Why didn't Trayvon Martin just walk away? I keep hearing that over and over and finally it struck me. He had no responsibility to walk away. He had no duty to retreat according to the Florida law that George Zimmerman didn't avail himself of in his defense.
Zimmerman didn't invoke Stand Your Ground for good reason. That is where the prosecution screwed up. That is how a teenager who was literally walking down the sidewalk minding his own business became convicted of his own murder.
The person who used the Stand Your Ground law was Trayvon Martin.
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It was evening. He was in his father's neighborhood where he didn't normally reside. He was being followed. He acknowledged on the phone to his friend Jeantel that he was uncomfortable. It's true he profiled Zimmerman as much as Zimmerman profiled him because of his race. Martin said he was being followed by a "cracker." It was unmistakenly racist. But in this context it proves that Martin felt threatened.
Martin also called Zimmerman "creepy-a##," another dead giveaway that Martin was scared, literally getting the creeps.
Zimmerman got out of his car -- the one stupid, unjustifiable act that made this tragedy possible -- and pursued Martin on foot, despite being told, "We don't need you to do that." by the police.
On his 911 call, Zimmerman was out of breath. From his physical appearance it doesn't look like it would take much. But it took something. He wasn't just strolling. He was pursuing Martin with some energy.
How could Martin perceive this any other way than a threat?
Let me tell you, I have been followed on the street. In two instances in downtown Seattle, both times crossing Third Ave on Lenora and I felt very threatened. Both times it got very close to a fight or flight situation. In one case my wife was with me and we were both carrying bags of groceries from the World Market on First Ave. I was scanning around for weapons. And both times the situation ended when Seattle Police Department bicycle patrols peddled by.
So I understand exactly how Trayvon Martin was feeling as he was being followed, pursued, stalked by George Zimmerman.
So why didn't he walk away? That's what everybody is saying, everybody I mean, who is defending George Zimmerman. It is a chorus of wingnuts all saying the same thing. That's what the jurors in Zimmerman's murder trial were saying. That's how Trayvon contributed to his own death. Why ... didn't ... Trayvon ... just ... walk ... away?
Good question.
Want a better one? Why isn't anybody applying Florida's really Bad Idea Stand Your Ground law to Trayvon? Why isn't anybody noting that it was Trayvon who was invoking the Stand Your Ground law? He was the one who had ground to stand, not George Zimmerman.
Why aren't the gun rights advocates so anxious to defend not only vigilante George Zimmerman, but the ALEC-pimped Stand Your Ground law to Trayvon? Didn't he have a right to stand his ground and defend himself from the onslaught of George Zimmerman? Under Florida law and conservative ideology, didn't Trayvon Martin have a right, even a moral obligation, to defend himself that evening?
Trayvon Martin was literally minding his own business. He was literally on his own ground. And it was George Zimmerman who invaded it. These facts are not really in dispute. It's just that the prosecution wasn't smart enough to use them. But the defense was smart enough not to invoke Stand Your Ground in Zimmerman's defense because it wasn't Zimmerman who had ground to stand. It was Martin.
The law, as it is written, gave Trayvon Martin, not George Zimmerman, the right to use force. Trayvon acted EXACTLY how the authors of Stand Your Ground intended for him to act. Except he didn't have a gun. He had Skittles and Iced Tea and 17-year-old muscles and 17-year-old instincts. But he had ground. The whole idea behind Stand Your Ground is that if you have a right to be where you are, then that is your place and you have no obligation to flee is accosted. Martin was definitely accosted on his ground that night, as the Stand Your Ground law specifically means it.
That is surely not how the authors intended Stand Your Ground to be used, however. The authors and supporters of Stand Your Ground never possibly conceived that it would be used by people who really do have ground to stand against aggressors, because they believe the aggressors are ALWAYS 17-year-old black males in hoodies acting suspiciously by walking on the sidewalk on the way back from the store and NEVER half white, half hispanic racist vigilante gun nuts.
Neither the authors of Stand Your Ground, nor the gun rights advocates, nor the conservatives who ardently support it, nor the prosecutors in this case, nor almost all the national news media fixated by it ... could conceive of Trayvon Martin being the one standing his ground because they can't imagine him having ground to stand.
That's racism and it is racism deep, deep down and shared across genders, across races, across the political spectrum.
And it is also why Stand Your Ground is very, very bad law.
Stand Your Ground permits, even encourages, violence. The law, despite the intention of its authors, doesn't know who is black and who is white. It only knows that you don't have to walk away even if you can. If you're minding your own business you can fight back. Trayvon Martin did exactly what the law said to do and now he is dead at the hands of a creepy-ass cracker vigilante who is too damn stupid and gun-toting reckless to have stayed in his car where he could have safely pretended to be a cop all night long.
Trayvon Martin followed the base logic of ALEC, the NRA and white America under imaginary siege and the law of the land. Now he is dead. His murderer is free. Justice is perverted. And everybody is left wondering what the hell just happened.
This is a fine example of what we don't want our society to be and the stone-cold reason this law and laws like it need to be beaten back.