Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman Ethics Train Wreck

Ethical Quote Of The Week: Ann Althouse

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

“It’s a terrible idea to go looking for incidents  where the killers are black and the victims are white and to exploit them in what seems like an effort to undo the distortions. I saw this happening earlier this week over the Christopher Lane murder, I labeled it “counter-Trayvonistic,” which was a too-subtle way to say: Don’t fight skewing with skewing in the opposite direction….Trayvon Martin — an individual human being — was used by demagogues to score points about the suffering of black people in America, but this is not a game, and it is delusion to imagine that there is a need to score points on some imagined other side. This is not a game. There is no score. And we are all on the same side.”

—–Law prof/ blogger Ann Althouse, reacting to the effort in conservative circles to assert that recent high-profile black-on-white incidents of violent crime were racially motivated, as a “tit-for-tat” response to the Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman distortions.

Uh, let's NOT ask the President about the thrill killing of Christopher Lane. After all, Jesse Jackson already said that it was "frowned upon"...

Uh, let’s NOT ask the President to give us his thoughts on  the thrill killing of Christopher Lane. After all, Jesse Jackson already said that it was “frowned upon”…

Prof Althouse is exactly right. Tit-for-tat is always an unethical and ultimately destructive response, abandoning the moral high ground and lowering ethical standards so that the good guys and villains are indistinguishable. In this case, it is especially wrong-headed, because the tactic also exacerbates the racial divisions that the Martin-Zimmerman lies and misrepresentations were cynically designed (by some, at least) to widen.

Althouse goes on to say, Continue reading →

Unethical Quote of The Month: Martin Luther King III

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

“The vision preached by my father a half-century ago was that his four little children would no longer live in a nation where they would judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. However, sadly, the tears of Trayvon Martin’s mother and father remind us that, far too frequently, the color of one’s skin remains a license to profile, to arrest and to even murder with no regard for the content of one’s character.”

–— Martin Luther King III, the son of the martyred civil rights leader and humanist, speaking in front of the Lincoln memorial before thousands gathered on the National Mall  to commemorate the upcoming 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 March on Washington, and his iconic “I have a dream” speech.

The passage was despicable and inexcusable, an insult to his father’s legacy and all of the courageous and sincere Americans, black and white, who have worked hard and effectively this past half-century to make remarkable progress toward the society that Rev. King envisioned.

“The tears of Trayvon Martin’s mother”  have exactly nothing at all to do with racial profiling or a “license to murder.” King’s son, proving once again that greatness of character and mind is seldom passed on to succeeding generations, chose to engage in divisive, misleading and cheap rhetoric that undermine his father’s goal of bring the races together. In this he was certainly consistent with the motivations of the event’s organizers, prominent among them Al Sharpton, whose paycheck and existence on the national scene depends on furthering the illusion of widespread racial discord, prejudice and injustice.

Even allowing for the excesses of oratory, the younger King’s speech deliberately misrepresented the historical, legal and factual record, which is this: a mixed-race citizen was pre-judged to be guilty of racism and murder by the color of his skin, and then demonized in order to provide a rallying point for a race-based political agenda. The civil rights establishment, aided by a complicit media and irresponsible politicians, distorted the facts of a tragic encounter so effectively that most Africans-Americans believe the lies rather than the facts, and bullied a politicized prosecution into bringing a criminal case to trial it could only win by jury intimidation, for it did not have sufficient evidence. Against all odds, a courageous jury embodied the best of the American justice system by properly acquitting an unpopular defendant who could not be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, a standard that is crucial to maintaining racial justice in the courts. Despite this inspiring display of character, the organizers of today’s event, its supporters, and most of those in attendance, have chosen to judge those jurors as biased, comparing them to the bigoted jurors in the Emmett Till murder trial, based on the color of their skin.

How immensely hypocritical, destructive and sad.

Martin Luther King propelled the cause of racial harmony and justice forward on August 28, 1963.

Today his son made pushed that cause backward to-day in favor of hate, suspicion, and ignorance, 50 years later.

Ethics Indictments And Observations On “The Greatest Race Hoax Since Tawana Brawley.”

