Rallies are being held nation wide demanding justice for Trayvon Martin, the young man shot by a a neighborhood watch captain late last month. This horrible incident has sparked debate on issues of race, gun control, justice (or lack thereof) not only within activist circles but within families who have found a way to keep the peace in the house by keeping silent about these issues. Here are two pieces posted on activist websites, for more information type Trayvon’s name into a search engine and read everything that pops up.
On February 26, 2012, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin went out to buy some snacks at the nearby 7-Eleven. George Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch captain in a small gated community in Sanford, Florida, was driving around in his SUV. Zimmerman called 911, saying Martin looked “real suspicious”—i.e., he was a young Black male, walking around in a hoodie. After the 911 dispatcher told Zimmerman not to pursue the youth, Zimmerman followed Trayvon Martin, got out of his car and then confronted Martin. Zimmerman was carrying a 9-millimeter handgun. Trayvon Martin was carrying a bag of Skittles and a can of iced tea. There was yelling, then a gunshot. Trayvon Martin lay face down in the grass with a fatal bullet wound to the chest. Zimmerman was taken into custody, questioned and released. To this day, he has not been arrested and charged with any crime.
It is very good and very important that people, not only in Sanford, Florida, but all over the country, are outraged by the murder of Trayvon Martin and are making their outrage known in many different and creative forms of protest. It is also important that, in connection with the murder of Trayvon Martin, the memory of Emmett Till—wantonly murdered by white supremacists decades ago—is being raised to express the fact that people have seen this go on for far too long and will not stand by to see it happen yet again.
At the same time, the fact that yet another Emmett Till moment can arise—that yet another outrage of this kind can take place—today, more than 50 years after the original Emmett Till lynching, and that this murder of Trayvon Martin is not an isolated incident but only the latest of an endless chain of such acts that are perpetrated, condoned and covered up by the powers-that-be, shows very powerfully that, this time around, we must not settle for anything less than stopping this, once and for all—we must build a movement to really and finally put an end to these and countless other outrages that spew forth from this system, by sweeping away this system through revolution. This is deadly serious and we must take this up very seriously.
Revolutionary Communist Party, USA
March 23, 2012
www.revcom.us
And something from www.anarchistnews.org :
The story is by now a familiar one. A young black male has been gunned down in cold blood by a person in a position of authority. It seems like a fresh outrage like this happens almost every week. And yet nothing changes, despite the numbers that swell the sidewalks at rallies denouncing the murders. Cries for justice ring out from every corner of the city, the state, the country, even the world. And yet the murders continue unabated. Each time the tragedy rips at our hearts, opening old wounds over the lives of those lost before, while carving new ones as details of the killing come out.
Except this time it was a little different. The shooter was not a cop in a uniform. He was an unlicensed neighborhood watch captain, a self-appointed cop in civilian clothes. Make no mistake, although Zimmerman was not a badged member of the local police department, he was nonetheless a police. He clearly wanted to imitate the murdering racists he saw around him, playing out a fantasy in his own neighborhood.
A dark-skinned boy is seen walking along the streets of a mostly white neighborhood. Zimmerman sees the boy as an outsider, and pursues the youth through his neighborhood. The boy speaks to his girlfriend on the phone about a strange man following him. Zimmerman speaks on the phone with the police, using a racial slur as he tells the cops he is trailing a “suspicious person.”
Screams ring out through the neighborhood. A gunshot goes off. The screams stop. A kid lies dead, shot once through the chest. Cops arrive on the scene and Zimmerman reveals to them he was the murderer. The uniformed police immediately accept Zimmerman’s false claim of self-defense, and begin to cover up the murder. The police choose to shield the murderer from persecution because he acts in accordance with their own interests, showing, as always, the police never “serve and protect” the true interests of a community. They treat Zimmerman as if he was a brother in arms. The cops act as a state-backed gang, beating back those who do not fit the plans for their master’s greed driven world, and aiding those who do.
