The Trayvon Martin Foundation

[Pointedstick]

Apparently Trayvon Martin's parents have set up the Trayvon Martin Foundation and are using their dead son's image and memory to sell merchandise, for the following purpose: "to create awareness of how violent crime impacts the families of the victims, and to provide support and advocacy for those families, in response to the murder of Trayvon Martin."

It looks like the foundation is doing its job of supporting Martin's parents quite nicely.

Words fail me.

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[RuralEngineer]

Is it just me, or does the picture on the merchandise actually look more like the sketches of suspects that the police hand out?

Maybe they should rethink the black and white color scheme.

[MediumTex]

So far in August I have seen a lot of really dumb things, but that is easily the dumbest.

I am confident that I will not see anything that dumb for the rest of the month.

If the Martin family knew the degree to which they were marionettes for some very cynical and opportunistic professional racists, they might reconsider their own amateurish opportunism in trying to cash in on their son's death while he was in the process of trying to kill George Zimmerman.

When people get sucked into this sort of thing, it always triggers the same question in my mind: "Are they really that cynical, or are they just that dumb?"

[moda0306]

So now we've established he was actually trying to kill George Zimmerman?

[Pointedstick]

So now we've established he was actually trying to kill George Zimmerman?

I think that was established in court and again by his girlfriend, who casually admitted it during two separate interviews on national television.

[AdamA]

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Collectibles?

Like these?

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[WiseOne]

So now we've established he was actually trying to kill George Zimmerman?

I think that was established in court and again by his girlfriend, who casually admitted it during two separate interviews on national television.

And how would anyone know this??  I assume the girlfriend wasn't discussing the matter with either of the two combatants during the fight.

If a guy with a gun followed and then caught up with you, would you be so confident that he wasn't a threat?  In that situation, I might well decide to at least try to disable the guy if I had the ability to do so.  And I'd be terrified enough that I wouldn't necessarily be acting completely logically.  I truly don't understand the sentiments on this board against Trayvon Martin.  He was certainly no angel, but I don't see how his actions were any less justified than Zimmerman's.

[Pointedstick]

And how would anyone know this??  I assume the girlfriend wasn't discussing the matter with either of the two combatants during the fight.

No, but it was her urging immediately before the attack (they were talking on the phone up until the moment of the first blow) that contributed to Martin's decision to attack Zimmerman, again, by her own admission. She counseled Martin that Zimmerman might be a gay rapist who would follow him home and molest Martin's brother. I'm not making this up. She said it in court, and then she said it again on Piers Morgan's show and on the Huffington Post.

If a guy with a gun followed and then caught up with you, would you be so confident that he wasn't a threat?  In that situation, I might well decide to at least try to disable the guy if I had the ability to do so.  And I'd be terrified enough that I wouldn't necessarily be acting completely logically.  I truly don't understand the sentiments on this board against Trayvon Martin.  He was certainly no angel, but I don't see how his actions were any less justified than Zimmerman's.

Well, Zimmerman wasn't "a guy with a gun". He was just a guy. His gun was concealed, so Martin didn't know he had a gun until Zimmerman was on the ground. It's not like Zimmerman was angrily charging at Martin brandishing a pistol.

Second, Zimmerman never "caught up with" Martin. It's been established that Zimmerman was going back to his truck when Martin in fact confronted him and asked him a question. If Martin was really in an irrational panic, why would he go out of his way to confront the person he was allegedly irrationally terrified of?

...Unless his irrational terror was that Zimmerman was a gay rapist, which meant that proceeding home was not an option. In this case (again, as explained by Martin's girlfriend), Martin would have needed to confront and disable the threat to his brother by beating him up and leaving him unable to follow Martin the rest of the way home. Martin had to use his hands and fists to accomplish this because his own (illegally-owned) handgun was not on his person at the time.

Unfortunately, this version of the events has Martin committing a hate crime. Battering a man because you believe he is he is gay and will follow you home and sexually assault your brother is a very, very serious crime.

