Mohler: The Central Tragedy of this Case Remains—Trayvon Martin Belongs to Us All

If you find my statement nonsensical, then refute it. The media seldom reports, with the furor and passion that was paid to the Martin case, the deaths of young blacks unless they were harmed/killed by a light-skinned person. By and large, they’ve reported this case in a dishonest and biased fashion that has nothing to do with the facts of the case. What other conclusion should I draw?

I agree with you that the media, for the most part, has reported this case very dishonestly. But to say that the media seldom reports (although maybe your emphasis was furor and passion) the deaths of young blacks unless they were harmed/killed by a light-skinned person doesn’t seem to square with the facts. For instance, the media has paid much attention to all of the homicides in Chicago. even the liberal news outlet, Huffington Post, has been keeping track of all of the Chicago homicides, much of which are black on black, black on brown, or brown on brown crimes.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/chicago-homicides

If you google Chicago homicides, you will get thousands of articles and even alot of misinformation as well prompting one professor of Criminal Justice to write this article.

http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20120726/NEWS02/120729840/a-city-under-siege-5-beliefs-about-homicides-in-chicago

As gang killings have soared in my city, the local media focused much of their attention on young African-Americans and Latinos that were dying on the streets…….. In fact, for about 3 months, there was a story in the the local paper almost every night about it.

I’m of the mind that the central tragedy of cases like this is that it was avoidable. I was reading some opinion pieces earlier this morning, and I think it was Bill O’Reilly who said that the lesson to learn is to avoid confrontation when possible. We should teach our children not to seek out confrontation, and to leave a potentially violent situation if at all possible.

I’m tempted to say “know when to walk away, know when to run”, but then I’d be guilty of the eisegetic interpretation of The Gambler.

Another tragedy that goes unaddressed day after day after day is the success and idolization of musicians/celebrities like Kanye West, who is a classless, profane, and violent thug, but who gets a pass every time he puts out another album - which is also classless, profane, and violent.

Here he attacks paparazzi, and here are some interesting statements about his behavior-

“Although Kanye’s behavior appears to be increasingly erratic, ultimately he will always continue to have a strong fan base due to the fact that he’s such a talented artist,” said New York-based publicist, Elissa Buchter. “The public is so desensitized to his outrageous comments by now, to the point where its almost become his calling card. A lesser musician may not be able to sustain it however definitely Kanye can.”

“Fans, including those in the industry, have a love and hate relationship with him. He says really inappropriate disgusting comments that get everyone irritate and remind us just how immature and classless he really is, but then he comes out with an over-the-top album so everyone forgets his last rant,” he said.

What lessons do young men learn from this?

And how has President Obama’s responded? This is the best he can do.

Susan, I have to disagree with you on this one. Kanye’s music may be filled with profanity, drug use, violence, gang life, and words that are degrading to women. But he is a voice of the black community. He is a symbol of the oppression and social injustice that exists in this world. His albums are like black hymnals. We need to listen to his words and extract from them the dross and find the gold inside of them. We can learn much about the plight of African Americans by listening to what he has to say.

In many ways, Kanye is like Trayvon, fighting his own Zimmerman. We each have a Trayvon that exists within our selves. We must listen to it and help it to survive- to survive against the Zimmermans that we each will have to face during our lifetimes. For some Zimmerman may represent a vice they need to overcome. For others it may be obesity. For some, Zimmerman may be the death of a loved one to Cancer.

You see Susan, Trayvon and Zimmerman are more than merely two men who met one fateful night. They have become symbols of the dual nature of our existence. The ancients wrote about this using forms we could understand. Darkness vs Light, Summer vs Winter, Death vs Life, Zeus vs Hades, Ying vs Yang… and in our own time, Black vs White, Communism vs Democracy, etc.

To understand this, is to understand all of our existence. When Trayvon cried out that night, he was releasing the spiritual energy of all the oppressed, from the time of the slavery in Egypt, to captivity in Babylon, al the way up until now. And that cry has created a ripple effect in time and space, that hits each one of us.