/ Jack Marshall / 26 Comments
Hey Oberlin! Can't you take a joke?

Hey Oberlin! Can’t you take a joke?

On  February 2013, the small, elite, ultra-liberal arts (both ultra liberal and ultra-arty) campus of Oberlin College was horrified by a series of racist and anti-Semitic posters, graffiti and anonymous emails. The classes were cancelled for intense self-examination and soul-searching; the news media reported on the shocking episode with dire reflections upon the increasing racial tensions in the U.S. Progressive pundits went further, flogging the story as proof of the assault on minority rights from the right, sparked by their rejection of a black President. From BET’s commentary on the Oberlin incidents:

“The sad truth is that the infection of intolerance is pervasive in American society in the age of Obama. We’re living in an era when Supreme Court justices consider the right to vote for African-Americans to be a form of “racial entitlement.” We’re in a period where Republican candidates for president cavalierly refer to the nation’s first Black commander-in-chief as the “food stamp president.” This is the period in American history that has seen the most highly orchestrated assault on minority voting since the end of Reconstruction. And in the midst of it are Republican elected officials boasting about it.in which two students made seemingly racist and other such for the purpose of getting a reaction on campus, not because they believed the hostile messages.  At least one of the two was an Obama supporter with strong progressive, anti-racist politics.”

It has now been conclusively confirmed by investigative reporters and bloggers that the perpetrators of the wave of apparent racial hate were two students, inseparable friends, who were not conservatives, Republicans or racists, but “pranksters” and provocateurs, who engaged in the conduct to see how the campus would “over-react.” One of the students, Dylan Bleier, had organized a voter drive for President Obama in 2008. His Facebook page announced him as a supporter of the ACLU, a Democrat, a member of the Green Party, and someone who placed “civil rights” at the top if his  interests and priorities. This means that there was not an outbreak of racism on one of the most liberal college campuses in America, but that two progressive students set out to make it seem that way—it was essentially a prank. Continue reading →

Ethics Quote of the Week: Former Rep. Allen West (R-Fla)

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

“Three black teens shoot white jogger. Who will [Mr. Obama] identify w/ this time?”

—Allen West, African-American conservative and formerly a Republican Congressman, in a tweet chiding President Obama for his identification of black shooting victim Trayvon Martin with his hypothetical son and himself, because of their common race.

finger-pointingYou will note that I didn’t say “ethical quote.” I don’t know that West’s quote is ethical. He is a metaphorical bomb-thrower, and exploiting this horrible story to say “how dya like it when its thrown right back at ya, sport?” to President Obama may be satisfying (and well-earned), but I’m not sure it’s productive or responsible. I detested the President’s two comments on the Martin case, and think that they were ill-considered and destructive, but this kind of tit for tat mockery doesn’t clarify why his comments were wrong.

On the other hand, West’s tweet raises some valid ethics points in a modicum of keystrokes. How do we know this killing was racist? Just because the assailants were black and the victim was white, there is no reason to assume that their motive of killing someone for the fun of it wasn’t race blind. Race isn’t always a factor just because the victim and perpetrator are different colors, just as it may not have been a factor in the Martin slaying—which is why a prudent and responsible President should have kept his self-centered musings to himself. Continue reading →

How Dangerous Lies Become Accepted Truth: D.C. Theater Embraces The False Emmett Till-Trayvon Martin Comparison

/ Jack Marshall / 91 Comments
If we want it to be true, then it will be true...

If we want it to be true, then it will be true…

I awoke to find this in my Washington Post Style Section this morning, in the column devoted to notable events in D.C. theater. My personal Facebook page is fairly well linked to the Washington , D.C. theater community, so I decided to register my disgust there. I’m continuing it here, and in the interest of economy, will simply repeat what I just posted on Facebook.

I will just add this: I foolishly assumed that the irresponsible, and either ignorant or malign attempts to equate the killings of Emmett Till and Trayvon Martin were isolated examples of race-baiting excesses, and would be widely rejected and debunked by more responsible figures and authorities. Not only did this not happen, but that indefensible comparison, and the damaging falsehoods it is intended to plant, like a deadly virus,  in our national fabric, is beginning to take hold as truth.