[Pointedstick]

In self-defense law, there's this concept of what a "reasonable man" would do in a similar situation. To use your example, WiseOne, if a person is openly brandishing a firearm and perhaps rapidly approaching you in a menacing manner, it's absolutely reasonable to assume that he means you harm, and try to disable him if flight is impossible, impractical, or reasonably judged to be too dangerous (due to proximity, lack of cover, etc). If that's what happened, then it's much more clear-cut and Martin had every right to strike Zimmerman due to reasonable fear of imminent bodily harm or death.

However, George Zimmerman didn't do any of that. He watched Martin from his vehicle, followed Trayvon Martin on foot a short distance with his firearm holstered and concealed, and then returned to his vehicle. No "reasonable man" could possibly conclude that such a person represented an imminent threat, that being the only legally permissible situation which merits the use of force.

Not only that, but regardless of which version is true, once it was clear that Zimmerman was beaten, Martin had no legal right to continue the assault. You're only allowed to use enough force necessary to make yourself safe. Once you've gotten your assailant on the ground, prone, and are able to rain blows down upon him with impunity, you're not allowed to perform a coup-de-grace move and kill your assailant. At that point, you are considered to be starting a new conflict as an aggressor.

With firearms, the way this works is that if you shoot someone in self-defense and he runs away, you can't shoot him in the back; the threat has passed. Similarly. Martin can't beat Zimmerman's head on the concrete once Zimmerman's threat has been neutralized, even if he originally had a reasonable fear for his life.

[MediumTex]

Remember, too, that the only marks that Trayvon Martin had on his body other than the gunshot wound were abrasions on his fists, presumably from striking Zimmerman.  In other words, there was no fight.  It was simply an attack. 

Martin attacked Zimmerman and once he had him pinned to the ground and was beating his skull on the sidewalk then, and only then, did Zimmerman defend himself using force, and the force he used was well within the amount of force that he was legally permitted to use in the defense of his own life.

It's sad that a young man died, but I think that it's important to understand that if Martin had possibly delivered even one more blow to the back of Zimmerman's head and killed him, we would almost certainly be hearing about this case in the context of a 17 year old thug who murdered a man in cold blood in front of his neighbors after a savage beating and was now facing the death penalty.

In the alternate scenario I am describing where Zimmerman simply submitted to the beating from Martin (which is what Martin's girlfriend suggested that Zimmerman should have done), it could easily be a death penalty case due to the hate crime element that motivated the attack in the first place (i.e., according to Martin's girlfriend, Martin attacked Zimmerman because Martin thought Zimmerman was gay).

There are plenty of examples of black people being attacked or killed based upon racial motivations.  I'm not disputing that in any way or suggesting that it isn't a terrible tragedy when it happens.  What I am saying, though, is that this case had nothing to do with race, and I simply can't comprehend the idea that in a person's own neighborhood they should be expected to just submit to a savage beating without defending themselves in any way, and if they are legally carrying a firearm I don't know why we would say that they aren't allowed to use it once a reasonable person would begin to fear for his life due to the nature of the attack.

If you are still in the camp that thinks that Martin was just a sweet little innocent boy walking home with his Skittles and Iced Tea when big bad George Zimmerman killed him in cold blood, "execution style", as reported on CNN, please take a closer look at the case.  If you peel back the cynical and racist smokescreen cultivated by the media through blatant misrepresentations such as NBC cutting and splicing the 911 tape, you will see a tragic but textbook case of self-defense against a gratuitous and unprovoked attack.

It's not illegal to walk through your neighborhood, and it's not illegal to walk behind someone.  Doing those things simply doesn't warrant being attacked, and even if we are going to be generous and give Martin a free sucker punch that breaks Zimmerman's nose, there is no conceivable justification for Martin to continue the attack at that point.  If you've ever been hit hard in the nose, you know that your desire to fight after that point rapidly diminishes.  Martin could have walked home after bloodying Zimmerman's face and felt like he had really shown that "cracker" who was boss.  He didn't have to keep up the attack.

