynical person deep down.

As if I hadn't already lost enough faith in the world, this morning I became educated on the murder of Trayvon Martin. Martin was a seventeen-year-old Floridian known for his good grades and pleasant demeanor before some psychopath named George Zimmerman shot him in the chest just because he seemed "suspicious" while walking around a gated community to visit his father's fiancee. He was dressed in jeans, a hoodie, and sneakers, and armed with Skittles. (Yes, that's right, Skittles. Apparently rainbow-colored candy is considered a WMD in Sanford, Florida.) But according to the "Stand Your Ground" laws that exist in numerous U.S. states, a person can "defend himself" from anyone who seems like a threat by using violence. Considering the fact that what makes a person seem like a threat is highly subjective, I don't see any reason why we won't soon see cases of one kid shanking another because she sees the fact that he called Justin Bieber a bad name as hostile behavior.

Now, to be honest, I don't think George Zimmerman is a mentally stable man. The first tip-off should be that he's called 911 a whopping 46 times since January 1, 2011. How does one make that many 911 calls over the course of a year? "Hi, I'd like to report that my girlfriend just dumped me. I think we have a situation here." "Mayday, mayday! I need to relieve myself, but these public toilets are totally unsanitary!" At least, I'd like to believe that no one with fully functioning brain-cells would shoot an innocent teenager after the police specifically told him not to. I'm not saying what he did was in any way acceptable or that I forgive him for being a complete and total...Well, there's really no clean word for the type of person he is, so I'll just leave it up to you to decide what I would be calling him if this weren't a school blog. But the guy obviously has issues. And people are calling Zimmerman a racist, but I truly don't think that is the case, as his Hispanic heritage makes him a racial minority himself. The police, on the other hand? Hoooo, boy.

I hope the police where I live are not irresponsible lazy bums who just sit around eating Dunkin' Donuts all day, but I have to feel a bit concerned, since clearly this is the case with the cops in Sanford. Here's a little quiz for you: Say you're a police officer. When a woman calls 911 to report a boy screaming for help and then falling to the ground after the sound of a gunshot, do you...

A. Send an ambulance down to the scene of the crime.
B. Give the caller instructions on how she can help the boy.
C. Not care, since the boy might not be dead after all and you agreed to meet your friend for coffee in half an hour.

If you picked C, congratulations, you think just like the cops in Sanford!

Seriously, even after the fight ended and Martin was proclaimed dead, the justice system has done absolutely nothing to punish his killer or even look into the case at all. Even though Zimmerman has a criminal history and his neighbors say he is a disturbingly violent person, he was not tested for drugs or alcohol, even though that is standard protocol for such cases. The message this sends to me is, "Solve your own problems, America, because we police don't feel like bothering to help you."

Gee, my generation sure has a bright future.

Trayvon, rest in peace. I didn't know you, but it sounds like you were a good person, and I have no doubt that you were completely undeserving of your awful fate.

Pictures courtesy of eurweb.com and cfnews13.com.


To learn more about the Trayvon Martin case, visit:

http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/19/justice/florida-teen-shooting/index.html?hpt=hp_bn2

http://www.thegrio.com/specials/trayvon-martin/trayvon-martin-15-facts-you-need-to-know-about-teen-shot-in-sanford-florida.php

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/03/19/148905661/killing-of-fla-teen-trayvon-martin-becomes-national-story-about-race

http://www.thegrio.com/news/past-zimmerman-911-calls-war.php

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/20/10780286-florida-stand-your-ground-law-could-complicate-trayvon-martin-teen-shooting-case

The "R-Word"

Over the past few years there has been some controversy over the word "retarded." Looking at this word from a linguistic standpoint, it is merely the verb "retard" - which means "to make slow; delay the development or progress of (an action, process, etc.); hinder or impede" - used in the past tense as an adjective. This is harmless enough in itself. However, modern vernacular seems to have changed the meaning to "stupid," and created the slang noun "retard."

The problem with saying things like, "How could you get such an easy question wrong? Are you retarded?" or "That's not how you play defense, retard!" lies not only in the offensive nature of these words, but also in the way they make the speaker look unintelligent. Calling someone "retarded" as an insult is inappropriate because it is wrong to compare someone who has made a dumb mistake to someone with a legitimate mental disability, and also because it is using the word incorrectly. Plus, the noun "retard" is not an actual word.

For some reason, I doubt this cat actually has anything wrong with his brain. He is merely being a cat.

"Retarded" is not the only word that gets this treatment. Another word that I constantly see and hear used incorrectly in a similar manner is "gay." "Gay" has two grammatically correct meanings - "happy" and "homosexual" - and yet people have tacked on a third one: "stupid." If you complain about your phone being "gay" for not having enough battery power, you sound kind of ridiculous. This may come as a bit of a shock, but your phone is an inanimate object. It is incapable of feeling happy or having a sexual orientation. (Even if your phone did come to life and fall in love with a person, the phone has no gender itself, so the relationship would be neither homosexual nor heterosexual. Just sayin'.) Therefore, you are using the word "gay" improperly.

However, going back to the word "retarded," it has been seen as somewhat of a slur recently, and I don't completely agree with that. People are comparing "retarded" to the N-word, but I personally believe there is a huge difference between the two. The N-word comes from a time when black people were seen as inferior and went through a lot of hardships, and using it nowadays, in my opinion, is disrespectful to all those who suffered under slavery and the Jim Crow laws. "Retarded," on the other hand, is not necessarily a mean-spirited word (though it is sometimes used as such). Picking on the mentally challenged is like an adult bullying a child, so most people wouldn't do it, and anyone who does looks like a total jerk. So if a person is referred to as being mentally retarded (and actually is), I do not find it rude. It simply means that this person is "slow" compared to others, which is not saying he is stupid or inferior; it is simply stating that his brain works differently. For this reason, I don't think it was necessary to have the word removed from federal health, education and labor laws under Rosa's Law. Going back to what I said in my earlier post about swear words, words in themselves are not bad; it is the manner in which people use them that causes hurt feelings.

Pictures courtesy of therword.org and cheezburger.com.

Check out the following websites:

http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/07/living/end-r-word/index.html?iref=allsearch

http://www.r-word.og