Anyone, regardless of race and political or ideological belief should be able see how intolerable this is. Everyone has an obligation to do what they can to stop it.

Here is my Facebook post. Continue reading →

Ethics Dunce, Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman Ethics Train Wreck Division (Yes, It’s Still Rolling!): Oprah Winfrey

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments
oprah

Oprah, Sharpton…Sharpton, Oprah. At this point, not much difference. A lot less than between, say, Trayvon Martin and Emmett Till…

At this point, Oprah’s not just a passenger on the Train Wreck, but doing her best to be its engineer.

Last week, in an interview, Oprah thoroughly debased herself by opining, in defiance of history, facts and fairness, that the death of Trayvon Martin and the torture and lynching of Emmett Till  were equivalent episodes. “Let me just tell you: in my mind, same thing,” Winfrey said.  About the same time The New York Daily News ran this despicable inflammatory front page:

Daily News Emmett Till

I decided to let it go. I had already written about how untrue,  dishonest and intentionally divisive comparisons of the Martin case to Till were, and frankly, I would rather write about something other than the most revolting and damaging episode of society-wide race-baiting within my lifetime. I had already scolded Oprah for one race-related ethics foul this month, and she is only one among many offenders in these depressingly divisive times. (Full Disclosure: I was once employed as an ethics expert for a regular feature in “O” Magazine) Oprah, however, is making the rounds promoting “The Butler,” and she doubled down on this irresponsible position while talking to Anderson Cooper. From Mediaite: Continue reading →

Don Lemon For President

/ Jack Marshall / 42 Comments
Ethics Hero.

Ethics Hero.

Bear with me: I’ll get to Don Lemon eventually.

In a mature, rational, respectful democracy with an objective and competent news media, difficult and contentious issues would be thoughtfully debated with open minds and fearless honesty, without the toxic influence of rigid ideologies, partisan loyalties, group identification, or biases. The objectives: reach the truth, identify problems, begin solving them.

This process is difficult under the best of circumstances, and in the United States, circa 2013, it is nearly impossible on any issue, and dangerous on the issue of race, with both the media and elected officials actively seeking to exacerbate racial divisions and misconceptions. A recent poll suggests that the perception of racial divisions in America has worsened by 25% since Barack Obama was elected President, following decades of steady improvement. Why is this? There are many reasons, but the cynical pandering to misconceptions in the black community is one major suspect.

President Obama, had he been fair and responsible, might have used his remarks about the George Zimmerman trial to point out that neither the incident itself nor the verdict of the jury were relevant to race issues, or created by a “stand your ground” law that has been a lightning rod for accusations of racism in the justice system. Instead, he talked about how he “understood,” and apparently agreed with, an interpretation of the events based on past African-American experiences with racism. This was irresponsible and wrong. It was as much an endorsement of irrationality, ignorance and bias as it would be to explain that current day racists see blacks through the prism, “those sets of experiences” in Obama’s words, of their region’s history of culturally acceptable slavery, and we have to respect their views as a result. The President has not, as would be a far more justifiable statement, explained that opponents of same-sex marriage are not bigots, but see the issue through the ” sets of experiences” of their religious upbringing. Serial rapists may also see women through the prism of their childhood abuse—those are rather damaging “sets of experiences”— at the hands of their mothers.

There are always powerful reasons why people have hatreds and biases, and reasons why hatreds and biases cripple their ability to interpret reality and act responsibly. We can all understand that, but it doesn’t justify distorting the facts. Blacks are not inferior to any other race, no matter what the “prism” says. Gay marriage poses no harm to society, and gays deserve the same rights as anyone else, and the Bible doesn’t change those facts. Rape victims are not responsible for the misogyny of rapists, no matter how their distorted thinking came to be.

