WHAT KILLED TRAYVON MARTIN?

Excerpts from:
The Scariest thing about Trayvon Martin
by Alexandra Petri

Fear.

You could smell it all over the story of Trayvon Martin. Fear in the call that George Zimmerman, self-appointed neighborhood watchman, placed to the 911 dispatcher about a suspicious figure in his gated community “looking about".

Fear in the phone conversation Trayvon had at the same time with his girlfriend, saying that there was a man following him and that he’d put his hoodie on.

Fear in the agonized pleas recorded in a neighbor’s 911 call as the two struggled.

Fear of the nameless, faceless menace of the You-Shouldn’t-Be-Here. It’s the fear that makes you appoint yourself neighborhood watchman in the first place, to make sure nothing Out Of Place shows up. Fear that what you don’t know will hurt you. Fear, followed by rage.

Trayvon Martin was 17 and looked younger. He was carrying iced tea and Skittles. He was unarmed. George Zimmerman must have been terrifying — larger, older, carrying a weapon. Instead, Zimmerman was, by his own account, terrified. He pursued, shot and killed Trayvon.

Fortunately for the fearful, Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law has their interests at heart. To get away with murder, you need not prove that anyone intended you harm before you shot him. All you need prove is that you were very, very afraid. You need a real and reasonable fear that your life is in danger.

But so few fears are. We’re more frightened of public speaking than drowning, of spiders than driving. What the law says is that force is justified if someone “reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm.” In a word — fear. If my fear is big enough, it can outweigh your life.

This law terrifies me. I don’t suppose I can shoot it?

To Zimmerman, the figure in the hoodie was a nameless, faceless menace. But he wasn’t. His name was Trayvon Martin, “Slimm” or “Tray” to his friends.

He wanted to be an engineer, the stories report. He was taking flying lessons. He got A’s and B’s and was majoring, said his teacher, in cheerfulness. . . .

We don’t know what might have become of Trayvon. Every possibility ended with those frightened pleas and the gunshot. . . .

Nice people don’t have racism, these days. What they have is something else. Localized fear. Fear of the life outside the gates. You go here. We’ll go here. This is your street. This is my street. This is my school. This is your school. Stay where you don’t look Out Of Place to George Zimmerman, and you’ll be safe. . . .

“I was afraid of him,” you say. “I was entitled to shoot. You never know what might have happened if I hadn’t.”

If George Zimmerman hadn’t, there would be one more face in the hallways at Dr. Michael Krop High School. And after that, who knows.

Trayvon Martin wasn’t a saint or an allegory.

Neither was he a faceless menace. . . .

This is where the fear gets us, and it’s a horrible place.

The Justice Department is investigating the case, after weeks of cover-up and bungling and failure to press charges by local law enforcement. But the standards for prosecuting someone for hate crimes are some of the highest set by law. The standards for shooting someone? Fear is enough.

Link to complete article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/post/the-scariest-thing-about-trayvon-martin/2012/03/20/gIQAfKlLSS_blog.html