Is Zimmerman really not guilty?
- Thread starter Neonian
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Kira was Righteous
Active member
ence it could be argued if zimmerman cornered Martin especially if he saw a gun that he feared for his life claiming self defence so you are right its very complex.My personal view is that zimmerman started the fight by grabbing him to apprehend him then martin attacked him. It just brings up the issue of what qualifies as self defence.
@Collosol idiot
Its not a video of martin and zimmerman so its just propaganda probably made by people like you. I guess zimmerman is a sniffer dog and could tell he was on drugs ... what is your argument i really don't get what your trying to put across apart from stupid republican esk propaganda.Zimmerman did his job and shot a child with some candy? I suggest you rethink what your trying to say and come back.
@Collosol idiot
Its not a video of martin and zimmerman so its just propaganda probably made by people like you. I guess zimmerman is a sniffer dog and could tell he was on drugs ... what is your argument i really don't get what your trying to put across apart from stupid republican esk propaganda.Zimmerman did his job and shot a child with some candy? I suggest you rethink what your trying to say and come back.
wholeheartedly agree with this it is meant to occupy the sheep whilst more important issues are swept under the rug so to speak.A lot of people a day are killed in America via guns but get a black kid killed by a white guy the media loses their minds.Its good in a way this so called pro-black attitude once americans get into the centre and start treating black people not as heros or villains but human beings this black pro propaganda stuff will stop.
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This is the way I look at it. This is a story, that should have NEVER been on the national media and just have stayed on the local news. But instead a bunch of people, either racist, or wanting to further an agenda, picked up the story on the national news, and twisted it to fit a narrative they wanted, to try to push an agenda, and ignite division in people. The police dispatcher tape was EDITED, to paint Zimmerman out to be a racist. People were decieved into thinking that a "white" man just walked up and shoot a "black" man to kill him, and was getting off free of murder.
You want to see proof of misinformation? Just go look at all the anti zimmerman articles....at least 90% of them will say "zimmerman called 911." which is not the truth. He called a non emergency police department number.
But enough of my rant. Im not sure exactly what zimmerman is(guilty or not guilty), but since most of the evidence supports zimmerman overwhelmingly, i tend to think that zimmerman is not guilty of any crime.
Here is my main thought though. From the time after martin had already turned the corner, and zimmerman had been told "we dont need you to do that", the call went on for close to 2 more minutes. Martin had 2 minutes to walk/run 100 yards, to where he was staying. (just saying, and 250 pound obese person could walk 100 yards in less than 2 minutes....martin was fit)
So somehow martin manages to waste 2 minutes to get home(suggesting he did not indeed go straight home)
Then you have the fact, that EVEN HIS GIRLFRIEND believes martin probably did hit zimmerman first, and start the "fight".(yet of course she said almost the opposite during the trial, that zimmerman hit martin)
My #1 belief, is that if martin didnt start hitting zimmerman, he would be alive today. But even if martin was attacked by zimmerman, if he tried to run, instead of fighting, then at least there would be the evidence to lock zimmerman up. But instead, all evidence(includeing several witness) all support Martin confronting zimmerman.
My number 1 pet peeve about the media portrayal of martin, is them useing a picture of him from like 2-3 years ago. When there are plenty of pictures that were taken around his death, that was closer to what he was actually like. People can change alot in just 2 years.
But anyways, only zimmerman will ever know what truly happened that night, and this story was blown WAAAAAAAYYYYYYY out of proportion. It is only used to divide people, and ignite conflict and try to push a agenda.
You want to see proof of misinformation? Just go look at all the anti zimmerman articles....at least 90% of them will say "zimmerman called 911." which is not the truth. He called a non emergency police department number.
But enough of my rant. Im not sure exactly what zimmerman is(guilty or not guilty), but since most of the evidence supports zimmerman overwhelmingly, i tend to think that zimmerman is not guilty of any crime.