And the acquittal of George Zimmerman was not evidence of rampant white racism, regardless of the African-American experience. The President had a duty to say that. He had a duty to say, “I understand, but you are wrong on the facts.” He did not. Instead, he encouraged and supported a distorted and biased narrative that is harming race relations and respect for the justice system, and far too many in the news media—which is to say, anyone in the media who is stooping to this—are trying to continue the process. For example, Abbe Smith, in the Washington Post this weekend, had an article on a topic I have discussed here more than once: the challenge of a defense attorney representing a guilty and heinous client. It was an excellent piece, but the Post headline writers and editors unconscionably and unethically decided to pander to the city’s  predominantly black population’s bias by publishing it under this:

“What motivates a lawyer to defend

a Tsarnaev, a Castro or a Zimmerman?” Continue reading →

Dear Juror B29: Shut Up.

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

Maddy

ABC News has decided to stir the pot by persuading one of the George Zimmerman jurors—one hopes the dimmest one, but who knows—to grab 15 minutes of fame on “Good Morning America!” Friday morning. Thus will America not only be wished a good day, it will also be simultaneously treated to the marvel and horror of the jury system. The horror: that ignorant fools like Juror B29 sit on juries, ever. The marvel: that such juries still bumble their way to the right decision as often as they do…and one did in the George Zimmerman trial.

The last is hardly a consolation for having to listen to Juror B29, who dares to show her face on national TV, presumably because she is Puerto Rican and not one of the inherently and presumably racist white jurors, and because she has set out to confirm the misguided convictions of those ignorant about the case but determined to be angry about it anyway. “You can’t put the man in jail even though in our hearts we felt he was guilty,” she says. “But we had to grab our hearts and put it aside and look at the evidence.”

Shut up.

  • Juries aren’t supposed to “feel” criminal defendants are guilty until the evidence shows they are guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
  • She has no idea what other jurors “felt in their hearts.”
  • Let go of your heart, B29, and spare us the self-glorification.

A nursing assistant and mother of eight children, the woman, calling herself “Maddy,” will be heard to say that she believes she owes Trayvon Martin’s parents an apology because she feels “like I let them down.”

Shut up.

  • A jury’s duty is not to the victim, or the victim’s parents. A jury’s duty is to the justice system.
  • The point of view of the parents of the victim in any crime is the most biased and irrelevant to a jury’s decision.
  • Stop sucking up, B29 What are you going to apologize for? Not sending a man to prison without evidence?

She says that the case shouldn’t have gone to trial and that it was ”a publicity stunt.”

Shut up.

  • It never should have gone to trial, but Zimmerman was guilty of murder and she wanted to convict him? That does not compute. B29 is hell bent on obliterating any credibility or respect a critic…or adherent…of the verdict could have had, in order to grab her moment in the spotlight.
  • Whatever the trial was, it was not a publicity stunt. But if Juror B29 really believed it was a publicity stunt, she should have been insisting on an acquittal from Day 1. But no…
  • ..because she says “I was the juror that was going to give them the hung jury.” You know, The dumb one. The one who felt a defendant brought to trial in a publicity stunt and a case that shouldn’t have gone to trial should be found guilty anyway.

She goes on to say, we are told, that

“It’s hard for me to sleep, it’s hard for me to eat because I feel I was forcefully included in Trayvon Martin’s death. And as I carry him on my back, I’m hurting as much Trayvon’s Martin’s mother because there’s no way that any mother should feel that pain.”

Oh, for the love of God, please shut up!

  • She was not “forcibly included in Trayvon Martin’s death,” whatever that is supposed to mean.
  • The more she talks, the more convinced rational people will be that juries should be entrusted to robots, computers, psychics, or maybe really smart household pets, because this is whiny, cowardly gibberish, and a disgrace.
  • Juror B29 is undermining the integrity of the verdict.

For a juror to do that is despicable, unless he or she is alleging jury tampering or other irregularities. It is every juror’s job to accept responsibility for a verdict, and not to try to game public opinion in an unpopular verdict by saying that she didn’t really believe in the final decision. Saying, as Juror B29 reportedly does (you can tell me about it, because I would rather gnaw my foot off than  give ABC a second of commercial viewing time for airing this offal), that Zimmerman “got away with murder”is ludicrous, and can only mean that 1) she doesn’t know what murder is, 2) she is pandering to the anti-Zimmerman fanatics, or 3) she didn’t vote according to the evidence as she saw it. If there wasn’t sufficient evidence to prove Zimmerman was a murderer, by definition  he didn’t “get away with murder,” because he didn’t commit murder under the law, and “murder” is a legal definition.