If, however, you look at Martin's activities in the weeks and months leading up to the confrontation with Zimmerman, you see that Martin was engaging in more and more violent and antisocial behavior, possibly being driven by the frequent consumption of "Purple Drank"-type concoctions, which are known after frequent use to create paranoia, agitation and aggressiveness, and when you view the case in that light it makes a lot more sense why Martin continued the attack in the manner that he did.

One of the many tragic elements of the case is that the criminal justice system had apparently failed so completely in the first place that Martin was on the street at all.  If I burglarized a house in my neighborhood (which the evidence suggests Martin did) and I then attacked a bus driver (which Martin's Twitter account refers to Martin doing), I would expect to be in jail, not attacking someone else inside some gated community hundreds of miles from where I live.

[moda0306]

All the physical facts of the case aside leading us to believe that Zimmerman was in quite a pickle and was unable to prevent what was going on, stating conclusively or with any certainty at all that Martin was trying to kill Zimmerman is pretty excessive.

Further, if some guy was following me through the dark, through yards, the idea that he may be a rapist is probably not the most outrageous thing in the world.  If some guy was following me at night I'd be nervous.  I certainly wouldn't try to beat him up for it, but I wouldn't care to be referred to as a homophobic racist who attemted to kill the man as I lay in my grave.

It seems that you're twisting the outwardly creepy (though not illegal) actions of Zimmerman, and Martin's interpretations of those actions, rather than giving Martin an actual legitimate fear for his well-being, as grounds to simply dismiss Martin as a homophobic racist who was trying to kill Zimmerman... an assertion that I find more than a bit hyperbolic (even if all the other assertions as to who the aggressor was and whether the fight was clearly in Martin's favor are true), especially when Zimmerman's behavior, while legal, certainly would leave plenty of people a bit off-put.

Anyways... Martin is dead as a doornail, so all we're left with to defend his actions is his illiterate girlfriend or whatever she was, the man who shot him, and a few neighbors who could barely see anything.  The fact that Zimmerman has proclaimed that he wouldn't change one thing about what he did had he been given the chance to do it again also speaks volumes.  Simlply put, following someone on a dark street is creepy.  It's not illegal.  It doesn't warrant physical aggression.  But if I were to follow someone and they were to end up dead at my hands, I probably would, at the very least, wish that I'd handled it differently.

[Pointedstick]

All the physical facts of the case aside leading us to believe that Zimmerman was in quite a pickle and was unable to prevent what was going on, stating conclusively or with any certainty at all that Martin was trying to kill Zimmerman is pretty excessive.

"Ignoring all the evidence, there's no evidence!" 

Further, if some guy was following me through the dark, through yards, the idea that he may be a rapist is probably not the most outrageous thing in the world.  If some guy was following me at night I'd be nervous.  I certainly wouldn't try to beat him up for it, but I wouldn't care to be referred to as a homophobic racist who attemted to kill the man as I lay in my grave.

But if you did beat him up due to your fear that he might be a gay rapist, and he killed you in defense of his own life, wouldn't it be reasonable to refer to you as a homophobe who chose the wrong target?

It seems that you're twisting the outwardly creepy (though not illegal) actions of Zimmerman, and Martin's interpretations of those actions, rather than giving Martin an actual legitimate fear for his well-being, as grounds to simply dismiss Martin as a homophobic racist who was trying to kill Zimmerman... an assertion that I find more than a bit hyperbolic (even if all the other assertions as to who the aggressor was and whether the fight was clearly in Martin's favor are true), especially when Zimmerman's behavior, while legal, certainly would leave plenty of people a bit off-put.

There's nothing wrong with being afraid. And 17 year-olds are dumb. I remember when I was a dumb 17 year-old. But somehow I managed to make it to age 18 without attacking creepy strangers.

