Your Vantage Point It occurs to me that there are many ways to interpret the tragedy of Trayvon Martin. Your opinion about the issue depends on many things, but, perhaps most importantly, the angle from which you view matters of race and inequality. W. E. B. DuBois one of the most astute observers of race in America during his time famously said that the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line. The echoes of DuBois’s poignant observation have followed us into the 21st century. I would adjust DuBois’s original focus on the color line—we must acknowledge the very real progress that has been made in the 110 years since his idea was first printed—and instead focus on colorblind racism. There are real and insidious inequities that exist between whites and people of color in today’s America. Most of the time these inequalities operate silently below the surface, like the powerful engine of a well-made car, while you sit in the cab and enjoy the ride. On those few occasions when the engine overheats, it becomes necessary to pop the hood. Then and only then do you get a glimpse of the entire complicated greasy, oily, smoky machinery—all of the twisting, grinding gadgets and pistons, the filthy residue between the gears, and the deadly emissions produced. All the things you take for granted, these ugly necessities, that make your daily ride so smooth. White hegemony is kind of like that engine. There was a time that only white people could ride in the car. Now black people can tag along. Still, too many people—black people, brown people, poor people—serve as fodder for the machine. Your vantage point—whether you are sitting in the car or fighting it out in the engine—creates two diverging viewpoints on race and, by extension, the event surrounding Trayvon Martin’s death. For one part of America (those behind the steering wheel) the crux of the matter rest at what happened between Zimmerman and the young teen as they fought that night of February 26, 2012 . It was a fight, a contest between mutual combatants, in which one fighter overpowered the other. In fear for his life, the loser pulled a gun, the Great Equalizer. The aggressor died. It was a classic example of the right of self-defense. That is what the law (part of the engine) says. That is what the jury decided. Thank God for the right to bear arms. On the other side of that interpretation of events, there are people for whom the spark of these tragic events took place the moment that George Zimmerman excited his vehicle to pursue a suspicious person that he described as a "f****** punk." He profiled Trayvon Martin. America sees nothing wrong with this; generally, we accept the idea that black men, black boys, are threatening. There is law on the books that says this is illegal. That, however, does nothing to make this incident, or any of the other countless incidents, that this has happened to black people any less painful. If you have not had the pleasure, it is difficult to understand what it is like to walk in America with black skin. The struggle is one of hypervisibility. Blacks, through no fault of our own, are always noticed. It is the societal calculus that measures our presence and either dismisses us, or but marks us as dangerous and threatening. In need of observation. Without the benefit of the doubt. Without the recognition of a common humanity. An individual’s entire life—their history, character, religious beliefs, aspirations, and educational and economic attainments—is flattened out into a cardboard shooting range target. There is no law against this. It is considered good common sense. It has, however, tragic consequences. These realities, these hard cold realities, are what still separate us today. You either understand these facts because you live them daily, or you have educated yourself so that you understand them and empathize, or you have the privilege of altogether ignoring these circumstances and the people they affect.
Posted on: Fri, 19 Jul 2013 04:37:59 +0000
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