I am going through a lot of personal stuff, including a need for surgery again, an a car that doesn't work (hundreds of dollars in repair work needed, and the money isn't here now).  And there is a lot more stuff, with a narrow hope of getting stuff published in a magazine, and hoping that acts as a break.  Life gets reduced to doing game designs and trying to find an edge anywhere.

Well, I had seen what happened after the shooting of the congresswoman and how it turned into a political football to score points.  And now, there is the shooting of Trayvon Martin, which has a lot of issues associated with it, from stand your ground, to a rash of burglaries in a neighborhood, to it now being a rallying protest point of the moment, and more.  

What is seen in this?  Like with the shooting of the congreswoman, it would be a good time for people to stop and assess where things are, and maybe their values.  Is it that?  No it isn't.  What it is, is a place to position oneself and score points for one's cause.  A death is turned into a political tool.  Considering the issues I am looking at, I really don't want to think on this now, and engage with people at random.  People don't seem interested in finding common ground, just justify what they know is right.  I need to keep reminding myself of this to back away.  Life's too hard to end up trying to go this route.

As a parting shot, I swear there are people who would think a Hunger Games reality show, with real deaths would be an awesome thing to have, particularly with those you disagree with being the contestants.  

Yeah. When you're struggling in your personal life your perspectives on many things change.

richardhutnik, you are economically struggling too, right? Haven't had a job for years correct?
(from what I remember you have told us before)

I keep reading that as, "Why I should avoid political threats on the internet".

Anyway, I hope everything works out for you, dude.

For the Trayvon Martin case...

I'd say it sounds like a pretty shitty case for self defense, so the guy should be looking at charges however 90% of what i've read has seem to have been discounted at later dates.

Don't think there is really any room for "Self reflection".... yet.

Though people hate to do this... the smart thing to do would be to wait two months... wait for all the facts to be settled and THEN protest if nothing has been done.

People are taking this as an open and close racist white guy shoots black kid and racist cops let it go...

even though the guy who shot him is half Hispanic... and from pictures looks noticeably Hispanic.

Not saying that can't be an aspect, but it seems a lot more complicated then that, especially considering the guy's general background which apparently included tutoring black children.

If I was going to jump to any conclusion it would be that he was a crazy overzealous wanna be cop who probably grabbed the kid, got his face knocked in a bit then shot the kid. Which he should go to jail over, but really that's a whole different argument and national discourse if that's what happened.

Oh, and also I think it's incredibly stupid that anyone even brought up that Trayvon got suspended for pot... and Geraldo Rivera can go to hell.

That said... that this is a big issue, i'd say is more a good sign then a bad sign... honestly.

In most western countries even, I believe this kind of thing wouldn't get this kind of attention.

Really, there's no such thing as half-Hispanic. George Zimmerman's Germanic name aside, his mother is from Peru and so is likely either mestizo or fully Amerind, making him racially a mestizo himself,  and he's a Spanish speaker, therefore he's unquestionably Hispanic by any definition. Since the media doesn't know how to process such a thing, though, they have been almost as dogged in their efforts to push him as a "white guy" as they have been not to publish a single picture of Treyvon Martin that isn't half a decade old.

I don't know what happened, but the way the media has handled this thing fucking stinks.

Yeah, I know technically there is no thing as Half Hispanic, but you know what i mean... essentially that only his dad was white and well... the guy doesn't even look white... and I mean, i'm someone that has a hard time telling hispanic people from white people... and indian and arab people too.  Honestly I just suck a figuring out peoples race by there features.

Is Zimmerman German, that'd make more sense anyway.  Always thought it was Jewish, which would make it even wierder, because he'd be part arab too.

The media handling of it has been pretty awful, but I think the storm would of happened even if the media would of covered it better.

Once peopel catcha  hint of a hotbutton issue they lose all restatraint and patience, even if the jury is still out on a lot of things.

Its aggravating because its media sensationalism mixed with pandering to race issues.

Yes, killing a black child through very questionable means is horrible, but its no different than if a cop killed a white kid, an Asian kid, or any other kid. We should be outraged not at the race, but simply the stupidity of the officer.

But instead, you have all the "Civil rights" people jumping into this tempest in a teapot. Bad things happen all the time, yet why is it only now anyone cares?

Yeah, Zimmerman(n) is a generically German name, but lots of Jews have German surnames owing to an Austro-Hungarian law that required Jews to adopt a German name since most Jews traditionally didn't even have family names. So George Zimmerman may in fact be Jewish, I dunno. Germans are the largest ethnic group in the U.S., though.

40 something shootings on the south side of Chicago during St. Patrick's weekend alone.

One kid is shot by someone who may be sort of white, kind of. Almost.