An Unpopular Opinion Plus Neil Jordan's Byzantium and If Woody Allen Were a Dentist

[mallorys_camera]

Justifiable force is one of the cloudiest areas of the law, so I'm not at all surprised the Trayvon Martin case played out the way it did. If you're being beaten up, you will act to defend yourself by whatever means you have at hand. If those means include a concealed weapon that you have a permit for, you will use it in self-defense.

Make no mistake – Trayvon Martin had every right to cut across the gated community despite Zimmerman's objections to his presence. Zimmerman is one of those creepy police wannabes. Obviously, he had an agenda on that particular day.

Florida has something called the "Stand Your Ground" law by which the use of deadly force is not required to be the very last response to an attack. I would say this is a highly questionable policy in general and rather dangerous when codified as law, but in Florida, it is the law.

There were plenty of inconsistencies in Zimmerman's story. It seems obvious to me that he was stalking Martin despite his statements to the contrary. What's critical, though, are the facts of the actual physical struggle between the man and the boy. Forensic evidence strongly suggests the boy was the aggressor.

The profiling, of course, is something that occurred on both sides. Martin tells his girlfriend he's being watched by a "creepy ass cracker." Zimmerman is heard to mutter, "Fucking punks," on the phone to the emergency police dispatcher. What's interesting to me here – at least on the basis of these two epithets – is that Zimmerman's hyper vigilance seemed predicated on Martin's age while Martin's is a racial slur.

Of course, I'm the mother of a kid who frequently got stoned on marijuana all throughout high school and wandered around in places his sorry ass had no good reason for being. This being the case, my emotional sympathies here are squarely in the Trayvon Martin camp. But I think the verdict was the correct one given the facts of the case and the peculiarities of Florida law. I don't see how any jury could have found differently, and I wish there had been more diversity on the actual jury to lend the verdict some authority.

Zimmerman does not get off scot-free. He's essentially a pariah now, and a trophy. I'd say his chances for making 2015 New Year's Resolutions are not very high; the temptation to being known in the black community as the man who got justice for Trayvon Martin is just too high.

I was driving with Phyllis a few months back through a community on the tony North Shore. We got lost.

"Why don't you just pull into one of those driveways and turn around?" I suggested.

"Oh no, honey," Phyllis said. "They be looking out those big picture windows and as soon as they see who's driving the car, we'll have a police escort."

Oh. Right. Duh.

The big gap, that. No matter how tight our friendship, I'm just never gonna fully get her reality.

###

In other news, Lucius highly recommended Neil Jordan's Byzantium so I trekked out to Hipster Ground Zero a/k/a Williamsburg yesterday, which was the only place in greater metropolitan NYC where it was playing, to see it. It did not disappoint.

I love Neil Jordan passionately; even his bad movies like his earlier foray in bloodsucking like Interview With the Vampire starring an incredibly overwrought and miscast Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt who even way back then many years pre-Angelina was obviously jonesing for a dominatrix to pee on him. I love that Jordan makes movies about magic, even when they're not overtly about magic. The Tiresias gender-shifting overtones of The Crying Game and the pudgy Orpheus stalking a whorish Eurydice through the Hades that was swinging London in Mona Lisa are no less mythological for being subtle. My very favorite Jordan movie is The Butcher Boy, which is just so fucking weird that it defies my attempts to analyze it.

Byzantium is a much better vampire movie than Interview. In fact, as far as vampyric universes go, I would put it right up there with Buffy. For one thing, it has an entirely different creation myth: Vampires don't create each other; they can only be created in a tiny cave on a remote piece of rock floating in a grey sea. This is a sanctuary to the Old Gods whose creatures vampires are. For another, it gives a nod to the economic realities of the vampire life. They need money – who doesn't? The vampire duet in this movie is a mother/daughter team. The mother works as a BDSM hooker; the daughter goes to high school, and agonizes a lot over the fact that at 200 years old, she's the oldest sophomore in her class.

Yes, yes, the special effects – waterfalls turning to blood – are certainly amateurish. I could do better special effects with my own little antiquated Photoshop program. And the film is singularly humorless in places where it could have benefitted from a little humor. Since I know Jordan has a rather sly sense of humor as evidenced multiple times in earlier films, I can only imagine that humor was surgically removed from this piece in order to make it conform more closely to the Hammer horror code.

###

Afterwards I wandered around Williamsburg for a bit spying on hipsters, and then proceeded to endure the trip back to Lawn Guyland that was much, much longer than it had to be due to various rerouting of subway lines on ground buses because of Hurricane Sandy track work and an N22 bus that was an hour late. I didn't really mind. I do this trip so seldom that everything I see is all part of the parade, part of the experience. If there was any place I particularly had to be, though, I would have been pissed.