If Zimmerman's actions weren't making Martin feel like he was in imminent danger, his attack was unjustified. That's simply all there is to it. It doesn't matter how creepy Zimmerman was. It doesn't matter how frightened Martin was. If there was no imminent peril to be afraid of, an attack isn't justified. That's literally all that matters. I'm not telling you what I think, I'm telling you what the law says. I'm telling you what society has decided the standard is, since you're a believer in democracy.

As a gun owner yourself, these are things you really need to grok. Misunderstanding when you can use force out of fear can get you put away for a long, long time. You can only use force to immediately save a life. Never to prevent a future danger, especially only a perceived future danger. What if you're wrong? As we can clearly see, Jeantel and Martin were both dead wrong in their estimation that Zimmerman was a gay rapist out for some molestin'. Where's all the outrage over that? Why aren't people demanding to know what was going on in their heads such that the first thing that seemed reasonable was that the stranger who was following you from more than a hundred feet away was a gay rapist?? To me, this mental leap is totally bewildering and offensive in the extreme.

[MediumTex]

All the physical facts of the case aside leading us to believe that Zimmerman was in quite a pickle and was unable to prevent what was going on, stating conclusively or with any certainty at all that Martin was trying to kill Zimmerman is pretty excessive.

I'm not saying that Martin was conclusively trying to kill Zimmerman, but Zimmerman told the police that Martin said he was going to kill him (i.e., "you gonna die tonight"), and a reasonable person could easily interpret having their head repeatedly slammed into a sidewalk by someone sitting on top of them who broke their nose minutes earlier as evidence of their attacker having the intent to kill them.

Further, if some guy was following me through the dark, through yards, the idea that he may be a rapist is probably not the most outrageous thing in the world.  If some guy was following me at night I'd be nervous.  I certainly wouldn't try to beat him up for it, but I wouldn't care to be referred to as a homophobic racist who attempted to kill the man as I lay in my grave.

It was Martin's girlfriend who said he was a homophobic racist, not me.

It seems that you're twisting the outwardly creepy (though not illegal) actions of Zimmerman, and Martin's interpretations of those actions, rather than giving Martin an actual legitimate fear for his well-being, as grounds to simply dismiss Martin as a homophobic racist who was trying to kill Zimmerman... an assertion that I find more than a bit hyperbolic (even if all the other assertions as to who the aggressor was and whether the fight was clearly in Martin's favor are true), especially when Zimmerman's behavior, while legal, certainly would leave plenty of people a bit off-put.

Maybe Martin was just a guy who was trying to kill Zimmerman.  I'm only citing the racist homophobic motivations because that is what the State of Florida probably would have cited in charging Martin with capital murder if he had succeeded in killing Zimmerman.

Anyways... Martin is dead as a doornail, so all we're left with to defend his actions is his illiterate girlfriend or whatever she was, the man who shot him, and a few neighbors who could barely see anything.

Did you see the neighbor John Good's testimony?  There was no question whatsoever that Martin was on top and continuing the attack "ground and pound" style.  Good had a very clear view and provided a tremendous amount of detail about what he saw.

The fact that Zimmerman has proclaimed that he wouldn't change one thing about what he did had he been given the chance to do it again also speaks volumes.

I interpreted that comment to mean that if he was again faced with the choice of submitting to a vicious attack or defending himself, he would defend himself again.

I know that others interpreted that remark as Zimmerman saying that if he had the chance to kill Martin again he would kill him again.  I just didn't interpret it that way.  How can anyone seriously believe that Zimmerman wouldn't do things differently that day if he had them to do over if it would have kept him from being attacked by Martin in the first place?  Wouldn't that have been a much better outcome for both Zimmerman AND Martin? 

Simply put, following someone on a dark street is creepy.

If I am walking down a dark street and someone is in front of me, you could say I am following that person, and there is nothing inherently creepy about that.

