by Steve Macias
In case you live under a rock, Zimmerman was charged with the shooting death of Florida Teen Trayvon Martin. Zimmerman pleaded not guilty, claiming he shot 17-year-old Martin in self-defense. The court case is a circus – the entire deck of race cards and their corresponding jokers have declared their opinion about the case, including President Obama.
Zimmerman stood in a courtroom today as a jury declared him not guilty of all charges. The ruling spawned the hashtag #IfIEverSeeZimmerman to trend almost immediately on the social networking site Twitter.
No matter what you happen to believe about the case, the tweets show how the American public views the case. I’ve picked five of the most revealing tweets:
5. #IfIEverSeeZimmerman ask him how much the NRA paid for his defense
— Keith M. (@ksecus) July 14, 2013
4. #IfIEverSeeZimmerman I’ll run in the opposite direction. He has the right to kill me and get away with it
— Andrea (@AndreaaLove_) July 14, 2013
3. #IfIEverSeeZimmerman I’ll just walk by and say a prayer for him. God knows the true story of what happened and will judge him accordingly.
— Made In His Image (@BlessedTeen) July 14, 2013
2. How cool would it be to live in a world where George Zimmerman offered Trayvon Martin a ride home to get him out of the rain that night?
— He Is P.Mαc (@PMacMusic) July 14, 2013
1. If Trayvon Martin had been a baby in the womb and Zimmerman an abortionist, would anyone who is complaining about this verdict care?
— Andrew Isker (@AndrewIsker) July 14, 2013
Prosecutors called Zimmerman a liar and portrayed him as a vigilante who had grown frustrated by break-ins in his neighborhood committed primarily by young black men. Zimmerman assumed Martin was up to no good and took the law into his own hands, prosecutors said. The case was heavily politicized. Those who feared the case would be used to attack self-defense and the right to own a gun held their ground in favor of Zimmerman. Others saw the case as an opportunity to demonstrate the existence of violence in and against black communities in modern America. In some cases, demonstrating that in this country it is almost worse to be racist than a murderer. If Trayvon wasn’t black, the case would never have made the news.
Those who are upset about the ruling feel this was unjust, so much that rumors and tweets about riots and violence have become an equally big news story. What are they to do when they feel slighted? How do they respond to what they perceive is injustice? A young man is dead – the jury’s acquittal of Zimmerman can not rob him of his victim’s humanity. The jury’s acquittal is not necessarily a declaration of wrongdoing on Trayvon’s behalf.
In any possible verdict, it still remains tragic that Trayvon is dead.
I hope the jury is correct. I can not say for sure that what they did is right. I surely hope it is, but we are still left with feelings that don’t belong in a criminal case.
This case transformed from a homicide trial into a divisive political circus. Quickly. Instead of questing for truth, people took sides and swallowed talking points. Justice in this one case became secondary to the vision of justice for society that each party following the case had in mind. I mostly ignored the headlines, but a few did catch my eye. One was about the political affiliation of the judge, another about the witnesses chosen to testify which asked — was justice or simply victory being sought?
I was just four years old when OJ Simpson was acquitted. High profile cases like his pushed their way out of the courtroom onto our television screens — “courtrooms” became primetime money makers for the entertainment industry with characters like Judge Judy. The justice system is now a content producer for entire television channels and weekly programming. Is this cultural obsession with courts healthy?
Strangely enough, the culture that obsesses over courtrooms is a most savage and brutal one. They kill millions of their own innocent children, wage endless wars in foreign countries, and steal and lie to their own countrymen in a pursuit for “liberty and justice for all.”
Fallen man cannot have justice for all. Complete justice is God’s alone and we can not hope to right every wrong in our world. What we have seen in my short lifetime is the duplicity of injustice because of our bureaucratic efforts to have justice for all. Vengeance is the Lord’s. A victim is reconciled on God’s terms — not the whims of a state legislator. God’s burden is light.
Man has attempted to escape God’s sovereign justice and to erase his standard for justice. In looking around we can see the language of justice constantly being used in the absence of real justice. Courts and legislatures invent crimes and punishments, apply them as they feel appropriate, and enforce them at their whim. They place their hope for true justice in the hands of fallen men, fallen governments, and degenerate institutions that trade justice for political gain, power, and profit.
Contrary to what the left says, prisons will not reform man. Contrary to what the right says, brute strength will not save man from his nature. Only the transformational power of Christ upon each individual will reform man — one by one and from the bottom up. RJ Rushdoony said that only “an order dedicated to the whole word of God and Christ’s regenerating power can give justice because it rests on a new man of God’s making.” Christ’s regeneration produces self-control.
The same invisible hand that rewards good ideas and innovation in the market, metes out justice in our culture. A marketplace is first a marketplace of ideas, which are always religious ideas that guide our wants, desires, choices, and morals. The invisible hand of the Holy Spirit doesn’t depend on the black robes of courtrooms to administer true justice. The Supreme Court of Roe V. Wade is supreme evidence of a partition of man’s justice against God’s.
Why are the people so angry? Why do they threaten with riots and revolution? People are upset about injustice. People long for true justice. Many look for this justice in the failed solution of a man-centered state, not understanding it can only be found in our reigning King Jesus.
Even the pagan poet Virgil longed for a hope greater than man’s ability — a hope from above to rescue us below.
“Jam nova progenies coelo demittitur alto-
Te duce, si qua manent sceleris vestigia nostri,
Irrita perpetua solvent formidine terras”
“A new race descends from the lofty sky;
and that should take away sin-
Thy influence shall efface every stain of corruption,
And free the world from alarm.”
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I wonder how many of these people were actually in the courtroom and saw all the evidence that was presented from start to finish? Until yesterday I did not even realize that NBC had altered 911 tapes and were being sued for it! The media has made yet another 3 ring circus and the American people are the gullible audience! This story has nothing to do with racism! Worse crimes occur every day in this country. It all depends upon who decides to report what and to whom.
“If Trayvon wasn’t black, the case would never have made the news.”
Neither would it have made the news had Zimmerman been black. White on Black crime is the only sort that matters apparently.
[…] controlling others. Self-control is the perfection of man — it can create a paradise of freedom. As Macias wrote, belief in Jesus Christ produces such a […]