Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Zimmerman had two big advantages over Trayvon
The Nevada Appeal ^ | July 27, 2013 | Professor Marilee Swirczek, Western Nevada College

Posted on 07/28/2013 12:47:05 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

The Zimmerman verdict sits like a stone in the guts of many Americans. We struggle to put our finger on what sickens us, but we know something feels really bad.

It wasn’t until I read Guy Farmer’s commentary (“Zimmerman trial marred by racial politics,” July 21) that I started to get it. Amid hundreds of words reviewing the facts of the case, which we all know by heart, Farmer reveals in 13 words what is wrong with the Zimmerman verdict: “Martin wasn’t an innocent young boy; he was a head taller than Zimmerman.”

In that profoundly disturbing sentence, Farmer demonstrates the deep, probably subconscious, generational and regional biases that fester in our complex American culture. In a sentence, Farmer absolves Zimmerman of the termination of a fellow human being’s existence and judges Martin guilty and culpable for his own death — because Martin was taller than Zimmerman.

That sentence makes me think about both Zimmerman and Martin in a new light.

Zimmerman, a 29-year-old man, possessed something — in addition to a gun — that the just-turned 17-year-old Martin did not possess — a fully developed prefrontal cortex.

In human beings, the maturation of the prefrontal cortex is not achieved until about 25 years of age. That gave Zimmerman an advantage over Martin in the areas of cognitive analysis, abstract thinking, problem solving, determining and evaluating consequences, calculating strategies in shifting or urgent circumstances, recognizing and controlling intense impulses and emotions, modulating behavior and considering complicated incoming information in fight-or-flight situations.

In other words, Zimmerman, almost twice Martin’s age, had a mature prefrontal cortex and a gun, while Martin had an immature prefrontal cortex still overruled by primitive limbic structures, a can of sweet tea, and Skittles.

Farmer sums up his analysis by quoting Reno attorney David Houston: “This was a case where [Zimmerman] forced a confrontation, but did what he had to do when he was attacked.”

Houston’s words reveal what makes our guts clench when we realize the sickening abdication of Zimmerman’s personal and social responsibility as a grown man in a position of power. Using Houston’s logic, maybe Martin did what he had to do when he was confronted — or more accurately, maybe Martin did what his immature prefrontal cortex thought he should do.

So if Farmer is suggesting that 29-year-old Zimmerman was frightened for his life, I am suggesting that 17-year-old Martin was too. But Zimmerman possessed all the ammunition to prevent this tragedy.

We’ll never know exactly what happened that night. According to Farmer, Martin wasn’t followed and killed because he was black, but because he was tall and therefore not innocent. And therein lay the convoluted and absurd rationalizations being offered to justify the uninvited confrontation and subsequent killing of an unarmed, immature, and yes, innocent boy by an armed, mature man.

The gnawing in our gut confirms that something is wrong here: In the case of George Zimmerman, the law may be satisfied, but justice is not.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: academia; blackkk; brains; florida; georgezimmerman; physiology; trayvon; trayvonmartin; zimmerman
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-80 ... 101-105 next last
To: 2ndDivisionVet

“...Zimmerman, almost twice Martin’s age...”

Professor, 28* is not ‘almost twice’ 17. In fact, it’s barely past the age of ‘maturation of the prefrontal cortex’ which, one supposes, the professor is still awaiting.

How did this one get thru grammar school, much less become “Professor?”

*Zimmerman’s age at the time of the shooting


41 posted on 07/28/2013 1:08:45 PM PDT by EDINVA
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

Is someone broke Professor Marilee Swirczek nose, then proceeded to knock her down and bash her head against concrete, she might be ‘afraid’ too... Even if the guy beating her brains out was one foot taller or 5 inches shorter... this woman’s a fool.


42 posted on 07/28/2013 1:09:08 PM PDT by GOPJ (Democrat dream: An America for everyone but Americans... freeper molson209)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Ditter

According to Zimmerman, Martin saw his gun, and they wrestled over it until Zimmerman managed to shoot him.


43 posted on 07/28/2013 1:11:11 PM PDT by Future Snake Eater (CrossFit.com)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 23 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

[that the just-turned 17-year-old Martin did not possess — a fully developed prefrontal cortex. ]

Neither does the author.


44 posted on 07/28/2013 1:11:17 PM PDT by UCANSEE2 (The monsters are due on Maple Street)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

Contact the author:

Marilee.Swirczek@wnc.edu


45 posted on 07/28/2013 1:11:19 PM PDT by Fantasywriter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

[That sentence makes me think about both Zimmerman and Martin in a new light. ]

Yeah, well everyone knows that stuff looks really different under a black light.


46 posted on 07/28/2013 1:12:40 PM PDT by UCANSEE2 (The monsters are due on Maple Street)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: EDINVA

47 posted on 07/28/2013 1:13:47 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet (You can't invade the mainland US There'd be a rifle behind each blade of grass.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 41 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

There is no logic in any of the arguments this supposed writer puts forth. This young punk started a fight, trying to kill George Zimmerman and Zimmerman ended it to save his own life. The verdict sits quite well with me. If someone is trying to seriously injure or kill you, you have the right to defend yourself. Up to and including killing the other person. How hard is that for these mentally deficient morons to understand?


