Every time I hear anything about this story, I cringe. Why? I cringe because I have a son that just turned 17 and every time I see this kid's face, I see my son's face. Seventeen years old...seventeen. This young man in the whole scheme of things was still a baby. He didn't get a chance to go to the prom, graduate high school, go to college, join a frat, find a wife, have children, have a career, nothing. This young man's life was snuffed out because of what....Racism? Until we really know the full story and find out the facts, this is all we have to go on. A white male, armed who makes a phone call to 911 while following young Trayvon Martin and making statements that just weren't kosher. It doesn't look good from beginning to end. What make matters even worse is that the police department is seemingly helping to make fact finding that much more difficult by what seems to be condoning the actions of this shooter by leading him with questions upon the first arrival of detectives for the investigation as well as not seemingly giving their best effort to try and get to the bottom of this tragic incident, instead passing this off to a higher authority to find the answers.
There will be a rally held in Sanford for Trayvon Martin "headlined" by Rev. Al Sharpton. I guess bringing "more" attention to this couldn't hurt anything but how much more attention can this get? This story of this incident is EVERYWHERE, WORLDWIDE! I don't know what Reverend Sharpton can do for this in addition to all that's going on but I guess any and all support is basically good support, no knock on Reverend Sharpton for sure, he's my Frat Brother and I respect his work. Honestly I feel that this horrific incident should stimulate something deeper and more relevant than the current talk of "here we go again". There's some underlying factors here that we as the African American community need to look at and explore which runs much deeper than just the current dialog. We have some ills in our own communities that has come to surface that I feel no one is actually addressing or looking at because right now everything its all about the family, facts and justice and it should be. But we are going to have to look further and deeper to really see and understand the nature of this incident and the mindset of the individual who has created this in order for us to be able to create change because change is what we need. My prayers go out to Trayvon's parents, family and friends for I can't imagine the pain and hurt that they're feeling with this huge loss. I also pray the the facts will come to light and that justice, one way or the other, will be served to the fullest. As the investigation for this incident progresses, we will open up further dialog about what could be the nature of the cause that created this, what underlying factors could have triggered this and what, if any, future actions can be taken to prevent this type of incident from happening again. Our children are our future, if we don't preserve the lives of our children what will happen to our future? Stay tuned.