Did Martin have some kind of "protected zone" behind him in which no one was allowed to walk?  I don't understand the line of reasoning at all that Zimmerman was somehow behaving inappropriately by walking 50-100 yards behind Martin.

It's not illegal.  It doesn't warrant physical aggression.  But if I were to follow someone and they were to end up dead at my hands, I probably would, at the very least, wish that I'd handled it differently.

I would wish that the guy who attacked me had handled it differently as well.

There is a certain assumption of risk that is involved any time you decide to attack someone. 

Martin probably assumed that he would be able to easily dominate Zimmerman in the attack, and he was correct.  The only thing that Martin probably hadn't planned on was for Zimmerman to be armed and able to defend himself once the attack got into full swing.

[moda0306]

But if you did beat him up due to your fear that he might be a gay rapist, and he killed you in defense of his own life, wouldn't it be reasonable to refer to you as a homophobe who chose the wrong target?

Homophobia is a general negative attitude towards gay activity.  It's not the fear you might feel by someone who's following you at night that might assault you.  To make ths about homophobia is a bit ridiculous.  It's the natural fear someone might feel if they're followed at night by another person.

If girl was creeped the hell out by some guy following her at night, it wouldn't be "straightophobia," it would just be fear of this guy who might rape you or assault you.  These two are TOTALLY different.

Further, "imminent peril" seems quite relative to me.  People react emotionally when they feel they might be in peril.  There's also never a hard line, as there's ALWAYS some uncertainty as to 1) whether you're in imminent peril, or 2) whether you have a way to back out.

I'm not trying to make Martin out to be a martyr hero... just trying to play devil's advocate when I see him refered to as a homophobic racist pre-meditated murderer.  And Zimmerman's a bit cold for not wanting to rethink his actions.

[MediumTex]

But if you did beat him up due to your fear that he might be a gay rapist, and he killed you in defense of his own life, wouldn't it be reasonable to refer to you as a homophobe who chose the wrong target?

Homophobia is a general negative attitude towards gay activity.  It's not the fear you might feel by someone who's following you at night that might assault you.  To make ths about homophobia is a bit ridiculous.  It's the natural fear someone might feel if they're followed at night by another person.

If girl was creeped the hell out by some guy following her at night, it wouldn't be "straightophobia," it would just be fear of this guy who might rape you or assault you.  These two are TOTALLY different.

Further, "imminent peril" seems quite relative to me.  People react emotionally when they feel they might be in peril.  There's also never a hard line, as there's ALWAYS some uncertainty as to 1) whether you're in imminent peril, or 2) whether you have a way to back out.

I'm not trying to make Martin out to be a martyr hero... just trying to play devil's advocate when I see him refered to as a homophobic racist pre-meditated murderer.  And Zimmerman's a bit cold for not wanting to rethink his actions.

In my post above I was willing to give Martin that first nose-breaking shot on Zimmerman.  That would be the one that was in response to all of the irrational, unreasonable and illegitimate fears you are citing above.

I'm actually sort of okay with that (because I want to make as many favorable assumptions as I can about someone who isn't here to defend himself).  However, once Zimmerman's nose is broken, his eyes are tearing up, he is bleeding, and Zimmerman is not fighting back, I really don't have much sympathy for Martin's decision to continue the attack beyond that point.  Even though there was never any threat to be neutralized by Martin in the first place, the shot to the face was plenty for Martin to believe that the nonexistent threat had been neutralized and he still should have just headed on home.

even if he was afraid of Zimmerman heading on home would still have been the best possible first choice, if Zimmerman had been a perv up to no good then the punch in the nose and the fight would have taken place on his property (where he was staying) and the case for his feeling the need to punch the guy or ground and pound him unconscious would be a pretty solid one, Zimmerman would be the threatening trespasser at that point, and since Zimmerman wasn't a perv and apparently had stopped following him at the time of the altercation none of what actually transpired would have happened at all

[Pointedstick]

But if you did beat him up due to your fear that he might be a gay rapist, and he killed you in defense of his own life, wouldn't it be reasonable to refer to you as a homophobe who chose the wrong target?

