OPINION SECTION -
TRAYVON MARTIN/ THOUGHTS, A PRAYER
I WALK so others may ride.
I SING so others may know and feel a song in their hearts. I SUFFER so others may know joy. I PRAY on the mountaintop so others may dance in the valleys. I WEEP so others don't have to...but SOME THINGS should be shared by EVERY SINGLE PERSON.
Lessons never taught are lessons never learned...and children who are never taught right from wrong become adults who practice wrong as if it is right. We are seeing that played out in Sanford Florida right now. Ironically the father of the defendant is a judge...and I can only wonder what kind of justice HE meted out or how the people who found themselves in HIS courtroom fared. If George got his values from his father, then God help them.
Sadly, injustice often mired in the human structural glue of bigotry and prejudice is all too frequently a generational phenomenon passed down like hair and eye color to succeeding generations who then take up that same gauntlet and the hate and prejudice lives on...germinating and festering until something like that which happened in February 2012 in Sanford Florida rises up and does its destructive work...and people wonder why?    THIS IS that thing that we still need to learn...and THIS is that time, so that other parents, other friends, others who DO WEEP NOW for Trayvon may NEVER EVER know this kind of pain again. Not for themselves, their children, their friends, or those who would merely grow up to BE...people of note, and worthy of the name FRIEND, and viewed by others as a person they would aspire to be like. THIS IS THE LESSON THAT GEORGE ZIMMERMAN OBVIOUSLY NEVER LEARNED: HUMAN LIFE IS PRECIOUS, and should NEVER be taken lightly or for granted or demeaned. It is the MOST vital and precious thing we have and it is THE ONE COMMON THREAD that binds ALL of us TOGETHER. BLACK, BROWN, RED, YELLOW, WHITE. WE ARE ALL HUMAN and THAT commonality DESERVES to be recognized for what it is. It is a GIFT and NOT one ANY OF US can take credit for, but we can and SHOULD take the BLAME...ANY TIME we take life and destroy its beauty and end the force it contains. How would YOU like to live every minute of every day knowing that so many around you do not consider your life to have value or meaning? Or maybe you do. Doesn't feel too good, now does it. The rest of you...how would YOU like to BE Trayvon right now, or be the parent of someone just like him, and knowing for a 17yo black male in this country and for far too many of them...life offers limited choices and almost UNlimited dangers. BUT PLEASE NOTE THIS: IF THOSE OF US WHO PROFESS TO BE GODLY, CHRISTIAN, HUMANE HUMAN BEINGS, all or any of the above, DO NOT LEARN from this peculiar but all too common tragedy, WE WILL CONTINUE to repeat this debacle OVER AND OVER AND OVER...as we have in the past, and JESUS WILL remember OUR names, recognized and remembered as those who did not act against this kind of injustice. And I am convinced He will and by God He should. Remember this too. This was NOT the south side of Chicago, or Overtown or Liberty City in Miami or NYC or south LA. THIS was a northern suburb of Orlando Florida, where the laughing giggly well-heeled TOURISTS come to play, and this is without question a stain, a blot on Central Florida...but on America as a whole as well. WHO IN HELL, WHO IN THE BLOODY HELL...does George Zimmerman think he is to feel he has the RIGHT to snuff out the life force of TRAYVON MARTIN OR ANYONE ELSE? WHO? I wonder if HE even knows.  * * * * * * * * * C'MON PEOPLE OF ALL CREEDS & COLORS. OF VALUES. HUMANITY, PRINCIPLES, KINDNESS, CARING, AND LOVE FOR ALL PEOPLE AND ALL THAT IS GOOD... STAND......YOUR GROUND, against the TYRANNY of mindless stereotyping. NO ONE'S SKIN COLOR or ethnicity nor national origin or sexual orientation or the like should EVER determine for everyone else what each individual member of that group is like. African-Americans, like Asians and Native-Americans and Hispanics, et al...are just like caucausians. Divergent. Diverse. Interesting...and anyone who doesn't realize that needs to get out more and mingle more. You just might be surprised at how many of your prejudices are meritless and devoid of justification. WE are UNIQUE on the earth. WE are SINGULAR and inspiring and adept and different, and WE deserve to LIVE...FREE from harm and ignorant prejudice. YES WE DO, ALL of us. ALL. PERIOD. STAND......YOUR GROUND, against the excesses of people with guns who don't deserve them...and those who would propagate dangerous practices such as unbridled and totally unfettered firearm ownership...even those who cannot or will not exercise even the most rudimentary common sense in their use...and those that champion these bastions of ignorance owning firearms do so at the expense of society for the sake or greed of a few. How can anyone stand idly by MUTE to things like Newtown and Denver, and Sanford. NO anger, NOT A SHRED of outrage...only muted indifference and disengagement. But, sadly many do. STAND......YOUR GROUND against the feeble minded, the mentally challenged, and those devoid of any sense of humanity... without feelings or emotions such as those had at Bunker Hill and all those wondrously important places in America's past where death was a price worth paying so that others' liberty would NEVER be imperiled. STAND YOUR GROUND against ALL and ANY who would deem the rights of others as meaningless and devoid of merit. THEY who would deprive others of their liberty don't even BEGIN to understand what it took for that liberty to now be available even to those who demonstrate NO respect nor appreciation for the cost...the price paid for it. I think Yosemite Sam said it best. 'DESPICABLE!' AND to NOT do so...STANDING UP FOR EVERYONE, even the 'least of these', risks ALL of us and yes even those who would dispose of those THEY consider such and I cannot help but wonder that if WE ALL do NOT stand up for the Trayvon's of this world then how can we expect anyone to stand up for US. WHOSOEVER SAID, 'THE LEAST OF THESE MY BRETHREN' (note: NO comma after 'these'), was referring to those He was talking ABOUT, not those He was talking to...and believe this. HE BELIEVED NO ONE fit that descriptor, for ALL were AND ARE precious in HIS sight. How do I know? HE SAID SO.
Now, sleep brother Trayvon, sleep...as those of us who are white and not bigots and care about what happened and deplore that which happened to you...WEEP, long into the rest of our lives and pray for those who don't have a clue that what George Zimmerman did was wrong no matter what he does to try to justify it.
He may get away with it here, but he WILL NOT get away with it in Eternity. No matter what that Mister Smartass greedy self-serving lawyer tells him to the contrary. 
Trayvon, let my tears for you keep you mindful that there ARE those who decry the injustice done to you, and to your family, AND TO SOCIETY and thank God there always will be.
AMEN...my brother who I have never met and now never will. AMEN...and let your life stand as a monument erected in faith by people of principle and justice against those who have NO clue what it means to BE HUMAN. AND BY THE WAY, to ANYONE who found themselves OFFENDED by that picture of Trayvon's body that has been circulating? BETTER you be offended by what it represents, NOT what it shows. Life sometimes gets REALLY unpleasant. GET OVER IT. Think how HE feels. Think how his MOTHER feels. SHE had to BURY him. 
(POSTSCRIPT: Now we know the jury verdict. I will have commentary on that shortly).
Ok, it is posted now. Next page.
Db |
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No comments:
Post a Comment