Here is my main thought though. From the time after martin had already turned the corner, and zimmerman had been told "we dont need you to do that", the call went on for close to 2 more minutes. Martin had 2 minutes to walk/run 100 yards, to where he was staying. (just saying, and 250 pound obese person could walk 100 yards in less than 2 minutes....martin was fit)
So somehow martin manages to waste 2 minutes to get home(suggesting he did not indeed go straight home)
Then you have the fact, that EVEN HIS GIRLFRIEND believes martin probably did hit zimmerman first, and start the "fight".(yet of course she said almost the opposite during the trial, that zimmerman hit martin)
My #1 belief, is that if martin didnt start hitting zimmerman, he would be alive today. But even if martin was attacked by zimmerman, if he tried to run, instead of fighting, then at least there would be the evidence to lock zimmerman up. But instead, all evidence(includeing several witness) all support Martin confronting zimmerman.
My number 1 pet peeve about the media portrayal of martin, is them useing a picture of him from like 2-3 years ago. When there are plenty of pictures that were taken around his death, that was closer to what he was actually like. People can change alot in just 2 years.
But anyways, only zimmerman will ever know what truly happened that night, and this story was blown WAAAAAAAYYYYYYY out of proportion. It is only used to divide people, and ignite conflict and try to push a agenda.
Europeans have a habit of killing each other for land, resources, etc.
You're arguing racism - but the fact is that Europeans treated people across the world relatively equally to how they treated each other. It's just that the rest of the world hadn't quite kept pace with the European 'arms race.'
It's much like how Rome, before Britain and America - went around, dominating the entire known world (reaching as far as China). Or how Egypt did much the same centuries before.
Civilizations wax and wane. A new dark age is coming, just as there was one following the fall of Egypt and the fall of Rome, so shall there be when the Western network of worlds stemming from European influences collapses. From it, perhaps we will see a resurgence of some of the Asian cultures for global dominance. Perhaps India will become the next major power of the world (China is burning itself out - they'll collapse with the west).
Perhaps it will be Russia reclaiming some of her former glory.
You're looking at a particularly narrow segment of human history and trying to use it to justify victimization of a particular race. I'm not going to sit here and try to argue that it was 'right' - but do understand that it's not the first time in history that slavery has been used - nor were blacks exclusively selected for slaves (far more low-class Europeans were brought in as slaves, particularly as the North began booming under industrialization and the country began its Western Expansion - which saw quite a few Chinese brought in as indentured servants, as well.... and the conditions they worked under were much worse... they were easy to come by and cheap to afford by comparison to the highly prized blacks).
You can't say that he was the aggressor.
I see you acting suspicious outside my home (you're probing around with a metal detector near the edge of my property line). I go out and ask you if there's anything I can do to help you.
Am I now the aggressor?
I'm a military guy. Security mindset, and a demonstrated survivalist. A prosecution attorney would love to have someone like me on trial - they could characterize me as a loose cannon and the world was lucky I didn't decide to re-live my days of being bullied at school years later and with an automatic weapon.
I must have wanted that confrontation to turn violent to sate my bloodlust.
If there's no recordings of the event - then it's not like anyone can say for sure that I didn't go out there and just start screaming at you.
Perhaps, in reality, I ask politely if there's anything I can do to help you, and you then you just start swinging your metal detector at me. I defend myself and you end up hospitalized or dead.
The 'Stand your ground' law doesn't even have to be evoked. Common sense holds that you cannot determine a true aggressor in this situation. I would have argued for Jury Nullification if the law was poorly structured enough to allow the case to fall under it (though that's the quickest way to get tossed out of a court room short of dancing around naked).
Between the time that Zimmerman hung up the phone (or the call to the operator was otherwise dropped) and the time that Martin was shot was four minutes. Martin was less than a block from his home around the start of this 4 minute mark. Zimmerman had begun returning to his car.
We need to move beyond the idea of a justice system as a means of punishing people like you would a child. You don't send people to prison as an adult form of "time out." The mountain of research all supports the notion that people don't 'learn their lesson' and often end up returning to prison after committing the same crime. In quite a few cases, people have become institutionalized - the prison system provided a structure they cannot find in the outside world and will actually commit -worse- crimes to return with a greater sentencing against them.
We also put people in jail for minor offenses that can (or should) be fined. Worse - a number of these laws take people who are, otherwise, productive members of society with careers and toss them behind bars for five years - which means they lose almost everything and leave the prison system in an economic class that is most likely to commit crime and return to prison.
When you could have just fined them with a 5-year pay-back plan and gotten money from them without having to worry about feeding and clothing them in jail and also losing out on their tax revenue.
