Trayvon Martin: National Outrage & The Struggle for Justice
The national wave of outrage and protest across the country following Trayvon Martin’s murder represents an important step forward in the struggle for justice in America. At the same time, the fact that local authorities could defend and fail to prosecute this cowardly act, shows how close we are to a full-blown police state in this country. First in the line of fire are youth of color, the poor, the undocumented and all those who resist the status quo.
What does Trayvon’s cowardly assassination by a neighborhood watch captain in an upscale, gated community have in common with the police shooting of Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen during Occupy Oakland, the murders of hundreds of our youth every year across the country, the beatings and murders of homeless people, and the thousands of deaths every year from the destruction of the social safety net? They are acts that terrify the population – create a culture of fear – that – backed by the police and courts – perpetuates the power, property and profits of the “1%.” They will stop at nothing. Trayvon’s death was not just about the racist vigilante who pulled the trigger: behind him stands a rotten system that can and must be replaced.
Everyone knows that Trayvon Martin was murdered – not only because he was a young black male wearing a hoodie while walking in a gated community – but because we live in a society where we fear one another rather than cherish one another. Our society focuses our energy on destroying our class allies rather fighting for human freedom – regardless the color it is wrapped in. The struggle for justice for Trayvon Martin’s murder represents the fight for the future of this country. We have an obligation to fight toward overthrowing this morally bankrupt and illegal corporate class and replacing it with a society that places the interests of the majority as the centerpiece for a just and humane society.
Those of us who understand what is at stake must insure that out of this unprecedented national outrage, we emerge with a united core of thousands of leading activists. The time has come to weld together the scattered fronts of the struggle for social, political and economic justice. The wave of outrage over Trayvon’s murder will inevitably subside, but out of it must come something lasting, something capable of unifying our scattered ranks. The Network for Revolutionary Change was formed to help this process. We urge you to join us.
For more information, visit: http://conferenceofrevolutionaries.com
Sheilah Garland-Olaniran from Florida and Luis J. Rodriguez from L.A.
“We have much to overcome if we are to take on the real culprits….”
By Sheilah Garland-Olaniran
Sanford, Florida March 25, 2012
As I walked toward Ft. Mellon Park across from Lake Monroe, to join with the tens of thousands from across the country who are outraged at the senseless murder of Trayvon Martin, in this sleepy, economically depressed little town of Sanford, I was overwhelmed with the flow of humanity, predominantly African American, gathering once again to demand some form of justice for the murder of yet another child of the working class.
Those converging on the park, while primarily African American, were also white, Latino and a few others. Seeing these emissaries from other racial groups was gratifying but infuriating because their numbers were so small given the enormity of the situation. The composition of the crowd also brought to surface the racial divide that persists while at the same time shows the glaring need for representatives of the entire working class to organize and defend one another in a show of solidarity and strength against the pernicious legal maneuvers of a growing police state.
The murder of young Trayvon Martin reminds us of the work we have ahead of us to fight for a humane, peaceful and racially tolerant society where laws no longer exist that perpetuate fear and loathing for our fellow human being, such as the now infamous “stand your ground” laws that permit folks to use deadly force if they feel “threatened” by someone and are not engaged in illegal activity themselves. You see, I am not sure Zimmerman was not engaged in illegal activity himself…that he had not profiled this young man simply because he was young, African American, wearing a hoodie and walking in a “gated” community. And the most galling aspect is that the Sanford Police Department did very little to investigate Zimmerman’s deadly use of force under the “stand your ground” law, which they are required to do.
I was text-ing back and forth while at the rally, with a white nurse who works in the ER of the nearby unionized hospital in Sanford. I was disturbed that this very intelligent nurse cautioned me that there might be a problem at the rally and that the she too carries a weapon to defend herself against perceived threats against her person. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that as a white woman, she was perhaps the most insulated person in this country when it came to being the victim of crime or physically assaulted. That young black children like Trayvon, or black women such as myself were much more likely to be attacked, and yet we were the least protected when it comes to society, the courts, the law, or in need of protection in the minds of many people.
And that our vulnerability creates the vulnerability she feels. Our too often divided and divisive working class has much to overcome if we are to take on the real culprits…not one another, but a corporate state that is rapidly and legally setting the stage for a society where the working class fears their class allies and align themselves with the corporate ruling class because of our fears of one another and our belief that the lies perpetuated over the centuries have validity? We are feeling the grind of the economic depression and the consequences of the instability and insecurity the depression creates. The voices of genuine African American and White working class leaders are silenced in the cacophony of the corporate political maneuverings.
The antiquated preachi-fying at the rally served to assure that the demands for real democracy and equality are diverted into the well worn, circular path of “civil rights” and “racial liberation.” While civil rights and racial equality are absolutely important to fight for, we must be fully aware that we can no longer simply fight to “overthrow” racism. We must fight for a society that is run in the interest of the majority, and that majority is the working class comprised of white, African American, Asian, Latino, gay, straight, etc. We threw off the direct shackles of legalized racism in the 1960’s, the shackles of the direct oppression of women, and yet, we find that those victories while very much needed at that time must and can go further. We have to be about the business of truly liberating all humanity from the clutches of the billionaire corporations that rule us, all of us.
Trayvon Martin lost his life, not only because he was a young black male wearing a hoodie while walking in a gated community. He lost his life because we live in a society that cherishes corporate greed over human need. We live in a society where our natural class allies fear one another rather than cherish one another. We live in a society that would rather we focus on destroying our class allies rather than focus our anger, disgust, and hatred to fight for human freedom regardless the color it is wrapped in. We have an obligation to fight toward overthrowing this morally bankrupt and illegal corporate class and replacing it with a society that places the interests of the majority as the centerpiece for a just and humane society.
Sheilah Garland-Olaniran is a union organizer in Florida and a Convener of the Network for Revolutionary Change.
The call for justice in the murder of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida has rippled around the country and world. He's become a symbol of the wanton attacks against young black men--some of this systematically (in bad schools, jails, prisons, and unemployed) as well as singularly as in Sanford. The fact that public officials, including police Chief Bill Lee Jr., have resigned in the face of national outrage says how this case must be brought to justice in a swift and thorough manner. There are still efforts by public officials and some media to "mediate" what happened by indicating that the shooter, George Zimmerman, was "half Hispanic" (what does this have to do with his actions?), had the law on his side (the controversial, for these very reasons, "Stand Your Ground" law, supported by the National Rifle Association), and that Zimmerman was an alleged neighborhood watch volunteer (although he pursued Trayvon, and apparently instigated an altercation before he shot the young man). None of this justifies what happened. We must demand that Zimmerman be brought to trial and that all the facts be exposed so that young men like Trayvon do not have to fear for their lives due to their race or appearance.
--Luis J. Rodriguez, Convener, Network for Revolutionary Change, Los Angeles
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