Does This Change Anyone's Mind?

Guess what?! A new picture of George Zimmerman has been released (for some reason). Now, you might remember (or you might not because you might have blocked it all out of your mind because you just couldn't stand to hear about a bunch of speculation over and over and over again) George Zimmerman is the guy who shot Trayvon Martin about a month ago. If you don't know what I'm talking about, might I suggest you volunteer to be on this man's jury. They're looking for people like you. When the video of George being taken into the police station surfaced, I heard way more than my share of "He looks fine to me" and "I thought that he was in a fight". Too rarely did I hear "He could have been cleaned up by the paramedics" and "That video is so blurry that it might as well have been shot with a potato". Anyway, here's the new picture. Behold!

Well, how 'bout that? Looks like the back of his head was bloody because he had been injured. Just like he had said that it was. Just like the police report said that it was. And I'm not saying that this means anything one way or the other. But it does mean that something happened out there before everything got kind of shooty. I'm not saying that I know what happened (and neither do you, by the way). There are only two people who know exactly what happened and one of them is dead. If I hadn't gotten so sick of hearing this story misreported and misrepresented ad nauseum, I might be interested in what people who were so quick to jump to a conclusion had to say about this. (I'm sure they're already got their conspiracy theories a-brewin'.) What I'd like to know is why this information is just trickling out? Or actually, why it's coming out at all? But considering how irresponsible the media has been up to this point, I see no reason to expect them to handle all of this any differently.

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You'll Never Know What Happened

Up until now, I have avoided the Trayvon Martin case/incident/subject. But today, I think that I am going to dip my toe in this pool of controversy. And I doubt that I'm dipping in the same pool as a lot of people. This is a completely different pool with a completely different toe. And since that analogy is starting to sound silly the more that I use it, let's just jump right in.

First of all, a whole lot of people have a whole lot of opinions. But really, I don't know that we know enough. Yes, I know that a young black guy who was unarmed was shot by an adult Hispanic male. (He's not white like the media was so quick to make him out to be when this story first came out.) That in an of itself, regardless of color, is not good. But from what I can tell, the public hasn't been told enough about the investigation that went on. That alone tells me that I don't know that I know enough to make an informed opinion. And I don't know that any of these people who act like they have an informed opinion have any more information than I do.

People seem to be all over George Zimmerman's case on this one. And I'm not necessarily saying that they shouldn't be. But shouldn't their anger be more focused (at this time) on the police and their seemingly shoddy work on this one? From what I understand, Zimmerman wasn't even taken down to the police station for questioning. I guess all of the police questioning just happened right there at the scene. I really can't imagine that. How did that go down? "Oh, so you shot him? Self defense? Well, good job, citizen! Carry on! You're free to go." That seems awfully weak at best.


My point here is this: There are only two people on this planet who know exactly what happened and one of them is dead. How we (as the public) are ever going to know for sure what happened is beyond me. Zimmerman says that the kid attacked him. And he did have injuries that were consistent with a fight. Whether or not Zimmerman provoked the kid or started the fight, we will NEVER know. Got that? We'll NEVER know.


I am astounded at how many people want this to be about race. I am seriously appalled at how many people are just jumping to conclusions and assuming that this George Zimmerman guy shot Trayvon for no reason other than that Trayvon was black and that George was a racist. There isn't enough evidence to know that or much else, for that matter. And look, I wish the kid hadn't been shot. Whether or not Zimmerman overreacted, I have no idea. I wasn't there and neither was anyone else. But if we are going to make this about race, could we make some other things about race too? If we're going to get all upset when a black kid gets shot by someone who wasn't black, can we at least get equally upset when a white kid or a Hispanic kid or even an Asian kid gets shot? (The poor Asians. They're always left out of the race wars. I wanted to be all-inclusive.)


That's it. That's me dipping my toe in this mess. Oh, but if only others could be just as cautious with their opinions before spouting off about something that they really don't have enough information about. Yeah, that's not going to happen any time soon, unfortunately. Crap. Just crap.

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