The Zimmernan Trial, Epithets, and Other Thoughts

Over the past couple of days with the George Zimmerman trial in progress, I have been thinking a lot about race in our country. Sadly, the Zimmerman trial is reopening old wounds when it comes to this issue. As it stands now, unless Zimmerman were to stand up and change his plea to guilty (which I don't advocate), the eventual verdict is going to outrage a lot of people on the "losing" side.

In addition, I have been participating in the comment thread of a website I support and read often. (I choose to not name it.) While I agree with the overall thesis of the posting, which concerns the trial, I have objected to some of the negative generalizations attributed to black Americans by a couple of the readers.

And if that wasn't enough, a young man I was conversing with this week drooped the n-word. Realizing that I had stopped talking, he acknowledged my discomfort, but reiterated the point he was making (which concerned race). While acknowledging his point, I advised him that he shouldn't use that particular word.

I can only hope that depending how the Zimmerman trial comes out we will not be hearing that word used in response. Nor should we hear the "cracker" word used as quoted out of the mouth of Trayvon Martin by Rachel Jeantel during her testimony.

Being in my late 60s, it is safe to say that even in Southern California, I grew up with the n-word. It was never taught to me by my parents, neither of whom used it (My mom was from North Carolina but was raised better.) I did learn it, however, from my circle of punk friends, who I ran around with as a teenager. We didn't know blacks; they were the folks who lived on the other side of town.

It wasn't until I got older, played on an otherwise all black baseball team, went into the Army, and began to really know black people that I learned that this kind of terminology was unacceptable. I still maintain that most white Americans have learned that lesson as well because the n-word has become unacceptable in most of white society. Yet, I find it deplorable that so many young blacks have adopted it as some sort of term of endearment among themselves. As one who has studied linguistics, I know that words in any language can die out if we refuse to use them anymore. It seems to me that it is black Americans themselves, at least younger ones, who are keeping the word alive. To actually hear it in rap songs is outrageous.

None of the above is to suggest that I am a liberal when it comes to this issue. I subscribe to the thinking as put forth by black conservatives like Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas, Shelby Steele and Larry Elder among others. I admire their thinking and their courage to express it in the face of being called sell-outs and Uncle Toms. At the same time, I have contempt for the likes of people like Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and the racist New Black Panther Party. The same goes for the NAACP, an organization that was once great, but is now nothing more than an arm of the Democratic party.

That brings us back to George Zimmerman, a man who is demonstrably brown, but is carrying the  baggage of historic white racism in this trial that promises to follow in the footsteps of Rodney King and OJ Simpson. How unfortunate that is, but it is a trial driven by racial considerations, and we can't deny it even if we think it should not be.

In a few days, many Americans are going to feel strongly that Zimmerman was either railroaded into an unjust conviction due to racial considerations, or that the Martin family was denied justice by a racist legal system. I will express my opinion as well because now that the state has rested, I don't feel that it met its burden. I say that as one who has participated in hundreds of trials myself, which makes this one even more troubling to me. Yet, when the verdict comes, I hope that we all can take some time for reflection before we resort to racial insults and allow our country to take several steps back to where we have come from.