The Impact of Trayvon Martin

You would never think a walk to the store to buy iced tea and Skittles could get you killed right?  Well, that's what happened to Trayvon Martin, an unarmed African-American teenager wearing a hoodie who was shot and killed by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman on February 26th in Sanford, Florida on his way home from the store because Zimmerman felt that Trayvon was acting suspicious.  Zimmerman, however, was not charged, as he claimed he was acting in self defense.

17 year old Trayvon Martin (left) and 28 year old George Zimmerman (right).

This story has received plenty of coverage recently and has sparked a major debate.  Many people feel Zimmerman should be charged with murder and label him a racist, while others feel Trayvon sparked this event.  Thousands of people, including famous athletes Patrick Ewing and Ray Lewis, gathered at a rally in Florida yesterday, exactly one month later, to protest the decision and support Trayvon's family.  Why has this caused so much controversy?  Well, let's look at what happened:

Zimmerman was out running a personal errand when he spotted Trayvon, who was on his way back from buying iced tea and Skitles, and thinking this was suspicious, Zimmerman called 911 and began to follow him.  The police dispatcher told him, "You don't need to [follow him]."  Zimmerman continued anyway, and moments later reported he had lost sight of Trayvon.  Then, according to Zimmerman's attorney, Trayvon confronted Zimmerman and began to attack him, reaching for his gun.  After a minute or so of struggle, Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon.  "At that point, either George or Trayvon was going to die," claims Zimmerman's friend Joe Oliver.

In this story, it is clear that both people are in the wrong.  If Zimmerman never followed Trayvon, or if Trayvon never attacked Zimmerman, then, well, let's just say I wouldn't be writing this blog.  However, this unfortunate event did happen, and it's hard for me to say who is more at fault.

I can say, however, that the reaction to this event on both sides has been ridiculous.  Zimmerman's supporters try to demonize Trayvon by pointing out the fact that he was suspended from school when he was killed because of marijuana.  Great, could this be any more irrelevant to what happened?  On the other side, the hate directed towards Zimmerman is appalling.  A black political group, the NBPP, placed a $10,000 bounty on Zimmerman.  Many others label Zimmerman as an old-fashioned white racist and claim he had the intent to kill Trayvon because he was black.  Without knowing the situation, this is a ridiculous claim to make, especially since Zimmerman is Hispanic.

I can somewhat agree with people who say that if Trayvon was white, this would never have happened, but I don't think this means Zimmerman was being racist.  As a neighborhood watchman, he has that responsibility to watch out for people who don't belong.  Is that racist?  Quite possibly, but is it true?  Yes.  However, with that said, in a community that is over 30% African-American, Zimmerman can't make the case that Trayvon doesn't belong simply because he is black.  Therefore, I do believe there were other legitimate reasons other than race that Zimmerman had for believing Trayvon to be suspicious.

For my junior theme, I am researching why crime rates are different across different neighborhoods, and I think cases like these play a big role because they demonstrate racial discrimination and generate hate between races, which develops racial stereotypes.  These stereotypes alone can elevate crime because people who are discriminated against because their race acts a certain way get a confused idea of what is acceptable, and the stereotypes become sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In this certain case, what people will remember as the final storyline is that a black person who was suspended for marijuana was shot by a racist, overprotective neighborhood watchman.  That story that the media is telling us builds on stereotypes that black people are delinquents (because Trayvon was suspended) and whites are racist.  These are not reasonable conclusions at all (Zimmerman wasn't even really Caucasian), but it's what people are drawing from them because of the media.  The stereotypes being formed about African-American people being delinquents that keeps getting built upon by the media makes them believe that is what they are supposed to and allowed to be, so they become much more likely to commit a crime.

Is anyone at fault in this event?  Was this racial profiling?  What effects do you think this event (or the severe reactions to this event) will have on racial stereotypes in the future?

The Truth About Kony 2012

In just a matter of days, this video of Kony 2012 has gone viral thanks to the power of social media on the Internet.  Joseph Kony is the leader of Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a group that has forced more than 60,000 children in Uganda to become foot soldiers and give their lives for a conflict they know nothing about, yet him and his group have been inactive since 2006.

Invisible Children is the nonprofit organization of filmmakers that created that video to make Kony "famous", so that people would become aware and donate to their charity, and they have been extremely successful in doing so.  However, only 31% of their donations by their own admission in 2011 actually went to the cause they aided, while the rest went to filmmaking materials.

Now, I just gave you a lot of facts and links, but what does this all mean?

Well, for starters, it shows the sway the Internet can have on people.  In the book White Noise, by Don DeLillo, one of the young characters, Heinrich, when asked a question of why he thinks a certain way or how he knows something, multiple times responds that the "radio said" so (22, 34).  This book was written in the 1980's (when people actually listened to the radio), but it captures the idea of how people can be influenced by technology--nowadays, the Internet.  People simply watch a video about how terrible this man Kony is, and they give their money without ever wondering what they're money is actually doing and how it will help; they just know they feel good that they "helped" a cause.

This brings me to another point: the feeling of donating has a huge effect on people.  People who donate always feel as if they have done something magnificent to help the world, even though they have no connection whatsoever to what they are donating to, which also relates to the book White Noise when a minor character Alfonse says, "For most people there are only two places in the world.  Where they live and their TV set" (66).  For the people who donate, they are donating to a place they only know of because they saw it on the Internet.  As long as it's not where they are, it doesn't matter to them where it is, they still get the feeling of superiority as they are helping the world.  This is also the reason why anti-Kony posts are all over Facebook and Twitter; people get the good feeling that they are helping the movement by raising awareness.

I'm not saying people who donate or try to raise awareness do not help the cause, but I think they are doing it more for their own benefit rather than the people in Uganda because they can't possibly feel as if they can connect to those children.  This is not a bad thing, as it definitely leads to more money donated, but I do think it would be even better if more people took the time to learn about the facts of the cause they're donating to and the organization they are giving their money to because I highly doubt that so many people would give their money to help some young adults make films when they could maybe do something more beneficial with it to help.

TV Tokenism: Psych

For my TV Tokenism assignment, I decided to do the show Psych, which is a comedy/drama that airs on USA Network and is in its 6th season.

Here is a cast photo of Psych.  Source

This cast photo is very typical of dramas on major networks because the main central character (Shawn, shown sitting in front) who is fully developed and complex is white.  Of course, he has a token minority partner, Gus, who sticks out in this picture not only because he is the single minority but also because of his bright shirt--almost as if to say, "Look we have a minority character in a big role".  Gus is a major character, but he is less developed and does't receive nearly as much screen time as Shawn.  He is also much more professional and typically  better dressed than Shawn, which contradicts racist stereotypes.

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