Zimmerman Lynch Mob

--this cartoon shows the 
 typical facile liberal perception

Ahm seventeen. Almost a man.
He strode, feeling his long loose-jointed limbs 
--Almos' A Man, Richard Wright

I am looking for a human 
--Diogenes of Sinope

How could they see anything but the shadows
if they were never allowed to move their heads? 
--Allegory of the Cave, Plato
_________________

I opened my news on a muggy North Florida Sunday to read the verdict of the Zimmerman trial: "Not guilty". I have faith in the jury system, and believe jurors -- my peers -- largely get it right, when provided the relevant data.

The form in which the news came to me was via a liberal news service which ran the Yahoo news article by Liz Goodwin. The lede begins,

"Zimmerman, 29, was charged with second-degree murder in the death of Martin, a 17 year old black boy ..."

"Black boy" -- evocative, no? My passing acquaintance with UPI and AP press manuals would suggest, "young man / adolescent / juvenile / or teenager" as fair descriptors, but "boy"?  BOY? Not for a 17-year-old young man, and especially not a young black man. It seems so uncouth as to be risible. It is derogatory, emasculating and humiliating.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit decided in a judgement last year that the use of the term "boy" towards a black man showed evidence of racial discrimination (Ash vs. Tyson Foods).  A retired judge commenting on the case was quoted in the New York Times as saying “It’s the same as calling him a nigger.”

Were Ms. Goodwin to describe a young black man thusly in our neck o' the woods, she would be liable to be jumped. Especially you, Liz-miss-white-person. No sir. Snoop Lion may say "boy" or "niggaz" ("fo shizzle my nizzle"), but certainly not you. Using a non-evocative, non-pejorative adjective is Journo 101, and it is sad when a national news service cannot get that right.

Our press is riddled through with bias at every slice. This should be the story of a trial and its findings, not an effort whip up some after-the-fact angst.

In addition to the offensive coverage, the comments from my fellow liberals following the story were atrocious, hideous, beginning with the suggestion that a black person now kill Z. The following is the comment I left:

"Why does the writer use the phrase, "17 year old black boy"? "Black boy" is the phraseology of the Jim Crow South; at 17, Martin was a teen. 

Oh, I get it, the liberals are just as disingenuous as the conservatives, and use anything in their arsenal, without regard to bias; in fact, intentionally with the intent of biasing. Disgusting, really. 

Some of the readers here call for the murder of Zimmerman by a black man ... most of you people here are nuts. Any hopes I had that this might be a truly liberal community are gone -- if this is liberalism in 2013 America, you can have it."

Ah, but a "boy" was killed, and we are gulled into believing that it was precisely because he was a "boy" (=young black man.) Don't give me that hokum. As Ranger says, when a 17-year-old young man earns the Medal of Honor dying in battle for his country, we do not call him a "boy". Trayvon falls short of that mark, but his age is commensurate; "young man", not "boy".

What passes for "news" and reportage today bores me. That people accept it is scary and disgusting.