On that night, Martin’s life was taken by Zimmerman. His blood washed away by the rain- or, what I would like to believe were tears from heaven. The only evidence we have of his existence, is the 9-11 recording, in which we can hear his cry for help. And with that one word “help”, he we was in essence saying to his aggressor… “Let my people go.”

Christian,

I’m guessing your sarcasm is aimed at the media?

No, Joel. That wasn’t sarcasm. Those were the lyrics of Kanye West’s song “For A Bag of Skittles”, from his 1998 album entitled “Z-Man Oppressor”.

[christian cerna]

Susan, I have to disagree with you on this one. Kanye’s music may be filled with profanity, drug use, violence, gang life, and words that are degrading to women. But he is a voice of the black community. He is a symbol of the oppression and social injustice that exists in this world. His albums are like black hymnals. We need to listen to his words and extract from them the dross and find the gold inside of them. We can learn much about the plight of African Americans by listening to what he has to say.

In many ways, Kanye is like Trayvon, fighting his own Zimmerman. We each have a Trayvon that exists within our selves. We must listen to it and help it to survive- to survive against the Zimmermans that we each will have to face during our lifetimes. For some Zimmerman may represent a vice they need to overcome. For others it may be obesity. For some, Zimmerman may be the death of a loved one to Cancer.

You see Susan, Trayvon and Zimmerman are more than merely two men who met one fateful night. They have become symbols of the dual nature of our existence. The ancients wrote about this using forms we could understand. Darkness vs Light, Summer vs Winter, Death vs Life, Zeus vs Hades, Ying vs Yang… and in our own time, Black vs White, Communism vs Democracy, etc.

To understand this, is to understand all of our existence. When Trayvon cried out that night, he was releasing the spiritual energy of all the oppressed, from the time of the slavery in Egypt, to captivity in Babylon, al the way up until now. And that cry has created a ripple effect in time and space, that hits each one of us.

On that night, Martin’s life was taken by Zimmerman. His blood washed away by the rain- or, what I would like to believe were tears from heaven. The only evidence we have of his existence, is the 9-11 recording, in which we can hear his cry for help. And with that one word “help”, he we was in essence saying to his aggressor… “Let my people go.”

Christian, we’ve interacted on several posts recently. Sometimes you choose to actually engage in a dialogue with opposing positions. However, much of the time you choose to attack other people’s intelligence and use sarcasm rather than actually interacting with their views. You would do well to exercise charity in your words. I assume that your purpose is to clearly and logically present your own views while also hoping to hone the positions of others. Your opinion could be very valuable on many topics, but I honestly tune you out most of the time because you don’t seem to exhibit a real desire to interact.

Engage with people about their actual position (not the caricatures that you love to paint). Understand their position as they do…and don’t discard it merely because you disagree. Take the time to read a post and post a thoughtful reply. It will actually improve the quality of conversations on this and other boards. I think you would then find that the comments would be less repetitious and more edifying…

Replying with sarcasm towards a legit question about your sarcasm……..

Hmmmmm………………….

I’m guessing you really don’t want engage in meaningful conversation…….

Judge Jeanine Pirro responds to the Rolling Stone cover featuring the Boston bomber. The Zimmerman/Martin case is certainly not completely parallel. but I think that here response to that case has some intersection with this one. Here is an excerpt.

“We coddle criminals as if they were the violated, not the ones doing the violating. We’ve got it ass backwards; we celebritize criminals, cloak them with respectability, make them look hip and rocker-cool, and our hearts bleed for the ordinary kid—surely the good kid gone astray. He doesn’t seem so bad. And we long to find sensible reasons for the most brutal of crimes as we stitch together a quilt of excuses—student loans, divorced parents, failed by his family, falling into radical Islam. And then we engage in a national therapy session—’how did we lose him,’ ‘where did we go wrong?’ Why do we look so hard to find excuses—this dirt bag worked hard to maim and kill innocent Americans who themselves worked hard to train their bodies to run a marathon, only to come face to face with evil. Before our eyes, a terrorist is turned into a rock star.”

The nation, and perhaps this thread, seem engaged in a therapy session - “how did we lose him, where did we go wrong” or perhaps “Trayvon belongs to all of us.”