At the bus stop I fell into conversation with a Woody Allen-type guy who saw I was scribbling notes about Poughkeepsie.

"Why are you writing about Poughkeepsie?" he wanted to know.

"Well, I'm trying to figure out what went wrong," I said. "When it stopped being this enchanting little village on the banks of the Hudson and turned into a horror show."

"Well, it lost its manufacturing base," he said.

"Yes, but that would have happened in the 1940s," I said. "The urban blight I'm talking about looks more recent. I expect it happened because Poughkeepsie is just a hop, skip and a jump off Highway 87, the great crack cocaine superhighway. That's what happens when the service economy – in this case prisons – replaces the manufacturing base."

We chatted for animatedly for 45 minutes or so. I don't know why I was so surprised when he slipped me his card as he was getting off the bus. He's a dentist. Lives in New Palz, right across the river from Poughkeepsie. Doesn't like to drive. Comes to Lawn Guyland every other weekend or so to play golf.

I might call him after I move. I might not.

Also RTT called and we chatted animatedly for close to half an hour. I guess my care package policy is paying off. He hadn't heard Max's news, was duly impressed.

"So guess what area of the law he's interested in?"

"I don't know –"

"Environmental law!"

"That's what I'm interested in!"

"I know!"

"We could go into practice together –"

And then your old Mama could die happy, I thought.

Comments

[chezsci.livejournal.com]

Way to sum up the Martin case, which I admit I have paid only scant attention to figuring it's Florida and well, the white guy's gonna go free. Especially since the prosecution's case wasn't rock solid and it was going to be easy enough for the defense to throw enough shade in the air to force a not guilty verdict. Add to that the fact that Zimmerman was a relatively clever creepy cracker and knew how to use Stand Your Ground to his lethal advantage, the outcome seemed foregone. I agree though - Zimmerman has as much chance dying of old age in his bed as a prison snitch does of getting through yard time without a shank in the liver.

I'd enjoy reading about your dating adventures with the Alvy Singer character you met in Poughkeepsie...free teeth cleaning - score!

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Zimmerman is a creepy guy. I never thought this was a racial case, though -- at least not a white vs. black racial case. Despite the Germanic last name, Zimmerman is pretty obviously Hispanic.

I suppose the census would designate him as "white Hispanic" -- but then, there are guidelines (notably affirmative action codes and antiquated Louisiana laws) that would designate me as black because I have a black great grandparent. In the colorful patois of those antiquated Louisiana codes, I am an octaroon!

Okay, just for you and of course in the interests of Better Oral Hygiene, I will call Alvy Singer. But he better not keep a collection of antique dental implements in his basement.

[robby.livejournal.com]

People shouldn't be arrested when a crime hasn't been committed. The lead detective testified that he has always found Zimmerman's account to be credible, and based on the evidence. Zimmerman was finally arrested after political, behind the scenes manipulation by the Justice Department. If Zimmerman hadn't had money for good lawyers this would have become a Kangaroo court, a political show trial, and a travesty of justice.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

People shouldn't be arrested when a crime hasn't been committed.

People are often arrested when crimes have not been committed. I believe it's up to the court system to determine whether the crime has been committed. I always figured that the job of the police was to see whether there evidence might exist that contradicts the statements of individuals involved in situations like this.

I think it's clear that Zimmerman's account of the case contained contradictory statements -- he was "stalking" Martin, and although I am not a lawyer, I suspect there may be jurisdictions in which that kind of behavior would be viewed as provocative enough to justify a heated response on Martin's part. I don't know though.

You're right that Zimmerman's lawyer did a great job. But I don't ssee Zimmerman as any kind of martyr in this process. He's not Bernie Goetz -- who, by the way, I do think got railroaded. But then Goetz was carrying a gun for which he had no permit.

[platofish.livejournal.com]

When the trial started I was taken aback by Zimmerman's weight gain...... A couple of days ago it dawned on me why he might have intentionally beefed up - its the perfect for disguising his identity post trial. If the world watches you for weeks as a 300lb man, then you loose 150lbs and grow a beard.....you can slip away to another State and start afresh without too much trouble.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

I don't think Zimmerman's smart enough to have gained the weight purposefully. I think he's been lookin' for LUV in deep-fried Twinkies.

[nokomisjeff.livejournal.com]

It seems all is well and running smoothly in your household. That is great. Your summation wasn't too bad either, I'm impressed.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Oh, thanks. My opinion seems to be equally unpopular among my liberal and conservative friends, so I figure I'm doing something right.

What was the Judge's take on the verdict?

[nodressrehersal.livejournal.com]

Sometimes what seems like the right thing from a moral or ethical standpoint isn't necessarily the right thing from a legal standpoint. I'm not sure what that means, but in this case, it seems to be the issue.

