it doesn't matter, a kid is now dead. even if it was self defense or even if it was completly by mistake, the kid is dead. there should be a punishment and a harsh one simply to make other people think 5 times before shooting a f*cking gun. even if zimmerman was afraid for his life i don't think that shooting the kid was neccesary, at best shooting at the air would scare him off.
Firearms are not tools of intimidation. They are tools for defense. You do not discharge them into the air - what comes up must come down. You only discharge at what you intend to deal damage to.
zimmerman is doing the same thing the media does only for the opposite cause, he is using the media and public opinion to lower his punishment and make the crime appear less then it really is.
He's not doing anything.
Nor did he commit a crime.
in the end, he killed someone. people must never forget that.
I really don't see the big deal. People die all the time.
I stopped at white people get shot all the time by black people i can guarantee you right without any doubt more blacks have been killed then whites. Actually some black countries weren't enslaved so that doesn't apply to all and if someone has more firepower then you tells to get onto a ship or they will kill you what do you say? The eithopians beat the slavers with sticks ^_^
As someone has already said, this is living in the past.
If you look back through history, however, whites weren't traveling to these regions and capturing blacks. Think about it for a few minutes, and you'll see why the idea of sailing a ship for a month to some portion of the world, beating them into submission to arrest them all, then carting them back to wherever simply isn't feasible.
What was going on, then?
Various tribes were vying for power in the area. A prison system was beyond their ability to maintain, and if you pissed off the local war lord, he'd sell you off to the foreigners.
They were killing, jailing, and enslaving each other for centuries before the ordeal went global.
It stands to reason that the regions with better unity and coherency would drive off the majority of the slave trade. Slavers weren't looking for a fight. They were looking for a profit. Fighting for live captives on foreign terrain with the extremely limited supplies that could be carried aboard sailing vessels is not a good way to go about trying to make a profit.
You go to places where people are looking for ways to get rid of each other, and offer a solution. A number of people looking to get away from the current regimes will hop aboard (probably before really knowing what they got themselves into).
The zimmerman trial was complex but ultimately zimmerman went after that kid with the intention to stop him whatever the means when told not to by police. You cannot claim self defence if you start a event but travyon was a druggie wannabe gangster so hes no angel either.
The problem is that we don't really know who started the physical altercation.
If you pin Zimmerman for disobeying the direction of a non-emergency dispatch manned by an individual with no binding legal authority - then people like me simply aren't going to call until it's to report someone in custody or in need of being taken to the morgue.
If you try to say that following Martin was instigating a crime - then you may as well start charging door-to-door salesmen with assault and the tabloid vendor with attempted murder. They are pursuing people, after all. They started whatever happens to them after they decided to approach someone.
... reality doesn't work that way.
In cases like this - it's next to impossible to really tell who started what, and who is at fault.
But society demands blood. The court room is the Coliseum and the conclusion needs to be blood soaking through the floorboards. If one person is innocent - it means the other must be guilty and killed.
It can't be that both are innocent of any legal wrongdoing (even if they didn't make the best decisions).
It can't be that Martin over-reacted to begin with, and an already tense Zimmerman didn't de-escalate the situation... leading himself or Martin to resort to physical violence that ultimately cascaded into a series of events where Zimmerman was being beaten against the ground before he was shot.
Legally - you can't really punish either of the two without strong evidence to convince a jury that criminal negligence or intent existed.
That evidence simply isn't there in the case. Neither is guilty of a crime - even though the situation was not a good one and ended in neither party's favor.