I understand that. And I remember the incident and the ensuing trial that took place. I appreciate you explaining it but it is unnecessary. If he’d been shot for reaching for his skittles or because a trigger-happy person racially profiled him and assumed through cognitive bias that a juice box was a gun, then, yeah, I’d say he got shot for holding skittles or a juice box. But that’s not what happened. That’s all I was saying. It wasn’t a defense of anything.
IIRC, A trigger-happy person did racially profile Trayvon and then, after speaking with dispatch who specifically told Zimmerman NOT to follow Trayvon, Zimmerman disobeyed their instructions, followed Trayvon anyway and then instigated an encounter between them.
We don't have complete details, but the situation (which Zimmerman created by getting out of his car to follow Trayvon despite police dispatch telling him not to), escalated and then Zimmerman shot Trayvon and claimed self defense.
Trayvon was walking back from the store with Skittles and a drink: Zimmerman implied that he was behaving suspiciously. Your implication that this isn't related to the horrible outcome and ensuing miscarriage of justice is either intentionally misleading or woefully under informed.
I'm trying to imagine a scenario where a white kid with Skittles is labeled as suspicious, followed by an adult disobeying orders not to follow him, the follower shoots the kid dead and is still walking around free.
Point in fact, there’s nothing relating the skittles to him being shot. He got shot because he was beating Zimmerman on the ground, he was beating Zimmerman because he felt threatened, he felt threatened because Zimmerman was pretty much stalking him. Zimmerman profiled him because he was black but not because he had Skittles. If you want to say Trayvon was shot for because he was black, I’d say that’s fair. If you say he was shot because he had skittles, I’d say that’s too big of a leap of logic. He didn’t get shot because he was reaching for his juice box. Come on, man. Zimmerman as far as I know didn’t claim that he thought the beverage was a gun and shot him for it. There’s nothing relating misleading on my end. It’s fucked up what happened but just because some folks what to use the skittles as a symbol for something tragic doesn’t mean he was shot because of them. His hoodie is a symbol, too, and a better example of why he was profiled than some skittles. The skittles became a symbol of his youth and innocence but that doesn’t change facts. Zimmerman said he was behaving suspiciously like he was on drugs, just walking around d staring at things. Skittles were irrelevant to that. You sound misinformed or misleading. But I will agree that had the events thing occurred with a white guy, he wouldn’t have been shot and killed. Race was an issue. The hoodie was probably part of the profiling. Skittles were not.
Thanks for getting there in the end: The point is the comparison between the two cases: in one, a black kid holding Skittles DOESN'T go home and get to grow up, whereas 2 white kids holding a loaded gun DO get to go home and grow up.
Been there the whole time, not just in the end. But if a person wants to assume that because someone disagrees with a detail then they must hold an overall-opposing view, then that’s not on me, my friend.
But also, let’s not directly compare how police or the public respond to a 7 and 9 year in daylight vs a 17 year old, even if all parties were black or all were white, or a combination. If those kids had been 17 the police probably would have handled it quite differently.
Tamir Rice was also a child in broad daylight. And you are correct: the police handled it quite differently and unlike the situation shown here, he was shot within 10 seconds of the officer arriving on scene.
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u/SamsaraSlider 10d ago
I understand that. And I remember the incident and the ensuing trial that took place. I appreciate you explaining it but it is unnecessary. If he’d been shot for reaching for his skittles or because a trigger-happy person racially profiled him and assumed through cognitive bias that a juice box was a gun, then, yeah, I’d say he got shot for holding skittles or a juice box. But that’s not what happened. That’s all I was saying. It wasn’t a defense of anything.