The justice system needs to start concerning itself with functionality. The laws need to be pruned back down to functional minimums and violators need to be looked at in terms of statistical probability of rehabilitation. Rehabilitation should be a program designed to not destroy the lives of people who have erred in an otherwise productive life while also being able to remove people in destructive lifestyles from negative influences while providing a system of structure they can work into that is independent of the legal/justice system.
Then, you can move to a system where: "Oh, you were convicted of a violent crime two years ago... and now you're on trial for another violent crime? You're up against the death penalty, and the firing squad is out back."
It needs to be a sort of immune system against criminals rather than a massive bunch of nonsense that indoctrinates people into a form of slavery and does little to actually take crime out of society.
But in order for it to do that - we, also, have to drop this ideology of the court room being the Coliseum where we get to cheer for various gladiators as they fight to the death.
Whew.. After seeing that video.. It makes more sense to me now. On the news, they made it sound like the kid was running around with a hoodie on and got shot but I guess it was more to the story then that. :I It was life or death and the grown man had to react quick before his life was ended by karate kid. And don't call me racist. I am black and I have been friends with people from loads of other races. They made it look like a race thing on tv but the dude in the video could have shut this case closed with all that. He had the right to shoot the kid. Eat or be eaten.
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because your first and second post was a wall of text i didn't read it all. i just read what you replied to me. i suggest that you don't write long posts everytime otherwise people won't read them completly.
in the hands of soldiers at war or policemen yes, not in the hands of civilians. firearms were built to kill, civilians don't have the authority to kill anyone. if he is afraid for his safety and doesn't trust the police then he can get non lethal weapons such as pepper spray or rubber gun.
i don't know if he commited a crime. and i will probably will never now. and i didn't really think when i wrote the word "crime" so i apologize for the misdirection. regardless he did kill someone and should in my opinion be punished even if was self defense. as i said to make people think before killing in self defense as there are non lethal ways. and like every smart person on this planet he is using media and propaganda for his own benefit, such as some people use the media to gather messes against zimmerman so does zimmerman uses the media to gather opposers to support him like the guy in the video. ofcourse he doesn't do it in the light cause it will put him in a worser position, but i can assure you he is working behind the screens to help himself, i know this because thats what every public figure is doing now days. good or bad.
if someone close to you would die in a similiar circumstences, you wouldn't say that.
The **** do u mean that wasn't racist. The guy just said that blacks r a less race. Black people shooting whites all the time? Sounds awefully racist to me, this coming from someone that is also half black half white. This case isn't about ****ing race and that's what u all r making it. It was bout a 17 year old MALE( doesn't matter what race he was) who was shot down walking home from the store by a grown man( again, it doesn't matter what his race is), who should know what right and wrong is, that was told by police dispatchers not to go after him and 2 stay in his car or go home. Instead he chose 2 ignore the directions he was given and got out of the car with a gun and followed the boy. I don't care how u look at it, he was told not 2 follow him, but chosed 2 anyway and as a result a boy was shot dead. He created the whole situation therefore he is guilty. Not because he is/isn't a racist, because he put himself in that situation. Can't believe how u guys r turning this into a race war.
Kira was Righteous
Active member
They probably would Aim ^_^ i can only give my opinion as on self defence theres no real definite answer. If you are in danger that you are fairly certain will lead to your death deadly force is permitted however it must be a necessary confrontation aka you can't escape before or after. Jail just makes more hardened criminals and costs money make them work for the community unless its a serious crime then isolation prison with mandatory rehabilitation lessons every day for 20+ years should do the trick.The death penalty never works your assuming the people who get caught are intelligent or care when in reality its either they are poor or/and have to commit crimes or have mental problems then you have the ones with mental problems.It does need change helping people become better productive members of society whilst permanently eliminating the consistent trouble makers is the ideal first step also about the death penalty what if you convict the wrong guy? sorry for double posting its the device im using.
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So, if you're not going to pay attention - then why the hell should any intelligent being waste time conversing with you?
I've encountered police with worse trigger and muzzle discipline than the vast majority of Concealed Carry permit holders.
Every creature has the inherent right to self defense that you cannot take away, even if you wanted to. What we've done is decided that, since people will choose self-defense at some point, we've outlined (in the civilian world, very vaguely) instances where self-defense is not a detriment to social function and is, therefor, allowable.
But everyone has the right to self-defense against any aggressor - including law enforcement.
