Will Trayvon Martin Become Part of Federal Mythology?

The media must be chagrined that its attempt to malign George Zimmerman fell short of expectations. Not only did media’s biased reporting fail to produce the public reaction it hoped for, but in the long run it may have precipitated a much needed reappraisal of society and media. It may be wishful thinking on my part, but I sense an emerging realization that it is finally time to move from 1963 to 2013. Although grievance groups and journalists will strongly resist such a move, they no longer have the power to get the public to act against its own best interest. – And it is not in the public’s interest to allow racial politics to take precedence over legal considerations in court decisions.

Some journalists seem to feel that they have a higher calling than simply reporting the news. They believe they have been chosen to make society better and society can be made better if the public would only adopt the enlightened opinions favored by journalists. So news events are reported in the manner that will best promote the media’s concept of what is fair and just. This kind of reporting is not new but journalists used to be a little more judicious when expressing their opinions. They rarely offer balanced reporting today and do not even attempt to deny their lack of objectivity. It would be difficult to pick the most outrageous example of this manipulative journalism but the media’s counterfeit depiction of a pubescent and chaste Trayvon Martin could rank close to the top.

Surely members of the liberal media realized that Trayvon Martin’s past history would eventually emerge. The public now knows that media’s Pollyanna portrayal of Trayvon Martin was fiction designed to mold public opinion. Facts have emerged about his drug use, his three school suspensions, – one for having stolen jewelry and burglary tools; his truancy and his text messages about the acquisition of guns. We have seen photographs of him at his correct age rather than the “young boy” photos that the media foisted upon us. And we know that Trayvon’s incorrigible behavior caused his birth mother to kick him out, telling him to move instead into the house of his father’s latest girlfriend.

We also are informed that the demonstrations for Trayvon are not spontaneous grassroots events. They are being organized by Dream Defenders, which has connections to the SEIU union, ACORN, Occupy, and the Southern Poverty Law Center. Dream Defenders plans, funds, and prints the signs for these demonstrations. In an interview, one of its directors stated: “We are actually trying to change the capitalist system we have today, because it’s not working for any of us.” But even though Dream Defenders has carefully orchestrated false demonstrations, they are not attracting the following they expected. We have also learned that the Justice Department used our tax dollars to fund anti-Zimmerman protests. We wait, hopefully not in vain, for Congress to redress this action.

Today’s one sided media reporting brings to mind the reporting of 1960s civil rights activities. There was no let up in news coverage of troubled spots like Birmingham, Little Rock and Selma . In these hot spots a pivotal event was usually identified and the media has religiously revisited it on its anniversary date for the last 50 years. These compulsory annual media ceremonies have created an enduring civil rights mythology, which until fairly recently, has remained unquestioned.

On the other hand, the 1960s media was restrained in its reporting on cities that desegregated peacefully or with minimal disturbances. These cities – Charlotte, Knoxville, Orlando, Atlanta, Huntsville and others too numerous to list, vastly outnumbered cities that experienced protests or demonstrations accompanied with violence. But amicable desegregation was not newsworthy and certainly couldn’t justify the enacting of racial preferences. However, the most significant aspect of the civil rights movement is that hundreds of years of a segregated society were altered within a few decades, and most cities achieved this without serious disruption. Our nation responded to racial problems by radically changing our society but we must not let today’s racial complaints undermine the rule of law.