When I was stationed in Germany in the US Army 1966-68, there was a murder trial involving three black soldiers who were stabbed to death by a white soldier outside of a bar. I seem to recall that the city was Kaiserslautern, at that time, one of the toughest GI towns in Germany. The case received wide-spread coverage in the old Overseas Weekly, a non-official, private paper that was wildly popular among the military community. The background was this: The white soldier had been serving a turn of duty at the kaserne gate one evening. A group of black soldiers was either trying to leave the post without passes or was returning late at night without passes. Either way, a confrontation ensued that resulted in the black soldiers receiving some form of discipline or simply being refused exit off-post.
At any rate, a few nights later, three of the black soldiers in question encountered the white soldier drinking alone at a bar downtown. They threatened him and told him they were going to be waiting for him outside. Sometime before leaving the bar, the white soldier came into possession of a knife. As he left the bar, he was attacked by the three blacks, knocked to the ground and was being beaten with chains. At some point, the white soldier got off the ground and plunged his knife into each of his assailants. They all died.
The soldier was court-martialed, claimed self defense, produced witnesses to the incident, and was acquitted, whereupon he was immediately flown back to the US. Among the black GI community, there was outrage and several disturbances resulted at various posts throughout Germany. It should be pointed out here that this was in the context of the 1960s, a different era in American race relations. Even in the Army in Germany, relations were tense.
Any parallel to the Zimmerman case today? Maybe yes. Maybe no.
But consider this: Below is a Fox News report of last night's disturbances in Los Angeles when a peaceful protest in the Crenshaw district got out of hand when dozens of youths broke off and marched down Crenshaw Blvd.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/07/16/zimmerman-protesters-raid-la-wal-mart-stop-freeway/
I watched much of it on TV from the vantage point of a news helicopter as it followed the disorderly procession down Crenshaw Blvd. At one point, 5-6 youths assaulted someone who had been sitting at a bus stop. They left him on the sidewalk. No cops responded. LAPD was apparently several blocks away "containing" the march. A few minutes later, about 12 youths swarmed a car. They were on the roof of the car and the hood. The driver was pulled out of the vehicle and a few seconds later was allowed to get back into the vehicle and drive off. Again, no LAPD anywhere in sight. (It was only later that the LAPD declared it an unlawful assembly and began arresting those who refused to disperse.)
Is it safe to say that either person conceivably could have been killed? Why was the driver allowed to go free? Was it because he or she was determined not to be white? I don't know.
Now consider this scenario: Suppose that driver had been a white male being dragged out of his car by a group of a dozen or so young men-as happened to Reginald Denny, a white truck driver caught in the wrong place at the wrong time in the immediate aftermath of the Rodney King trial acquittals. Suppose that man had been armed and had shot one of the attackers and killed him.
George Zimmerman II?
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
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2 comments:
Something is wrong in the black community. At one time, in the 40's they had a lower out of wedlock birthrate than the whites. Once the government began to "fix" the racism at that time, they introduced negative incentives. The women were paid more if they had more children and there was no man in the house. Welfare became a mess. Since then, it has gotten much worse with lower expectations and without regard for the consequences. They have created a dependent, volatile, crime ridden society because they promoted dependency programs.
Obviously, the Civil Rights Program since LBJ has failed. Now you have mobs destroying things and raiding stores for some affront because a white killed a black... regardless of the circumstances.
There were no riots after Reginald Denny was hit in the head with a brick on national TV. Yet we now have race baiters, from Obama and Holder on down to Sharpton who stir up mobs. This holds blacks in lower esteem and legitimizes looting to them as an expected response.
Yet another example of how and why liberal Democratic policies just don't work.
Your army story seems to be an exact parallel to this case. Black on white crime doesn't count and goes basically unreported. It is the same for the black on black crimes. It is only the relatively unusual case of white on black crime that obsesses the media. It becomes a permission slip to smash, burn down, and loot local stores. Then they complain when the stores refuse to rebuild there or charge more for goods.
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Yes, race (particularly black/white issues) most certainly constitutes a one-way street in America these days, does it not??
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