When the South declared its independence - they were within their rights to defend themselves from Northern aggression. Because the North ultimately won the war - history refers to them as rebels and tends to vilify them - but the fact of the matter is that they were people who chose to defend their way of life against a system of laws that had become overbearing and exclusive of their way of life.
The fact is that criminals can and will acquire firearms. The overwhelming majority of firearms possessed by criminals were obtained through illegal means (which means laws to regulate their sale will not make it more difficult for criminals to obtain firearms). Of those - only about 10% were stolen firearms (thus, they were not ever sold within our regulatory system).
The fact is, also, that a person with the kind of training I have -will- kill you in a hand-to-hand confrontation if I will it. Unless you have some serious training of your own. Even a simple augment like a baseball bat or crowbar is only going to give you a limited advantage (that I can quickly mitigate by picking something up). Your best option for defense is a sidearm-type firearm (pistol/handgun).
A person with raw fighting experience falls into a similar category. While they may be less efficient and tactical in their approach to fighting - they are going to seriously out-class the average person who is not used to those situations.
Now - if someone like me decides to go wild with a firearm... it's going to take quite a few amateurs or some similarly trained people to deal with me. People with my type of training are a bit much for most local police forces to handle. Which is why armed citizens to counter with overwhelming fire support are a good deterrant.
If I'm confident that people will go inside and call the police - all I have to worry about are the police - who I know I have a range, firepower, and likely training advantage over. You don't want to be one of the first dispatch officers. Local departments likely have a contingency to recall a small team of officers to equip them with better equipment and then deploy them via a van... but you're looking at a 20-45 minute response time. Not much better than regional SWAT.
In that time frame - I'm largely limited by ammunition and movement speeds. Officers will be dedicated to diverting traffic and trying to keep people indoors. A few with personal weapons they carry on duty might have a weapon with similar range capabilities and try to pin me down - but that's subject to a high degree of variability. This region has the advantage of being rural, where a higher percentage of officers carry a rifle.
Of course - the mom with an AR15 could drop me from a window as I'm moving by the business across the street. But civilians shouldn't do that.
Only police and military need firearms.
Because they're always going to be there when you need them, and they're always going to have your best interests at heart.
So if someone is killed in the process of committing a rape - we should punish the woman being raped. Obviously, she should have thought about using non-lethal means of defending herself.
There's nothing wrong with death. It is the most certain factor of life.
There is no evidence that Zimmerman is pathological and requires some kind of intervention by society to prevent him from committing a crime or creating a similar incident in the future. There's no reason to assign financial, legal, or other liability to him for the incident. Thus, fining, confining, and execution are not really pursuable.
Then you don't know. You assume.
Zimmerman has, in fact, been 'running deep and quiet.' He's largely avoided the media and the public.
Just because someone is close to me does not mean I forsake logical thought when it comes to their life.
I've had to deal with the death of my parents and two of my grandparents, as well as my Uncle. All before I was 22. Thankfully, none of them died violently - but I've known and been somewhat close to a few people who have.
One of they guys in my unit got drunk before deployment and, for whatever reason, decided to start shooting at police. He took his issues with him to the grave.
I, myself, died several times during birth (what happens when you're 2 months premature because of an infection the gynecologist missed).
Death isn't a horrible or objectionable thing. It's part of a natural process and is a natural consequence of certain things. It is not necessarily desirable - but it's nothing to get worked up over in cases like this.
In the time we've been arguing over the Martin case, 450 thousand people have died in the U.S. from motor vehicle accidents. Most of which involving abuse of alcohol.
People, for whatever reason, think it's a good time to go out and drink to the point where they don't remember what happened. Culturally - that's "having a good time."
Yet a kid gets killed because two people got into a fight... and the "who started it" is completely indeterminate... is a tragedy worthy of national outcry and public demonstrations.
Go out, get drunk, crash your car or wake up having been impregnated.
Or - go out, boogie down the street, shoot at some guys in blue shirts, run from the cops... then relax to a widely popular style of music that glorifies that lifestyle.
