Sunday, July 14, 2013

Zimmerman Transcripts. (Partial.)

29 comments:

  1. "Celebrating" that animal with a "funny" post is horrific.

    A young child will never get to go to college, have a family, be a man, because that animal murdered him in cold blood. The shame of all America is on display to the world.

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    1. I didn't think this was meant to be funny, and I sincerely doubt it's celebratory. There's nothing to celebrate and never could be, no matter how the trial turned out.

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    2. Monica, one man killed another man. It happens dozens of times each day in this country. People want to make this particular one out to be the Crime of the Century (at least this year's CotC) but, as sad as it is, it's just another murder. He's hardly an animal.

      Maybe I'm reading your comment wrong and you get this upset about all murders. In that case, I stand corrected.

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    3. Less an animal and more a predator.

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    4. Based on his High School performance, I don't think that he would have gone to college if he were still alive.

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  2. I feel a bit uncomfortable seeing and commenting on a student's transcript, even if I'm pretty sure it is now thoroughly public.

    That said, it looks like Zimmerman is not very good at some things he would very much like to be good at. That is, undoubtedly, at least a small part of the larger picture that led to Trayvon Martin's death. I'm not convinced that the verdict was incorrect, given current law (though I'm open to such arguments, as well as arguments about changing the law), but I just can't get over the fact that a young man went out for a walk and ended up dead, for no good reason that I can discern, and that the person who did several things to precipitate and escalate that situation hasn't been held responsible in any way. I'm finding myself especially concerned that our adversarial legal system makes it impossible for Zimmerman (and/or those in Zimmerman's support system) to admit that he made some really bad decisions that night, decisions that led to a totally unnecessary death. Even if the situation has been devastating for Zimmerman, too (and I'm somewhat willing to believe that, while never forgetting that devastated but still alive is a much better position to be in than dead), we don't seem to have a means to make that devastation into some sort of learning experience, for Zimmerman, and for the larger community and nation of which he and Martin were a part. Instead, I'm afraid Zimmerman will become a victim and/or hero in others' eyes, and that, of course, will only exacerbate the situation, and quite possibly lead to more deaths.

    Maybe this is a case where something like restorative justice would have worked better? I honestly don't know. All I know is the adversarial system we've got (in the courts, and also in the legislatures and the press) isn't actually making us safer, or helping us live well with each other.

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    1. P.S. Monica and I were writing at the same time, so my post is not meant to answer hers.

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    2. CC, I don't see how a transcript shows much of anything. He wasn't a great student. Nothing unusual about that. He's not psychotic so I doubt he ever felt that killing somebody would make up for a D in math. Thankfully, students with a 1.75 GPA don't typically become murderers. There would be a lot less people around if they did.

      One of the problems with trying to make sense of this episode is that we put more significance in what we know than the pieces of information that we don't know. in other words, we know that Zim took some actions but we don't know what TM did. Whether you think Zim was justified depends on what you suppose TM did but nobody really knows.

      Maybe after the civil trials are over, Zim can admit any mistakes he made. Until then, anything he says will be used against him in court.

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    3. I agree you can't tell much from a transcript. For whatever it's worth, I was looking more at the psych and criminal justice grades than the math one, since I believe Zimmerman did have some interest in going into law enforcement (I'm not sure math would matter, except as it affects overall GPA, or why he was taking what look like two math courses aimed at quite different audiences).

      And indeed, we (still) don't know what happened, and the prospect of civil trials is definitely part of the equation at this point. I know I'm dreaming when I think about a better way to resolve the situation, but it still strikes me that our adversarial system of justice is exacerbating the situation, and making it more likely that it will lead to additional similar tragedies. I hate that.

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  3. Who is Zimmerman? Is he some kind of famous person? I don't understand why we are talking about him here.

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    1. Oh, Bob Dylan! Of course. Bob's career has taken some strange turns but going back to college is definitely the most unexpected. I didn't hear that Dylan had shot somebody though. Reading the comments, I'm really confused. Sure wish I hadn't cancelled cable last month. Anyway, it sounds awful.