Another unprovoked lynching in the south. This time it’s setting off a panic. It’s supposed to be a new era; did we not get rid of lynching? Many believed we were in a sort of post-race America. Trayvon Martin’s murder has smashed apart this myth. Outrage over the killing has spread rapidly through various social networks, and is beginning to spread into the streets across the country. We can no longer pretend that we have erased the old lines of color that divide our society.
Anger is mostly being focused on George Zimmerman at the moment, but only punishing the murderer will not bring justice. The murder of Trayvon was not just a result of one “bad apple” want-to-be cop acting out on his prejudiced and stereotyping beliefs. It was rather the result of a doomed institution, which grants power to murdering, racist thugs with badges, and to those who chose to act like them, even if they don’t have a badge and a government issued weapon. Attacks should not just be made on an individual, but on the system which perpetuates murders like Trayvon’s, Ariston Waiter’s, Joe Stafford’s, and many, many others.
This is not the first the first time there has been race-driven killing by an “authority figure” in Sanford, Florida. Nor will it be the last if the protests are limited to staged rallies, with a set list of speakers who speak vaguely of the need for “justice” and “accountability.” A focus on just punishing the committer of a murder fails to look at the overall conditions which lead to the murder. We cannot expect the murders of young black males by police to stop while the institution of policing remains. While Zimmerman himself is not sworn in as a police officer, he has served in the same “role” as one in this case. The Sanford Police Department has also helped to cover up the murder, treating Zimmerman as if he did have a badge. The police have released conflicting witness statements to create a murkier picture of the killing. They also failed to conduct any immediate investigation of Zimmerman, allowing facts to disappear before they became public.
While the system is horribly and fatally fucked, we also cannot ignore the actions of the individual. Clearly Zimmerman’s act was terrible, and has damaged all those involved. This deed must elicit a response, but to what degree is tough to decide. Judging the community dynamics and appropriate conflict response from so far away is difficult. Most across the country are demanding the legal prosecution of the Zimmerman, as the proper way to attain justice. Already a police commissioner has resigned, under community pressure for failing to arrest Zimmerman. We cannot ignore the appalling killing Zimmerman has committed. But to send someone into the prison-industrial complex is never justice. This may seem an extreme stance for some, but it is clear to others that while what Zimmerman did was despicable, sentencing him to serve time in prison only places him under the rule of those who commit racist acts of violence every day. Punishing one individual through prison only perpetuates the terrible system.
Some may attempt to defend Zimmerman’s intentions, even as his actions are universally accepted as deplorable. “He was just trying to protect his neighborhood, without relying on the police, isn’t that commendable?” they’ll say. Certainly communities that do not rely on the police to resolve conflicts are desirable. But this was not what Zimmerman was after. He was still heavily dependent on the police, as evidenced by the forty-six calls he made to police in just over a year. Zimmerman instead was attempting to emulate police behavior, giving himself a false position of authority by anointing himself the head of the neighborhood watch. He was not interested in creating a welcoming community, but rather a space free of “outsiders”. To Zimmerman all black men were automatically suspicious outsiders. Racism like this cannot be accepted, and Zimmerman should not escape without consequences. The consequences provided by the state are not adequate; they do nothing to prevent atrocities like these from happening once again.
Protesters have begun to take to the streets in many communities in outrage over Trayvon Martin’s murder. So far much of the rage has been focused on just this specific case, but we should encourage an expansion of the anger to include the entire racist policing institution. Trayvon’s murder is a result of the same apparatus that has given Atlanta the killings of Ariston Waiters and Joetavius Stafford in just the last six months. Their names, and the countless others who are victims of police violence, should not be forgotten as Trayvon is mourned. The collective anger everyone has felt over Trayvon’s death should not just be directed towards the legal punishment of one person, nor should it be limited to desperate pleas to authority figures to stop the violence. A victory in this battle is not a prison sentence for George Zimmerman, or a new piece of legislation. Rise up and strike back against the pigs who attempt to control our lives.
Against (A)LL Police
Fire to the Prisons
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