48 posted on 07/28/2013 1:14:21 PM PDT by bigredkitty1 (March 5,2010. Rest in peace, sweet boy. I will miss you, Big Red.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

Hmmm...I guess my 14 year old, 6’0” 220 lb. high school freshman defensive lineman son doesn’t have a fully developed prefrontal cortex either. Wonder why he isn’t out on the streets, going full MMA on everyone he perceives to be threat?

Probably because he does have something that will get him by until he develops a prefrontal cortex...the wrath of two very involved parents who would “tear him a new one” if he so much as spoke to an elder in a disrespectful tone, much less laid a hand on anybody except in self defense.

Maybe THAT’S what Trayvon needed until he got cortexed up...


49 posted on 07/28/2013 1:14:26 PM PDT by FLAMING DEATH (I'm not racist - I hate Biden too!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet; freebilly
Evidence and facts be damned....

"It's not the facts of the case, it's the seriousness of the charge..."

GZ was SUPPOSED to be guilty so that gun control could be legislated from the bench.

With the acquittal, they have to rely on whipping the masses into a frenzy, to include black-on-white attacks to scare people into demanding action.

50 posted on 07/28/2013 1:14:29 PM PDT by Old Sarge (My "KMA List" is growing daily...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Dilbert San Diego

He should have used the Miracle Zip Dematerializer he, the KKK, and the local Nazi cell invented for just such emergencies.


51 posted on 07/28/2013 1:15:22 PM PDT by libstripper (A)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: Future Snake Eater
Let's just say Martin saw the gun but not soon enough for his under sized brain to comprehend what he had gotten himself into.
52 posted on 07/28/2013 1:17:02 PM PDT by Ditter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 43 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

When I was reading this pile of tripe, I said to myself only a liberal professor could write this much nonsense and sound articulate.

I then went back to the top and discovered I was right.


53 posted on 07/28/2013 1:17:20 PM PDT by Fzob (In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock. Jefferson)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet
According to Farmer, Martin wasn’t followed and killed because he was black, but because he was tall and therefore not innocent.

This is the point at which the professorette's mind jumped the tracks, like that speeding train in Spain.

54 posted on 07/28/2013 1:17:52 PM PDT by shhrubbery! (NIH!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

The want to keep this subject in the forefront, even if they have to begin babbling and just mention the names. I guess racism is becoming difficult to stir up.


55 posted on 07/28/2013 1:18:32 PM PDT by BerryDingle (I know how to deal with communists, I still wear their scars on my back from Hollywood-Ronald Reagan)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet
where [Zimmerman] forced a confrontation

More fact aversion in the beatification of St. Skittles.

56 posted on 07/28/2013 1:18:39 PM PDT by tbpiper
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

“The Zimmerman verdict sits like a stone in the guts of many Americans.”

I know what she means. I felt the same way after I ate those gas station tacos.

“We struggle to put our finger on what sickens us, but we know something feels really bad.”

Perhaps our own need to inject racial elements into a case that had none? Nahhh, couldn’t be that! (rolls eyes)

“In that profoundly disturbing sentence, Farmer demonstrates the deep, probably subconscious, generational and regional biases that fester in our complex American culture.:

Uh-oh, my bullcrap-o-meter is pinging in the red zone. I haven’t seen anything like this since I sat in on that Wymyn Studies’ major’s thesis proposal.

“In a sentence, Farmer absolves Zimmerman of the termination of a fellow human being’s existence and judges Martin guilty and culpable for his own death — because Martin was taller than Zimmerman.”

No, Farmer points out that Martin was physically imposing and probably stronger/faster than Zimmerman. Unlike the 12 year old child portrayed in most of the pictures.
That sentence makes me think about both Zimmerman and Martin in a new light.

“Zimmerman, a 29-year-old man, possessed something — in addition to a gun — that the just-turned 17-year-old Martin did not possess — a fully developed prefrontal cortex.”

RED ALERT! RED ALERT! BS INBOUND! BS INBOUND!

Look, to say teenagers don’t always think things through like an adult is not rocket science. I didn’t at that age, either. I sure as HELL knew, though, that if I jumped a guy and started slamming his head into the pavement, there were going to be consequences. And if I attacked a guy and he’d shot me, I wouldn’t be happy about it, but the guy who shot me would have been in his legal rights to do so.


57 posted on 07/28/2013 1:19:02 PM PDT by DemforBush (Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet; All
It wasn’t until I read Guy Farmer’s commentary (“Zimmerman trial marred by racial politics,” July 21) that I started to get it.

Racial politics cloud views of Zimmerman trial

lahontan appeal
july 20, 2013

guy farmer

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3048349/posts

58 posted on 07/28/2013 1:19:30 PM PDT by SteveH (First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Here’s what I sent:

Dear Ms. Swirczek: Are you aware that Rachel Jeantel said that Trayvon hit Zimmerman first? Jeantel says Zimmerman was receiving a much deserved “ass whoopin’” for being a homosexual stalker. All would have ended well if Zimmerman had just allowed Trayvon to bash his head into the sidewalk until TM was satisfied the “ass whoopin’” was complete.

Though who knows when that would have been. Trayvon said in his own texts that it wasn’t enough for a person he was beating to bleed from the nose only. He wanted more blood than that.


59 posted on 07/28/2013 1:22:46 PM PDT by Fantasywriter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 45 | View Replies]

To: 2ndDivisionVet

The good professor is an idiot.


60 posted on 07/28/2013 1:23:48 PM PDT by driftdiver (I could eat it raw, but why do that when I have a fire.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-80 ... 101-105 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson