But I will note, with interest, that a growing number of prominent black voices are reacting in a way that I find refreshingly constructive. They are wondering why the black community (and the news media) aren't outraged by the long-standing scourge of violence against blacks perpetrated by other blacks.
Juan Williams has just such a question in today's WSJ. In it, he cites an old quote from Jesse Jackson that I remember well:
"There is nothing more painful to me at this stage in my life than to walk down the street and hear footsteps and start thinking about robbery. Then look around and see somebody white and feel relieved... After all we have been through. Just to think we can't walk down our own streets, how humiliating."Whatever the facts of the Trayvon Martin case are, these black voices are raising a most excellent question. Where is your outrage, Al Sharpton? Why aren't you tweeting about that, Spike Lee? And most of all, our first black President: why aren't you siccing Holder on a real problem, Mr. Obama?
What I'd really like, is for "activists" to quit using every event to get on TV. Maybe they should get real jobs? What does Al Sharpton do anyway? Why is the Black Panther party getting away with offering a bounty on the guy? Why is it that every time a black kid gets killed, there are tons of people on TV immediately about how wonderful a kid he was and how he wouldn't hurt no one... and then you start learning about who they really were. The reason is they will use the event while it is fresh, and when the real facts come out, it is already old news.
ReplyDeleteWhy aren't they first asking what he was doing there late at night in a gated neighborhood he didn't live in or know anyone? Why is that even acceptable to "the black community"? Why does it seem to be beyond imagination that somehow Zimmerman was defending himself? could we at least wait until after an investigation before we call for the lynching?
Those castle laws are designed to stop prosecuting people for defending themselves. For example, if you are attacked you shouldn't have to lay there being beaten with a baseball bat unable to shoot him because you are worried about prosecution. You shouldn't have to ask to see the gun before you shoot an intruder in your home. And already, over one public case, where the facts are still unknown, I'm hearing criticisms of these laws.
I'm sure we'll learn what happened eventually, but if he was attacked, even if he was stupidly following that kid to keep an eye on him, he had every right to defend himself. And if not, most likely he will be prosecuted. He should not be required to "retreat" into his house and hope nothing bad happens.