It's so nice to hear that your efforts are appreciated and that there's the potential for one last, satisfied smile at the end of it all.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was really pleased to get the phone call.

[alexkaufmann]

I watched the entire Zimmerman trial. Prosecution had a weak case to start with and never actually came out with a reasonable theory of the crime. This was a textbook case of reasonable doubt.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

I think the verdict was the correct one.

[flaxendandelion.livejournal.com]

Listen, I really appreciate you being one of the white folks who pretty much get it. And as much respect as the law needs to be given in the context of maintaining social order, the law was wrong, and the legal system was wrong, from the jury selection to the happy-go-lucky prosecution (happiest proseuction that lost a case EVER), to the police department that allowed a guy with a domestic violence rap sheet and who was expelled from a community college for 'posing danger' to be a rent-a-cop. The guy called 911 46 times for shit like garage doors being open to kids running around a pool FFS.

There are so many aspects to this case WITHIN the legal framework that were so suspect, that if this were a white boy who was killed, or if Zimmerman were a black man, the perpetrator would be serving a first degree murder sentence right now.

The defense said Martin pounded dude's head into the pavement 25 times. Did you see his injuries? The blood on his head and face was not the victim of a 25 concrete pounding. If it was, those 25 blows would have been so soft and very much in that kid's own self defense.

When Zimmerman was interviewed the first time he denied it was him crying for help on the audio: he sure changed his story.

Please do not put Martin's comment about Zimmerman being a creepy ass cracker on the level of Zimmerman's menacing chase of this kid. Martin's comment was borne of a lifetime suspicion that whites burdens blacks with, while Zimmerman's profiling was the assumption that because a black person was allegedly breaking into people's homes, it was this black kid who was the perpetrator, which he thinks justified his stalking of him. If the burglar was a white kid, you think he would've stalked any white kid in a hoodie with Skittles and fruit juice?

Let me ask you this: if Zimmerman had a right to shoot Martin under stand your ground, did Martin not have a right under stand your ground to kick the ass of the guy following him, asking him what he's doing in that leafy white neighborhood, refusing to answer why he's being followed? (Do I need to point out the prejudicial nature of that very question that Zimmerman asked as well?)

I love the fact Zimmerman assumed the burglar was not of that neighborhood as well. Just love it.

Why did the white Hispanic aggressor have the right to murder someone, but the black 17 year old not have the right to defend himself BEFORE the fact? When you defend yourself, you're going to shed some blood. Is it being suggested the only way Zimmerman could have been found guilty is if he came out of that fight in crystal clean shape? Seriously? That would imply one has no right to self-defense in this country, which kinda flies in the face of standing one's ground. Do you see how this whole charade is just one big circular clusterfuck designed to exonerate whites?

It is not just the legal system. It is also the unconscious fear that whites have of blacks, and the contorted loopholes and excuses they make when confronted with their bigotries.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

I don't know that I'm necessarily one of the "white folks who pretty much get it" but thanks for the thought.

I will say that race isn't something that's ever seemed like an important determinant to me except in a cultural sense. I've never understood concepts like "racial superiority" or "racial inferiority." I mean, I really don't get them not even intellectually.

Yeah, there were certainly inconsistencies in Zimmerman's story. You do raise interesting question heres: did Martin not have a right under stand your ground to kick the ass of the guy following him? Why did the white Hispanic aggressor have the right to murder someone, but the black 17 year old not have the right to defend himself BEFORE the fact?


I'm not a lawyer and I haven't read the pertinent Florida law. I suspect "proactive" self-defense would constitute aggravated assault or worst though. There's no way it can be "self defense" if you're initiating the physical contact. Again, haven't read the legal definition of "self defense" under Florida state law, but I imagine it hinges on physical contact.

As the mother of a teenage boy, I know how remarkably easy it is to bait teenagers and how once they're baited, most of them will stand up and act a certain way because it's tied into a certain behavioral code that's almost -- dare I say it -- chivalric. So I understand Martin's behavior from that perspective. I do have to be honest here and note that this behavior can appear very threatening to me, particularly when I don't know what I'm doing that's "baiting" them.

I would say this is a teenage behavior that has absolutely nothing to do with race.

But race is one of the factors that teenagers organize their social groups around, so in that sense it does have to do with race, if you get my distinction here.

I'm with Obama's white grandma: If I see a group of black teenagers on the sidewalk 200 feet ahead of me, I cross the street. FWIW, I'd do the same if I saw a group of white teenagers on the sidewalk 200 feet ahead of me. Not with Asians though.

Does this make me racist or just commonsensical? Honestly, I don't know. What pundits call "profiling," I'd call "intuition." The difference is that I'm not codifying my responses into institutional policy or law.