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  4. One thing about the case that may be relevant to this blog, and the perennial themes thereof (and perhaps also to the report card): Trayvon Martin strikes me as having been a pretty typical 17-year-old: a bit unformed, somewhat all over the place, understandably immature. Zimmerman, on the other hand, strikes me as a pretty immature 28/29-year old (this impression is probably heightened by his brother going on all the talk shows speaking for and about him today). Zimmerman's well into the age range where we're told the frontal lobe is supposed to be better developed, but I'm not sure we're seeing much evidence of that in his case. I don't know whether there's a way to force a person to grow up (and I'm aware that ultimate capacity for maturity varies from person to person), but I am convinced that Trayvon Martin would have been better off had he encountered a 28-year-old whose judgment better fit his chronological age (in other words, had he encountered a man, and not another boy-man).

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    1. I think you're right. It's interesting that Martin's immaturity is "proof" that he was a "thug" (at least in some quarters). He just struck me as a 17 year old boy.

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    1. Heh. While I'm disinclined to see any humor in the situation, that's not a bad pun (or whatever it is).

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  6. Is this relevant to College Misery? Sure (at least during the slow summer months), because we all teach potential Trayvons and Georges. Like Cassandra, I noticed Zimmerman's D in Juvenile Delinquency, since he styled himself a community watchman. I wonder what his instructor remembers about why Zimmerman did so poorly.

    Speculation: he entered the class with preconceptions and did not allow the textbook and lectures to change his mind. Speculation: he has a fantasy that he's good at law enforcement. Notice his use of the word "suspect" for Trayvon Martin when he gave his first statement to the police?

    I'm basing this on something I often see in my primates classes. Some students (mostly men, I've noticed) come in thinking that males are dominant in all primate species and bring food back to the little lady baboon or marmoset, presumably at home with her babies and pearls. They can accept that gorilla males have multiple female mates, but not that marmoset females have two male mates. They see film of various lemurs where the females lead the way to food or into battle, but they describe the hierarchy of a typical lemur species as male-dominated. Nothing I say or the book and films show will change their minds, and they are mystified why their exams are Ds and Fs. Zimmerman certainly seems as closed-minded as these students, but his transcript may not be relevant at all to his actions that night.

    In any case, the verdict makes me feel sick.

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    1. So either he improved, or his performance was inconsistent (which in my experience usually is a result of outside issues/lack of soft skills rather than lack of ability to do the work). And he did well in a class with an African-American professor (who was also ex-military) -- which could be significant, or not. Honestly, though I absolutely believe race played a role in this incident, I think it played a much more complex role than suggested by some of the overly simple, traditional black/white racial narratives some commentators are invoking. It's a 21st-century story which can't be analyzed in 20th-century terms.

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  7. Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.

    Then God said to Cain, "What have you done? You shall be a fugitive on the earth."

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  8. Or perhaps the initial post was a response to this article:

    http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/07/14/us-usa-florida-shooting-future-idUSBRE96D0DT20130714

    No words.

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  9. Is the Zimmerman / Martin story something any of us have talked about in class? I'd love to know how that has been going.

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  10. We actually did talk about it in my Comp class last year. It was more of a sideline to an essay on stereotypes and assumptions. The discussion was not contentious, but then, look at where I teach. We are all very definitely on the same page.

    You know, I am not sure I think Zimmerman's transcripts really mean anything. I dunno.

    I have to think that those mothers on that jury meant well, and tried to follow the system. The system we have (and it's a good one) says a person is innocent until proven guilty. The laws in FL are such that what the prosecution had to prove was that Zimmerman did not feel like he had to protect himself. That is the real problem, I think.

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  11. This story from Slate expresses a lot of the ideas I have about the trial and its aftermath.

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    1. I call your Slate piece and raise you the ever-brilliant Ta-Nahesi Coates at the Atlantic: http://m.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/07/trayvon-martin-and-the-irony-of-american-justice/277782/

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    2. @Ben: How do you get a link in your comment? Is it a MAC thing?

      @Slouching: LOVE this article and Ta-Nahesi Coates. Thanks for sharing it as I have not been online much----too depressed about the verdict to read more about it.

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    3. It's HTML: <a href="yourLinkURL">your text goes here</a>

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    4. Thanks, introvert.prof!!!

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  12. Interesting that we have Zimmerman's transcripts but Obama has never released his.

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  13. Zimmerman wants to be a lawyer now, despite being a CC dropout.

    He isn't good enough to shovel shit in Irkutsk.

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