Despite the media jackals barking at their heels, responsible jurors should not speak about a case, the deliberations or the verdict. Irresponsible, blathering fool jurors like B29 shouldn’t either, and news shows shouldn’t seek to nauseate America and undermine the justice system by giving them a forum. Shame on ABC, which also, on its website, again called Zimmerman “a white Hispanic,” the term invented solely for the race-baiting to skirt the inconvenient fact of Zimmerman’s  multi-racial heritage. “Maddy,” however is just an uncolored Puerto Rican.

And the Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman Ethics Train Wreck keeps rolling on…

_______________________________

Sources: ABC News, Washington Post

Graphic: ABC News

Ethics Quote of the Week: Ann Althouse

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

racist-proud-plant

“It’s entirely fitting that her name should be forever linked to the motto “Racist and Proud,” because that isn’t a lie. It’s true. It is racist to press the racism template onto the Zimmerman story, and it is done with full intent to stimulate feelings of race-based anxiety in vulnerable minds. That is heartless and evil.”

–—-Law professor/blogger Ann Althouse on the recent Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman Ethics Train Wreck passenger, progressive environmental activist Michele Renee. Renee attended a George Zimmerman support rally in Texas and held a sign reading “We’re Racist & Proud!” to falsely tar the group as racist

Althouse also writes of Renee,

“It’s a harsh consequence to become — for all time, on the web — Renee “Racist and Proud” Vaughan. She’s apologized — sorry she got busted. You know how apologies are. But I doubt that she’d be sorry if her trick had worked and amplified the legend of the racism of Zimmerman and his defenders.”

Michele Renee has written two extravagant apologies, but Althouse is right: they are unbelievable. This is signature significance: no honest, fair, decent and ethical person sets out to brand others as racist with a false flag stunt, not one, not as a mistake, not ever, because ethical people don’t have horrible ideas like that, or if they do, they certainly don’t act on them. Am I unfair to guess that her MSNBC-cheering colleagues and friends are giving her high fives and telling her “nice try”? I don’t think so. Althouse is correct: Renee’s actions smack of evil, and she arises out of an increasingly hateful and divisive culture on the left that seeks to demonize innocent people for the crime of not seeing the world their way.

Having said that, I find the whole idea of pro-Zimmerman rallies disturbing, offensive, and misguided. Rally for the jury system; rally against race-baiting; rally against the calculated and cynical racial politics of Obama and Holder. But Zimmerman, though he does not deserve to be a hunted man and the face of racial profiling, also doesn’t deserve any rallies. His reckless conduct got a young man killed. What is there to  support?

________________________________

Sources: Althouse, Gateway Pundit (and Graphic)

Ethics Hero: The ACLU Jumps Off The Train Wreck…

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments
And not a moment too soon...

And not a moment too soon…

It appeared that the American Civil Liberty Union would continue its descent from its original role of non-partisan Bill of Rights watchdog and defender to its evolving position as a liberal/progressive advocacy group when it called for Eric Holder’s Justice Department to pursue a civil rights prosecution against George Zimmerman. In a post on the group’s website following the verdict, ACLU executive director Anthony Romero wrote…

Today, our thoughts are with Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton, whose young son was taken from them far too soon. Last night’s verdict casts serious doubt on whether the legal system truly provides equal protection of the laws to everyone regardless of race or ethnicity.This case reminds us that it is imperative that the Department of Justice thoroughly examine whether the Martin shooting was a federal civil rights violation or hate crime. We call on Attorney General Eric Holder to release strengthened guidance on the use of race in federal law enforcement. We also urge Congress to pass the End Racial Profiling Act. These specific actions would go a long way to ameliorate the widespread problem of racial profiling. We need solutions not only in Trayvon Martin’s case, but also systemic reform. Continue reading →