You reap what you sow.
it's the job of the guy writing the argument to make it readable and accessible, if a university academic is writing a 10,000 page work i doubt people are going to read all of it. same for books and stuff with the same intention of teaching or giving an opinion. at the very least they have a short "i get the idea" version in the beginning.
in my country there is a guy with govermental office that his job is to review the current govermant. in 2012 he release a yearly report on the govermant with 64 chapters and an enormous amount of words, i didn't read any journalist who actully read the whole thing before posting what was in it. they all read the introduction and some key parts.
this 17 year old kid is not a trained person and i highly doubt he can kill someone with raw force. i am am 100% you don't need to kill him in order to stop him. yes every person has the right to self defense and i am not saying we should not carry guns, but we should not shoot unless we are certain someone is going to die unless we kill the criminal. you really think there is no chance of both zimmerman and trayvon getting out of this alive and relativly unharmed?
unless it is established she chould not have ended the rape without killing him. yes she should be punished. this may sound bad but in truth it will result in less deaths. it is possible for a women to avoid rape or stop an ongoing rape with non lethal means. i don't suggest the punishment should be as severe as jail time or a fine, a community job should be enough. it's simply to put the idea in people's minds that they should try and avoid unncessary killing.
i assume but i regard it, to myself at least as a fact. people who play so purely don't survive, if zimmerman isn't doing anything to make himself appear better in the eyes of the public then he will ever die or run away because public opinion beats anything.
first of all i am sorry for you loss.
now, you obviously have a problem with drinking. i think you are correct that that should be handeld. deaths could have been avoided if we punished people more severly for drinking and driving and if we put more restriction on alcohol use. the same for guns, deaths could have been avoided if we punished people for shooting when unncessery and if we put mroe restriction on gun use.
the fact that people get guns in an ilegal way means we should have more power over it don't you think? it's harder to bust a gun shop owner who works legaly then a dealer in the street. for some reason they let both slide in my opinion.
just as you believe that the death of people close to you could have been avoided if they didn't have access to alcohol (if you believe that way, from your words i think you do) so do i believe that many deaths could have been avoided if civilians didn't have access to guns. because we can't enforce people to not consume alcohol or use guns we should at least make it better for them to not kill someone while doing so. so alcoholists won't drive and drink and self defense would be done using non lethal means.
Trollasaur
Active member
Trayvon was a bad kid, and Zimmerman wasn't much of a greater person either
Zimmerman is innocent of murder at least, if he wanted to KILL trayvon he could of done so without getting his ass kicked.
Zimmerman is innocent of murder at least, if he wanted to KILL trayvon he could of done so without getting his ass kicked.
Unbiased King
Active member
I'll agree that the media is flipping this into a race issue, but I wholeheartedly stop you when you say that the issue is a who-shot-who thing.
The privilege of Stand Your Ground was abused in this case.
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The reporter is just providing clear, detailed background check as to who these two people were and what they've done, which holds virtually no relevance to the actual case.
I mean there's a reason why the jury was expected to have no other knowledge on the defendant/victim other than the details of the case; it wasn't a trial about who might have been trying to make drugs or who has no history of racial intolerance, but merely whether or not Zimmerman acted in "self defense".
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OneMellowGuy
Active member
Yes Zimmerman was innocent, and the media tried to start a race war. For the most part it didn't work.
However this guy:
Edit: Didn't mean to say Innocent, I meant to say not guilty
However this guy:
As a black person I'm gonna excuse the fact that you called me a lesser being. But you think we should get over slavery? Not happening. For that matter why should we?
Edit: Didn't mean to say Innocent, I meant to say not guilty
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chopstickchakra
Active member
You know black people weren't the only slaves right? Clearly Colossal doesn't but you do right? Slavery wasn't as much a racial issue as a class issue while it was happening, now it's treated as a race issue. If you wanna talk about race issues in slavery try mentioning how Irish and Chinese slaves were sold at a fraction of the price as black slaves. Or how some(not all) black slaves were housed and looked after medically, better than non black slaves. Slavery didn't start because someone saw a black person in Africa and said "oooh his skin just makes me wanna work him in a field 'til he dies" no it started because some Dutch sailors went to Africa said "These people don't seem to know anything about our way of life let's bring them home and exploit them for a profit." Did you know in the 18th century when blacks were sought after, the Irish, the Natives and many other foreigners were segregated and left to starve off, they were falsely enlisted into the armies as cannon fodder, and they were the ones being persecuted as criminals(sounds a lot like the 50's and 70's)
OT:Look people it's pretty ****in simple stand your ground shouldn't have applied as Zimmerman was the aggressor. He confronted Trayvon, he instigated the conflict and he shot another human being "Because he was scared" Zimmerman had every intention of using that gun the minute he picked up the phones and talked to the police. No matter what way you wanna spin it, it was murder.
