[Vision2020] Zimmerman Verdict Does Not Alter Truth

Mon Jul 22 08:29:20 PDT 2013

If someone was following me, and I was that close to home, I would have gone the rest of the way home and told my family what had happened.  This would have resulted in a call to the police, I'm sure, which would have ended up with it being all just a misunderstanding, which it was.  I would not have ambushed him, or started flailing away at him with my fists.  This reminds me of what I heard someone ask on NPR the other day.  What if Trayvon Martin wasn't there and it was Mark Zuckerberg (CEO of Facebook) instead?  Well, the question that wasn't asked was "would Mark Zuckerberg have attacked Zimmerman"?  My guress is that no, he would not, though I don't know for sure.

It Martin had had a gun, and was a responsible gun owner, he would have avoided the confrontation, which certainly seemed doable.  He was pretty close to the place he was staying.  If he'd had a gun and wasn't a responsible gun owner, who knows what might have happened.

How can you be so certain that Zimmerman's life wasn't in danger?  We have his story where he claims that Martin was beating his head into the ground for around a minute and that he had seen his gun and told him he was going to die that night.  I know, it's Zimmerman so we refuse to believe because: Zimmerman.  However, what he says matches what evidence we do have.  I have heard about no injuries on Martin (aside from the bullet wound, of course), so I find it hard to believe that Zimmerman attacked Martin.

This whole "he's only 17, he's just a kid" thing also bugs me.  I don't know if you were ever 17, but I was and emphatically did not think of myself as being a "kid", and was in no way feeling like I needed protection when I walked around.

You say "Folks who stalk unarmed kids with guns and then kill them should be punished."  What about people who follow unarmed kids and who happen to be armed themselves and then get attacked by them?  That's the more pertinent question.  You guys make it sound like he had his gun out, was moving silently from bush to bush, and who had set a pack of Skittles on the ground in a clearing in the hopes of baiting a 17-year-old.  He started carrying a weapon after some incidents with aggressive dogs in the neighborhood, at the advice of the police.  He may have hardly remembered it was there in the first place.

Paul

________________________________
 From: Joe Campbell <philosopher.joe at gmail.com>
To: Scott Dredge <scooterd408 at hotmail.com> 
Cc: viz <vision2020 at moscow.com> 
Sent: Sunday, July 21, 2013 9:45 PM
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Zimmerman Verdict Does Not Alter Truth

Paul,

What would you do if someone were following you around in a car? What would you have done when you were 17?

You don't know what caused Zimmerman's head injuries or the injury to his nose. They were in some sort of fight, right? The injuries seem consistent with that, nothing more. Have you ever had your head bashed in? do you know how much blood there would be if just once Zimmerman had his head bashed to the ground? Do we have any clean pictures of Martin's head and face to see what they looked like?

What if Martin had a gun too? Then he could have shot Zimmerman. What then? You say you are for protection of rights but what do you say when you look at the statistics, which I posted recently, suggesting that had Martin shot Zimmerman his chances of getting off free would have been far less than Zimmerman's? Do you want to argue that the criminal justice system if free of prejudice? Is that your claim? If not, let the people vent. What is the harm in that?

There is something wrong with Zimmerman's story. I don't want to vilify Zimmerman. All I want to do is prevent the next Zimmerman/Martin episode from happening. Leave police work to the police; if a 911 operator suggests that you should refrain from following someone than do it; if you feel so insecure when you leave your home that you need to carry a gun and follow "suspicious" people around, then don't leave your home; make sure someone is actually trying to kill you before you shoot them. This is all good advice that Zimmerman failed to follow -- and that you might fail to follow to, Paul, which is the only reason I'm talking to you now.

Martin was 17. 17. He was a kid and Zimmerman, man enough to police the neighborhood, shot an unarmed kid in an effort to what -- save himself? From what -- a beating? Do you really want to say that he didn't use excessive force, long after he stalked the kid, after he was advised not to do so? Do you think we should all be armed, that if Martin were armed the situation would have been better since he was killed and if he were armed he could have defended his life? Is this the kind of culture you are striving for?

Folks who stalk unarmed kids with guns and then kill them should be punished. I'm not saying the jurors were at fault but we need to change some laws to make sure that this doesn't happen again.

Joe

On Sun, Jul 21, 2013 at 7:08 PM, Scott Dredge <scooterd408 at hotmail.com> wrote:

Warning: The link provided is to an article that has a graphic picture showing Trayvon Martin after being fatally shot.
>
>http://www.laprogressive.com/zimmerman-verdict-truth/
>
>Snippets from the article:
>
>It was the picture that convinced me.
>...
>What the picture of Trayvon Martin shows was a child who was shot in 
the chest, while clutching a paper bag in his left hand.  What the 
picture shows is that Trayvon Martin was clutching a paper bag.  
Clutching it as he allegedly grasped George’s head.  Clutching it as he 
allegedly grappled for George’s gun.  Trayvon Martin left DNA traces on 
the paper bag, but not on George’s head and not on George’s gun.  The 
picture was not ‘newsworthy’ because it showed the utter dishonesty of 
George’s constantly mutating lies.
>
>
>George refused to testify, as was his right.  So there was no 
evidence to support his claims that Trayvon Martin attacked him.  No 
evidence that Trayvon Martin grasped his head and slammed it into the 
ground.  There was no evidence that Trayvon Martin grappled for George’s
 gun.  Those were arguments by George’s attorneys – arguments without 
evidence.
>
>
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