I'm going to let you all in on a little secret. Whenever anyone anywhere does anything stupid in this world, the first thing black Americans think is: Please don't be a black person. Lady tries to rob a convenience store naked from the waist down? "Don't be a black lady." Knock-out game? "Don't be black kids." Mayor caught smoking crack? "Don't be Marion Barry." (Fortunately that time was Toronto Mayor Bob Ford.) This thought came to my mind immediately upon learning that a kid had tried to hitch a ride to Hawaii in the wheelwell of a commuter jet, miraculously surviving the bitter cold and thin air of high altitude travel in an unpressurized container. This guy surely Googled how to sneak into a commuter jet's wheelwell but he didn't Google what would happen if you fly 20,000 feet in a non-pressurized compartment--where survival of the journey becomes more unlikely than possible. It turns out this kid originally came from Somalia, and though I do not know what desperation this young man was going through that made him think that this was a viable option, but it doesn't change that this was a dumbass move, and he barely avoided winning a Darwin Award.
When someone does something extremely dumbass, and the result of their stupidity is their own death--and they have failed to reproduce--they are to be nominated for the Darwin Awards. As dark as it might be to think about, really, it's for the best that some people don't have children. Outside forces did not cause their deaths--they'd brought it on themselves.
Also this week loon Bryon Smith was convicted of first degree murder in the deaths of two teens who had broken into his home. Like the George Zimmerman case, this defies traditional criminal charges: This is where the victim became the perpetrator, and the victim becomes wholly unsympathetic--and the one man left standing could control the narrative. The castle doctrine should've provided Smith with more authority to kill the intruders--a portion of self-defense erraticism that I actually support. However this guy was undone when he told the truth--he didn't attempt to whitewash what he'd done with conflicting accounts--unlike Zimmerman. Smith clearly tortured those kids--and clearly he should've either lied afterwards or claimed some mental ailment. (Plus they were white.) His inability to stage a cover-up has led to his arrest for the crime.
What is disturbing besides the kids' deaths was the way in which the mainstream media are covering it: Emphasizing how "innocent" and "popular" the white kids were--while burying the fact that they were breaking into homes when the shooting occured. Further they were shot multiple times wheras Trayvon Martin was shot once (Still, the same media that didn't question why Zimmerman had called the police when he didn't see the black kid commit a crime is now not questioning why the pretty white kids had broken into at least one home. The media bent over backwards to make a white girl look innocent while bending over backwards to make a black guy look guilty.) In all likelihood, they were trying to rob Smith's place, and their fun exploration into criminal behavior was interrupted a genuinely damaged individual with guns. What was a home invasion robbery was turned into a juvenile rite of passage because the criminals did not fit the profile and out of fear of appearing insensitive to the dead kids' families. Smith will pay for his crimes for the remainder of his life; but the media's coverage of this case has been inexcusable too.
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