thoughts??

This is going to be a strange post for me. im generally not a political type of person (mostly because i can see both sides to every thing- and i dont believe everyone SHOULD believe the same thing, so i would hate to persuade someone to believe in something they dont want to.) but there has been a major trial going on you might have heard about- where a teenage boy was shot.- before i give you my two cents here is some background information.

I do not believe in  "stranger danger" (i can hear my mom having a heart attack as she reads this right now) but honestly "stranger danger" ALMOST doesnt exist. statistically the most likely person to kill me would be my husband (or my other boyfriend that my husband doesnt know about...only kidding) if i were a child, the most likely person to kidnap me would be my parents or other family members.  If i were raped the perpetrator would most likely be a family member, friend, or acquaintance.  chances of me walking down the street and getting attacked (other than like robbed, but i probably wouldnt be hurt out of the situation) is like ridiculously low.  because MOST of the time strangers are just people we dont know yet, and our friends and family are the ones who want us dead/raped/abused.

that being said- there is NOTHING im more terrified by than stranger danger.  and this terror comes from someone who KNOWS it is very very unlikely to happen. I am so afraid of it, i nearly punched my husband in the face when i thought he was an "intruder".  I wouldnt open my window to talk to someone who offered to help me when my car broke down on the side of the road (talk about rude. i locked my doors and talked through the window when he asked me to pop my hood!). i even slept a few years with a small knife under my mattress "just in case".
I believe this "stranger danger" fear is not necessarily a trait of my generation, but it is something that i dont believe other generations had engraved in them the way people under say 25 have.  i grew up with multiple high profile kidnappings on tv (not the kind where black kids get kidnapped, or the thousands of kidnappings we dont hear about on the news) but im talking about the pretty white girls with blond hair that "disappear".  so it is no wonder our parents/caretakers/teachers started obsessing over "dont get in the car with strangers" "if someone is following you, run, scream for help, or fight back" "dont talk to strangers" (seriously at 23 i get pee-my-pants nervous when someone stops their car, to ask for directions. i do a quick "please dont kidnap me, please dont kidnap me...")

ok so assuming Trayvon Martin and i are in the same "generation" (although he is 7 years younger than i am) and assuming he grew up with parents who cared for him, and wanted him to be safe, and were concerned for his well being (which i believe we can assume that based on the fact that his parents have fought so hard for this case, and even though they are not together, i dont think, they have provided a united front, which to me makes me believe they worked together to co-parent) and assuming that since we have these things in common he is also afraid of "Stranger danger"

so i put myself in his possition (from the side of the story that his friend who was talking to him on the phone)
im walking home, im 16 (sophomore in high school) its dark and its raining and im cutting through yards probably because its cold and its raining and its dark. and im DEFINITELY on the phone.  or bare minimum im pretending to be on the phone, because i do that when im walking alone at night (it makes me feel safer).  now i notice that some ADULT is following me, and i pick  up my pace, thinking maybe im just being crazy. and then i run into this ADULT again, and when i do i ask him why he is following me. and (according to Zimmerman) he lifts his jacket and his gun shows, and i now see this weird man who has been following me, has a GUN on him. you better bet your ass, if i had the balls i would reach for that gun as fast as i could (only i would freak out, probably pee my pants, start crying, and freeze).
now i know im leaving a lot out of that. but the fact is this is a teenage boy, he is a BOY.
and ADULT can not go out looking for trouble, and then take the law into his own hands.

think about it this way, these parents, will never see their son go to prom, graduate high school, go to college, get married, have babies NOTHING.  i remember when my brother was like 17 or 18 and he got in a fight and got a cut on his head and my mom was PISSED (sorry to call you out on that ma) because he had stitches on his head for prom (im sure it was more anger that he got in the fight, but i do remember an argument about how he was going to have this big cut on his head).  he still got to go to prom and she was mad, imagine if that particular fight caused my brother to die.  even if it was an accident, should the other person just walk away?? if you have a pool and a kid wonders into it and dies YOU get in trouble, you have a dog that bites a mail man YOU get in trouble, you provide life saving surgery but leave a small gauze pad inside of the person YOU get in trouble (i know these are different court systems and such) but you follow after a child and then start to loose the fight that you (probably) initiated and shoot him, you can walk away?? i dont get it.

trayvon is someone, we as a society, have decided is not old enough to have the same rights as everyone else.  He is too young to vote, too young to buy a pack of cigarettes, too young to buy a snuggy off an "as seen on tv" commercial. Too young to stay out past a certain time, too young to buy a gun for his own self defence, too young to go to a.doctors appointment with out his parents. He still has like 8 years until his brain, according to modern science,.says it is fully developed. Adolescents has even been coined "second infancy' because of the massive changes in development, additional sleep requirements and mood changes.

If he was your child, how would you feel?
We shouldn't have to worry about children going to the store to get ice tea and candy and getting stalked, and then shot in the chest on their way home

i know im skipping over a lot of facts here, and i realize he will probably not get in trouble because of that whole "reasonable doubt" - and even with out bringing race into this situation (because no one wants to admit they are prejudice, even though EVERY single person, even infants, are prejudice)  what if Trayvon was a female?? while talking to my dad last night he even said "there's a difference between daughters and sons" but why, there is no evidence that Trayvon was any stronger that i was at that age. sure more woman REPORT sexual attacks, its VERY likely that the number of attacks are actually very close to the same regardless of gender, just boys are less likely to report it.

thats just my two cents. you dont have to agree. and honestly i dont know what i would LIKE the outcome of this case to be.  honestly i just wish this zimmerman guy had just stayed home that night, and left this police work, to people who have been trained and employed to be a police.  sure we should look out for our neighbors but NO ONE else felt they needed to leave their house to help the cops out (when the fight was going on even) because police work should be left for POLICE.