Zimmerman was 100% in the wrong in every way leading up to Trayvon "beating him near death". You wanna know how to keep yourself out of the situation where you get your head beat in by a teenager don't confront one when you know you can't beat them, and yes Zimmerman knew he wouldn't be able to win a fight or he wouldn't have brought a gun. Just because Zimmerman has a precedent to use as a technicality shouldn't blind us to the fact that he alone created the situation that allowed that technicality to help him get away with murder(Which it was)
OneMellowGuy
Active member
I meant to say got guilty, because he was not innocent and he was in the wrong. But looking back on the case the prosecution fail to prove he was guilty.
Some things cannot be simplified any further without losing substantial portions of their meaning.
The microwave mentality is part of what has destroyed this nation.
Obama: "We added jobs to the economy!"
"No, you didn't. You -reduced- the rate of job loss by adding in low-paying jobs that are on government stimulus and have no long-term employment impact."
But no one sticks around to hear 'the rest of the story.'
Democrats: "We balanced the budget."
"Again, no, you didn't. You allowed the trading of social security bonds to cover all manners of public debt. This, effectively, annihilated any sense of a true social security trust fund. This, through accounting, made the last years of the Clinton administration appear to run a balanced budget while the true public debt continued to increase."
But no one sticks around to hear that argument and actually investigate. They believe the nonsense and keep right on trucking.
Which is why I highly question the claim that such people are sentient.
Martin was experienced at fighting - and the position he had Zimmerman in carried a high risk of lethality. Martin was on top of Zimmerman and slamming his head into the concrete. The forensics collected at the seen collaborate this description of events.
There is, also, no guarantee that you will be able to stop someone without killing them. That is a silly ideal. Someone has decided to use force against you and you don't really have any guarantee that they are going to stop before you're dead. You either choose to survive or you choose to die. That is why fights should not be taken lightly.
I have considerable amounts of training and experience when it comes to security work. Killing someone is simple. Taking someone into custody who is actively resisting always results in someone's bones being broken, joints being dislocated, and is one of the more hazardous parts of working security. 'We' can bring you under control pretty quickly when we want to - but your arm is never going to work quite the same way, again.
But in civilian cases - you're not expected to bring someone into custody who is attacking you. You're not held to the same standard as an officer. You aren't going to be grilled on the Deadly Force Triangle and the Use of Force Continuum and how the situation and your actions compare against the principles you were trained on.
Will it, really?
Most rapists are repeat offenders, and 13% of women who are raped will attempt suicide.
87,000 completed and 70,000 attempted rapes are estimated to have occurred in 2002.
Roughly 16,000 suicide attempts can be extrapolated to have been related to rape per year:
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Female suicide rates are relatively stable per-capita, and the number of female suicides is roughly 6,800 per year.
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"Kilpatrick et al. found that 19% of surveyed rape victims had attempted suicide, compared to only 2.2% of non-victims, and whereas 17% of non-victims seriously contemplated suicide, 37% of rape victims had done so. Resick found similar data where 17% of rape victims seeking treatment reported making a suicide attempt."
Now we combine that with how many rapists are repeat offenders. The research is a bit muddy, here, and we can only base off of legal proceedings (charges filed and convictions filled):
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"In a subsequent twenty-five-year follow-up of 136 rapists, the failure rates for sexual charges and convictions were .19 and .11 at Year 5, .26 and .16 at Year 10, .31 and .20 at Year 15, .36 and .23 at Year 20, and .39 and .24 at Year 25 (Prentky, Lee, Knight, and Cerce)."
31% at year ten were brought back up on rape charges. 20% were convicted.
Most experts believe recidivism amongst rape cases to be grossly underestimated. Less than half of all rapes are reported, and the true number can only be guessed at.
It can well be argued that any killing of someone attempting a rape would prevent far more deaths by reducing suicide factors among women.
And - again - I must ask: "Why are we concerned about how many people might die if we allow people to defend themselves?"
Is it the government's responsibility to prevent death, or to enable function? Preventing death is akin go holding in your poop - it's a losing battle in the end.
