I've never been more depressed in my life than I have been reading some of the absurd right wing responses to this young man's shameless murder. First, there's a false equivalency floating around that got posted on Facebook by one of my "friends":
You won't recognize me. My name was Antonio West and I was the 13-month old child who was shot at point blank range by two teens who were attempting to rob my mother, who was also shot. A Grand Jury of my mommy's peers from Brunswick GA determined the teens who murdered me will not face the death penalty ... too bad I was given a death sentence for being innocent and defenseless.
My family made the mistake of being white in a 73% non-white neighborhood, but my murder was not ruled a Hate Crime. Nor did President Obama take so much as a single moment to acknowledge my murder.
I am one of the youngest murder victims in our great Nation's history, but the media doesn't care to cover the story of my tragic demise, President Obama has no
children who could possibly look like me — so he doesn't care and the media doesn't care because my story is not interesting enough to bring them ratings so they can sell commercial time slots.
There is not a white equivalent of Al Sharpton because if there was he would be declared racist, so there is no one rushing to Brunswick GA to demand justice for me. There is no White Panther party to put a bounty on the lives of those who murdered me. I have no voice, I have no representation and unlike those who shot me in the face while I sat innocently in my stroller — I no longer have my life.
So while you are seeking justice for Treyvon, please remember to seek justice for me too. Tell your friends about me, tell you families, get tee shirts with my face on them and make the world pay attention, just like you did for Treyvon.
Read more at
http://www.snopes.com/...
I don't think it's necessary to spell out all the ways in which this case is nothing like the travesty that is the Martin case. But the comments attached were even worse: white people who believe that black people prey on them and get away with it because of reverse racism.
Then I encountered a guy on Google+ claiming that those who think that the Stand Your Gun laws, and the conceal and carry laws, add up to a potentially murderous situation are "idealists." I had to be a fool and write back and say that if objecting to armed vigilantes gunning down unarmed innocent people is being an idealist, then I'm an idealist.
I couldn't believe his response. He said, first of all, Trayvon wasn't innocent because he had traces of marijuana in his blood, which makes him a law breaker. The writer had the decency to admit that he didn't deserve to be shot for this, but I guess the mantle of innocence is gone, and with it all grounds for sympathy. He said my term "vigilante" was a "crack," and that people will have to take up the business of protecting themselves if the police won't do the job. Protect us from what, kids buying Skittles?
Anyway, certain whites seem to be responding to the case in their usual way, with a sense of victimization. How to get through to such types is beyond me. Thanks for letting me vent.