Casualties in the Trayvon Martin... George Zimmerman affair

Trayvon Martin wasn't the only victim that night in Florida.  There has been much collateral damage since.  Damage that has generated additional casualties.  A casualty by definition is not a dead person or thing.  It is something rendered injured or ineffective.

From Websters:

Definition of CASUALTY

1. archaic : chance, fortune casualty — Sir Walter Raleigh

          2 : serious or fatal accident : disaster

3

a : a military person lost through death, wounds, injury, sickness, internment, or capture or through being missing in action

b : a person or thing injured, lost, or destroyed : victim casualty of the last election

These are the casualties that are the result of the killing of Martin, arrest, prosecution and trial of Zimmerman and outcome:

News Media who portrayed Martin as an 11 year old boy when he was a 17 year old late teen.  Truth was a casualty.

Race Relations that have been on the fence too long, took a spill into the dark side.  Those who make a living at stirring hate emerged.  Race Driven Lynch mobs in social media have been disgusting.  "Kill Zimmerman" and "Trayvon deserved it" are memes that has driven a wedge.  Progress that had been made was a casualty.

The young girl, Trayvon's friend who testified.  You couldn't help but grasp how lost this poor girl is.  She will live her life (however long that is) in the shadow of this case.  CNN news commentators argued after her time on the stand that black English as spoken, read (not) and written (not) by her is a valid use of the English language.  Culture is a casualty.

The rumors, misinformation and disinformation about the evidence in this trial and the guilt or innocence demonstrated by same was hashed and rehashed by amateur lawyer wannabes who do not grasp the principles of legal procedures.  On TV I saw one man begin to rail about what HE would ask if HE were the prosecutor.   Ignorance of the process is the results in bad judgement.  Sound Judgement is a casualty.

People's certainty of guilt or innocence or Zimmerman or Martin's culpability in all this has demonstrated how we much we lack objectivity.  Our constitutional rights demand objectivity in these things.  Presumed innocent until?  It seemingly has become impossible to look at a situation, remove the emotion, and tell ourselves the truth about an event.  A couple of weeks after the whole thing blew up in the media and people were buying Hoodies to wear in protest, I warned of what is about to happen, how this would turn out as the facts were developed.  I was right because I had no dog in the fight.  I was objective.  Most were not.  Objectivity is a casualty.

When our President chose to take sides in this as was NOT his right, he's supposed to be a leader, he must stay out of these things.  He chose the wrong side - again.  Having the office doesn't make you a leader, character does.  Leadership was a casualty.


There are other things... but in the end the real casualty is justice.  Our Justice system has been swayed by public opinion.  This should never have gone to trial.  This has shown how poorly things are run.  

There was a brilliant editorial on this.

From the end of the article:

It should be clear at this point that we are witnessing the collapse of a politically-motivated prosecution. Even if Zimmerman is acquitted, this case has already damaged the integrity of our judicial process. The Florida State's attorney's office demonstrated that they do not have the backbone to make unpopular decisions. Whatever else may come, the integrity of American institutions has eroded a little more.

Casualties