You've nothing to base this off of other than your assumptions. Zimmerman was a nobody. The only reason he is "somebody" is because the mainstream media started talking about him. He, himself, has no power to manipulate the media. They are the ones who will manipulate him.
Whatever he says will be edited and cropped and put into whatever context suits the agenda of a journalist. People are using him as a proxy for their own personal campaigns.
The thing is, however, that a society that is stupid enough to embrace and worship a substance that kills them deserves the death and destruction they get.
If they are intelligent enough to understand - and do it anyway - they deserve it. If they aren't intelligent enough to understand - then you're trying to explain to a bunch of rabbits why they would be better off to wait and not eat the sprouts of plants from your garden. No matter how sound your idea and logic - you're simply not going to accomplish anything.
The same goes for firearms. The ghettos deserve their gang violence for embracing that culture. Unraveling the illegal firearms trade is a fool's errand - the harder you fight it, the more profitable it becomes to get involved, and the more people you will find who are willing to take the risk of getting involved.
Trying to punish people for defending themselves is going to have people like me dis-establishing your government in a hell of a hurry. Because we'll defend ourselves from what we see to be an unjust and completely out of control system.
How do you get more power over something you have no power over?
What are they going to do? Write a law that says the only legal way to sell firearms is through an authorized dealer? .... That's exactly the way it's done. Arms in the U.S. are manufactured with serial numbers and tracked from the point of manufacture to the point at which they are declared destroyed. Most firearms recovered from criminals who use them never existed within that system - they are produced in other nations or by other means that makes them technically illegal.
Tracking these supply lines does occur - but the reality is that it's a sort of hydra. As I said - the harder you fight it, the more profitable it becomes. The people who transport these firearms are not violent criminals. They are smugglers and more like white-collar criminals who don't like to be near the nasty ends of the business (and the reality is that a fair portion of the illegal firearms trade goes to non-violent, non-criminal portions of the population, as well).
You shut down one supply and two smaller ones take its place. You shut one of them down and the other one picks up the slack. It's a never ending process where the efforts would be better spent removing criminals from society and patrolling the streets as opposed to trying to shut down something that is virtually immortal.
My mother died of cancer. My father of natural causes (though I suspect sleep apnea or some high blood pressure issue - though those are natural causes, he did go 'before his time.') My uncle from diabetes (well, not taking care of himself - but it was that combined with diabetes that ultimately ended him). My grandmother was from the same type of cancer that took my mother.
Death is a natural part of life. Many of today's problems exist because people are not dying fast enough.
Overpopulation through India and portions of Africa are a direct result of eliminating Smallpox. Smallpox would kill you off if you were not relatively healthy and had good support behind you. Man, woman, child - it didn't matter - you had to be of decent sustenance to survive -the- human virus (or had to be in a nation that could afford to vaccinate against it).
By eradicating it - anyone who can physically survive long enough to reproduce, essentially, will - despite their ability or inability to provide for themselves or the consequences of procreation. Many cultures through the East are still living as they did while Smallpox existed (and came with a 30% case fatality rate) - which is to have very large family sizes.
These ballooned exponentially once the limiting factor merely became whether or not someone could find enough food to not starve to death.
A number of problems in America can be traced to this, as well. The number of welfare recipients has been increasing almost geometrically as time has gone on. A fair portion of the population is even beginning to become undocumented, with thousands living in virtual isolation from the U.S. legal system and law enforcement. Many of these sectors would not be able to afford vaccination procedures and they would be unable to properly sustain themselves to increase their odds of survival. Thus, their population size would not be allowed to grow like it has.
Of course - it's a foregone conclusion that the next hundred years will contain a substantial collapse of this civilization and usher in a new dark age. There's a possibility that Smallpox will make a return. When it does - it's an automatic 2 billion deaths from the virus alone with secondary deaths likely being 2-3 billion on top of that as critical support infrastructure and supply lines break down.
Else - the world undergoes an economic collapse triggered by expansion of the welfare state and the mentality that people are entitled to a way of life. Critical infrastructure fails and key energy supply lines dry up. Civil wars break out and the people left, a hundred years later, will stare in awe at the left over husks of our factories and tell legends of what our civilization was capable of - as people did while watching the sun set behind the crumbling Pyramids and the Roman Coliseum.
Which is straying somewhat off topic.