[millysdaughter.livejournal.com]

Iz confused

If I was lost, I would think of a police escort as a Good Thing.
I do not like getting lost.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Zimmerman was not a police officer. There's no indication that Martin was lost or that he did not have a perfect right to be where he was under the law.

[old-cutter-john.livejournal.com]

Sending my substantial agreement — and from New Paltz, of all places. I hope I don't need a dentist while I'm here. The world often works that way.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

OMG that would be so hilarious.

Funny, how the towns on one side of the Hudson are still so pretty while the towns on the other side of the Hudson are so blighted. Newburgh is actually the Murder Capital of New York State. It's gotta be access to Highway 87, right?

Enjoy yr climbing adventures and stay hydrated!!!! :-)

Justice

[(Anonymous)]

1. White folks are lucky that black folks don't dish out what would be justice for all the shit they take.

2. I represented lots of folks in court for years. No way if the races were reversed that shooter would not be UNDER THE JAIL pending trial. White folks would be going on and on about black racism and how white folks have right to walk around black neighborhoods.

3. When "crackers" end up filling the jails and get taken out for a lynching a few thousand times, I'll start regarding the word as a racial slur. Right now it's a description of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of white supremacy.

4. Zimmerman is just the ragged ugly edge of white supremacy, enforced in so many other oh-so-nice ways.

Re: Justice

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

White folks are lucky that black folks don't dish out what would be justice for all the shit they take.

Oh, please.. i just loathe this polarization bullshit. It's such a typically male response. Right! Every guilty white liberal male of a certain age has to talk the talk though. I've been listening to it since I went to my first protest march at U.C. Berkeley when I was 18 years old. Know what? I'm sick of it. It's not helpful.

What is helpful? Trying to relate to other human beings no matter what their color as human beings.

Of course Zimmerman would have been arrested immediately if he were black and the kid he'd shot had been white. I think I said as much somewhere above. But Zimmerman would never pass the membership requirements for the Aryan Brotherhood and to try to paint him as the face of white supremacy is just ignorant. And "cracker" is a racist slur, whether you choose to acknowledge it or not.

[cah1470.livejournal.com]

"The big gap, that. No matter how tight our friendship, I'm just never gonna fully get her reality." Really hit home because in my opinion it's why there is still such a gap in public response to these things. We are all coming from totally different experiences but the majority really can't wrap their heads around how the minority can go to the same school, live in the same town, eat at the same restaurant, and still have such a radically different experience. The jury decided based on the evidence and the laws of the state and I understand that but it still put real sadness in my heart when I heard the verdict. I can't even describe how much fear I have for my own son who is almost exactly the same height and weight as Trayvon and only a few months younger than he was when he was killed. But I had these fears before the trial. I saw comments like "where is the outrage when young black kids kill each other for no reason every day?" Trust me I have outrage and fear it just doesn't get media attention. My son has the same sort of odds of being killed in a gun fight as he does to graduate from high school. That is outrageous and I wish I had some power to change the odds instead of just being terrified for him.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

"The big gap, that. No matter how tight our friendship, I'm just never gonna fully get her reality."

Well, it is the truth, and it is a continuation of the discussion we started to have a week or so ago.

I'm going to be working with "at risk" -- politically correct euphemism for "black" -- teenagers at the beginning of August, and I have absolutely no clue of how to make anything I do or say relevant.

I will say that part of the problem as I see it is that these kids relate to an economic system that works like Lotto. Winner takes all! Loser... Well, I don't rightly know what the losers do. But that's part of the problem. In a sense, the "winners" of this kind of system have a huge monetary incentive to perpetuate it. The upside though is that urban black culture -- as epitomized by sports stars and musicians who become business moguls -- is the dominant street culture, at least in the parts where I live, which means it has a huge effect on cultural mores.

RTT, my kid, was always, "Niggah" this and "Niggah" that around the house. It used to infuriate me. First of all, the word sickens me -- I can barely bring myself to write it. Secondly... Duh. Robin! Have you looked in the mirror recently? Guess what? You're not black!!

[bel-ebat.livejournal.com]

My head and heart were split the same way on the case.

My dad is/was an environment lawyer (I'm not sure if retirement ends it), and he thinks it's one of the best areas for lawyers to start in today. He came to it pretty late in his career but claims that if he were starting over as a new lawyer, he would do environmental from the start.

I almost went to Lewis & Clark in Portland, which has the pride of being the nation's #1 environmental law school. But I decided that was not QUITE the school for me.

Thinking of environmental law as the big picture makes me feel pretty good about all the classmates I know who got jobs at oil & gas firms because of zee fracking, etc.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Environmental law is definitely the practice area to be in right now.

What are your plans? Are you still thinking Peace Corps?

[katestine.livejournal.com]

Funny enough, we were driving down 87 as I read this post.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Quelle coincidence! ;-)