A Friend’s Zimmerman/Martin Reflections
Tibor R. Machan
Over these last few days I have sat reading and listening to
many comments about the Zimmerman episode but could only shake my head
mostly in disbelief--has the country gone crazy?
And then today a friend from way back--we served in the US Air Force
together some 50 years ago--sent me the following which I believe is
exactly on the money. So I asked his permission to share it and here it
is:
“I
guess that it's my old age. I am imagining that most, if not all,
commentary in the media, particularly the President, report and react to
the Zimmerman-Martin trial as if Zimmerman had seen an unknown young
"unarmed" black, not white, teenager, in his neighborhood, walked up to
him without provocation, shot him dead, and a white jury said he was not
guilty of any crime.
“The
jury mistakenly took the allegations that a young black, not white,
unarmed teenager was drawing blood from Zimmerman by bashing his head
against the concrete while Zimmerman yelled for help, as fact, when, of
course, those allegations were made by white people so they must have
been lies, therefore, we won't mention them in our rants about injustice
and the necessity to break-in and rob stores to retaliate for a
prejudicial system.
“No,.
. . as the President points out, black people are not "naive" about
statistics showing the extraordinary preponderance of young black men
committing a full range of crimes including murder well above the
percent of their population numbers compared with white peers. Is a
better word "denial"?
“To
remove the fear many whites demonstrate when in the presence of young
black men in circumstances specified by the President, they are going to
have to earn the removal of that fear by a statistical change in
behavior. No amount of "education" or any other fix will ever remove
it.
