Let's talk about Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman, and how unbelievably fucked up this all is

yeah that was cryptic

i know of two places where that has happened. one is east palo alto, where they built an ikea. the other (sort of) is oakland, where they also built an ikea.

well according to the patriarchy thread, an ikea would solve all social ills

Here's the Touré & Piers clip.

piers is a condescending prick, esp in that clip

Totally. smdh @ "calm down."

just a bit of lazy TV journalism let's be cool

I kinda can't keep cool about this, because every time an irrelevant source like George Zimmerman's brother (I mean...what the fuck?!) gets implicit institutional approval, the more legitimate the heinous 'alternative viewpoint' (which is based more on the quantity of garbage 'evidence' than the quality of logic which informs said evidence) becomes in the eyes of those with racist leanings. Ol' Clem said he saw that black feller smokin' reefer, and Fred's cousin says Fred's a right upstandin' pillar of the community, so I think we got all the evidence we need to get out the lynchin' rope. Except the lynchee is already dead, so they seem pretty content this time to take on the entirety of black America.

So are there any more facts about this case that correspond to the actual shooting and not character assassination jpegs?

http://news.yahoo.com/public-opinion-shifts-trayvon-martin-case-063506171.html

stuff like that really makes me feel i am living amongst millions of folks with close to zero moral intelligence

i wonder why anyone would have hopes for our democracy in that context

Just 18 percent said they thought “Zimmerman was attacked” by the teen.

In the WPA poll, 39 percent said they believe Trayvon Martin was “minding his own business” when he was attacked.

just 48 percent of Americans said police should arrest Zimmerman

i cut and pasted those three out of order so maybe the implication isn't fair but it sure seems like there's a sizable chunk of people who think zimmerman was within his rights to shoot trayvon martin even if he wasn't attacked because trayvon ... talked back? might have been casing some houses?

Should                   48%
Should Not             16%
Unsure                   36%

ah that makes more sense

i was reading it as should not: 52%

always important to remember that most americans don't pay that much attention to the news so when it's not something like "planes crashed into the world trade center" opinion polls are gonna be kinda pointless

but yeah the idea that 30% of americans would change their minds on something over a few days cause they watched cnn or something...people just don't get information that fast, it's not even feasible

that 48% figure still used to be 73% though xpost

I can't find the internals of the cnn poll but I wouldn't be surprised if that 73% is a subset of people who consider themselves familiar with the situation, whereas the 48% wasn't

Fuck America. Seriously, if I ever start seriously thinking about having kids, I am out of here.

Nearly three-in-five (59%) of those who say they have seen “a great deal” about the story believe that Zimmerman should be arrested. This is compared to 48% overall who believe he should be arrested.

i mean maybe the 36% is just like, fuck it, let's see what the grand jury decides

i sort of feel that way now too, i'm willing to be angry all over again in april

1. Zimmerman was attacked 18%
2. Neither DNR 11%
3. Both DNR 4%
4. DK/Refused DNR 27%
5. Trayvon Martin was minding his own business 39%

nah dawg 36% is "I mostly just watch american idol and my facebook friends post pictures of puppies instead of political articles" and/or "I am an old man in a retirement home, who is this calling me, where am I"

heh

"america is confused"

18% think zimmerman should be arrested
20% think he shouldn't
62% are just happy they have someone to talk to on the phone cause their grandkids never call anymore

Not watching cable news helps.

In exchange for the Zimmerman conviction that's never going to happen at this point, can we sink Florida to the ocean floor and delete all cable news networks? I really think I'd settle for that.

56% of americans would be fine with sinking florida to the ocean floor, 77% if you only count people who have heard 'a great deal' about florida

can we put disney world on pontoons

the magic kingdom reef

no way I'm hanging on to one of Cinderella Castle's towers.

yo everybody I'm as into hating America as the next guy but public opinion polls throughout history wherever human beings are will always indicate that ppl are fuckin horrible monsters a lot of the time, America's got its own special nasty take on how to suck at being human but c'mon now what's terrible about a case like this + public reaction is that it reminds us that that our desire for people to be generally Good/belief in that proposition doesn't stop it from being true that people are often hateful & easy to manipulate

It's not just the opinion polls. They're simply verification (however skewed and inaccurate) of the extent to which so many people's latent racism is pouring forth as they rush to blame the victim of this travesty BECAUSE HE'S FUCKING BLACK AND APPARENTLY DESERVED TO FUCKING DIE.

Like, I'm as reasonable a "hey, man, let's try to fairly examine both sides of the issue" type as could be, but I see no other way to frame the position of these sub-human fucks.

move to europe, definitely no racism there

so many people's latent racism is pouring forth as they rush to blame the victim of this travesty BECAUSE HE'S FUCKING BLACK AND APPARENTLY DESERVED TO FUCKING DIE.

while i'm sure that's true in many/most cases, it's not the only way that people justify their disparagement of trayvon's character. people's latent (and not so latent) racism is pouring forth as they rush to assume that that the police response is being called into question and the case is receiving national attention only because the victim is black. this distrust leads them to accept even the most half-assed support they can find for "the official story".

same thing, i suppose.

No place is perfect. Always thought Toronto sounded pretty decent.

No place is perfect. Always thought Toronto sounded pretty decent.

― Marty McBrundlefly (Deric W. Haircare), Saturday, March 31, 2012 10:33 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

No minorities->no racism

people's latent (and not so latent) racism is pouring forth as they rush to assume that that the police response is being called into question and the case is receiving national attention only because the victim is black.

Yeah, but (and I realize I'm not telling you in particular anything new) cases like this very pointedly don't receive national attention very often specifically because the victims are black. I don't really recall instances of black people being so gouache as to complain en masse when there's national attention paid to similar incidents when the victim is white. Although I'd argue that they'd be in a much more defensible position if they did.

There's just no angle from which I can look at responses of this nature and see them as anything but inexcusably ignorant at best and horrifyingly racist at worst.

No minorities->no racism

F'real? I'd always heard Toronto was pretty racially/ethnically diverse. Unless this is what you mean by 'no minorities'.

see, the thing is, and this is why one wishes to reach through the screen to throttle Brooke Baldwin in the vid whiney linked upthread, there is no "if the victim were white" here because if the victim were white a motherfucker woulda got arrested.

Yeah, I'm curious: we've since heard about other insane instances when a murderer has walked because of this Stand Your Ground shit, but how many of the victims in those instances were white? I really wanna know. I'm gonna guess zero?

aren't people still supposed to be arrested with stand your ground? and THEN let go? i don't know the details but it seems absolutely fucked that these cases apparently don't have to go to court.

No minorities->no racism
― thistle supporter (mcoll),

the fuck?!

And also, Toronto has plenty of racism! Canada! We have racism too!

Montreal, also!

And xenophobia and police brutality! We do it all!