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defrogYou don't need me to tell you about the weekend protests over the Trayvon Martin verdict, or Presidente Obama’s comments about it, or the predictable conservative meltdown over both.
I don’t even have to Google it to know what they're saying at Fox News and Breitbart.com, et al. I’m guessing they’re complaining that Obama is sticking his Big Govt nose where it doesn’t belong, and playing the Race-Bait Card, and planning to take everyone’s guns away (again), and only saying what he said for political gain. Blah blah blah.
Admittedly, they have a point with the Big Govt thing, as least as far as General Holder’s interest in Stand Yr Ground goes. Unless he has a compelling reason apart from politics for the DOJ to get involved, the laws themselves should be sorted out state by state. The NRA seems jolly convinced Holder is using it as an excuse for Obama to outlaw guns, but they’ve been saying that since Obama’s first POTUS campaign, so there's no reason to take them seriously.
And as for Obama’s “It could have been me” speech, let’s admit that conservatives would be complaining about Obama no matter what. If he says nothing, he’s ignoring the issue. If he says something, he’s playing politics or starting a race war. There’s no pleasing these dingbats, and most of them are only really bagging on him for the sake of bagging on him. (Except for Sean Hannity, who is just being a dick about it.) So Obama might as well do what he wants.
As you might guess, I do think Obama said what needed to be said. The inescapable fact is that Martin is dead because he was a black kid in a hoodie. That’s not specifically why Zimmerman shot him, but it is what led to it. And given all the people saying that Trayvon Martin got what he deserved for wearing a hoodie and (possibly) smoking a little weed, I think it’s more than fair to point this out. Because you can’t fix problems by pretending they don’t exist.
So while we may all be Trayvon Martin, some of us are less Trayvon than others.
Of course, the downside of bringing all this up is that everyone starts getting defensive to the point that it becomes just another distraction. So here’s some decent advice on how to approach it more constructively.
Not that it’s going to help much, if only because enough people get paid for a living to be as unconstructive as possible about every sociopolitical issue under the sun, and they have a big enough fanbase that just eats that stuff up like Skittles. The problem, as always, is FEAR – fear of kids like Trayvon, and fear that the solution to the problem is going to be inconvenient in some way – like having their guns taken away (making them easy prey for black people in hoodies, for example) or some vague revenge fantasy (KILL WHITEY). Or something.
Fear will do that.
But hey, if it were that easy, we’d have fixed racism a long time ago. And anyway, as Presidente Obama correctly pointed out, we’ve come a long way from the 1960s. And our kids are better at it than we are. So why not, Jim?
The content of their character,
This is dF
I don’t even have to Google it to know what they're saying at Fox News and Breitbart.com, et al. I’m guessing they’re complaining that Obama is sticking his Big Govt nose where it doesn’t belong, and playing the Race-Bait Card, and planning to take everyone’s guns away (again), and only saying what he said for political gain. Blah blah blah.
Admittedly, they have a point with the Big Govt thing, as least as far as General Holder’s interest in Stand Yr Ground goes. Unless he has a compelling reason apart from politics for the DOJ to get involved, the laws themselves should be sorted out state by state. The NRA seems jolly convinced Holder is using it as an excuse for Obama to outlaw guns, but they’ve been saying that since Obama’s first POTUS campaign, so there's no reason to take them seriously.
And as for Obama’s “It could have been me” speech, let’s admit that conservatives would be complaining about Obama no matter what. If he says nothing, he’s ignoring the issue. If he says something, he’s playing politics or starting a race war. There’s no pleasing these dingbats, and most of them are only really bagging on him for the sake of bagging on him. (Except for Sean Hannity, who is just being a dick about it.) So Obama might as well do what he wants.
As you might guess, I do think Obama said what needed to be said. The inescapable fact is that Martin is dead because he was a black kid in a hoodie. That’s not specifically why Zimmerman shot him, but it is what led to it. And given all the people saying that Trayvon Martin got what he deserved for wearing a hoodie and (possibly) smoking a little weed, I think it’s more than fair to point this out. Because you can’t fix problems by pretending they don’t exist.
So while we may all be Trayvon Martin, some of us are less Trayvon than others.
Of course, the downside of bringing all this up is that everyone starts getting defensive to the point that it becomes just another distraction. So here’s some decent advice on how to approach it more constructively.
Not that it’s going to help much, if only because enough people get paid for a living to be as unconstructive as possible about every sociopolitical issue under the sun, and they have a big enough fanbase that just eats that stuff up like Skittles. The problem, as always, is FEAR – fear of kids like Trayvon, and fear that the solution to the problem is going to be inconvenient in some way – like having their guns taken away (making them easy prey for black people in hoodies, for example) or some vague revenge fantasy (KILL WHITEY). Or something.
Fear will do that.
But hey, if it were that easy, we’d have fixed racism a long time ago. And anyway, as Presidente Obama correctly pointed out, we’ve come a long way from the 1960s. And our kids are better at it than we are. So why not, Jim?
The content of their character,
This is dF