Homophobia is a general negative attitude towards gay activity.  It's not the fear you might feel by someone who's following you at night that might assault you.  To make ths about homophobia is a bit ridiculous.  It's the natural fear someone might feel if they're followed at night by another person.

If girl was creeped the hell out by some guy following her at night, it wouldn't be "straightophobia," it would just be fear of this guy who might rape you or assault you.  These two are TOTALLY different.

It is different--because sexual assault at night by a man walking right behind you is a very real danger faced by women.

By contrast, I don't think that sexual assault at night by a man walking more than 100 feet away from you is a very real danger faced by male African-American teenagers. But I'll admit I could be wrong. Maybe there's an epidemic of hispanic-on-black gay rape I don't know about that might have colored their thoughts.

Further, "imminent peril" seems quite relative to me.  People react emotionally when they feel they might be in peril.  There's also never a hard line, as there's ALWAYS some uncertainty as to 1) whether you're in imminent peril, or 2) whether you have a way to back out.

"Imminent peril" means if you don't take action RIGHT NOW, you believe you will be injured, killed, or kidnapped in the next few seconds.

It's not always easy, no. Your blood is pumping, adrenaline is flowing through your system... That's part of why self-defense is such a heavy burden. It's also a really really great reason not to start fights. If you're a dumb 17 year-old, your judgement is likely so bad that you need to avoid situations where you might be tempted to start fights. Probably the absolute worst thing you can do is confront a stranger who you're easily capable of avoiding, attack him, and then proceed to pummel him senseless. That's pretty dumb, regardless of your motivation.

I don't think Martin was a racist, homophobic premeditated murderer. I think he was a stupid teenager who had started down the wrong path of life, who was feeling creeped out and wanted to prove himself by beating up the creep, all the while being fed impossibly stupid ideas by his idiot girlfriend.

Unfortunately, sometimes when you adopt a thug mindset, take advice from stupid illiterates, feel that initiating violence is an acceptable way to demonstrate your feelings, and act irrationally on that feeling, well, sometimes you might just get unlucky and pick a target who happens to have a gun.

If you want to talk about who did everything wrong in this situation, Trayvon Martin is the poster child for it.

[clacy]

There is a lot of speculation that Trayvon had been found to have a lot of stolen goods in his locker at school and was likely a part-time amateur burglar. 

It also sounds like he had bought skittles and Arizona Watermelon fruit cocktail at the store that night.  These two ingredients form an intoxicating drink called "lean" when combined with cough syrup.  Lean is apparently used by kids on the streets to get high.

[MediumTex]

I assume that everyone has heard about the Oklahoma case of the youths who decided to kill the college student who was jogging through his neighborhood just because they were bored.

People are justifiably outraged at this senseless crime.

Imagine for a moment, though, that rather than being murdered by these youths, the victim had been armed and had been able to defend himself effectively so that at the end of the attack the three youths, aged 15, 16 and 17 were all dead and the victim of the attack survived, perhaps with just a broken nose and lacerations to the back of his head.

Imagine how the college student would have been vilified for this act of vigilante-ism.  Imagine how the media would react if some Skittles and cans of iced tea were found in the car the youths were riding in.

Zimmerman was doing almost exactly the same thing that the murdered college student was doing, except that Zimmerman was walking through his neighborhood rather than jogging when he was attacked...and of course Zimmerman was armed.

The outrage that people feel over this young man's life being snuffed out is probably about what they would have felt if Trayvon Martin had succeeded in killing George Zimmerman--it would have been "Neighborhood watch volunteer brutally beaten to death as neighbors look on by 17 year old who had attacked bus driver only days before.  Victim's wife left to raise young daughter on her own.  Killer's parents say he was a cute 12 year old, but had been running with a rough crowd lately."