As of the writing of this article, Trayvon Martin’s killer, George Zimmerman, remains free and has not been charged with any crime. Zimmerman has absurdly claimed that he was acting in self-defense. The racist Sanford Police Department, citing Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law, has taken him at his word.
While much discussion has been devoted to the particulars of the “Stand Your Ground” law, few have indicted the U.S. justice system for its selective application of self-defense principles. Time and again, self-defense rights have been invoked to protect racist violence, while those same rights have been systematically denied to oppressed communities.
If Zimmerman gets away with murder—and we in the Party for Socialism and Liberation believe that if we fight with enough determination, he will not—it would not be the first time that a self-defense plea has been used to justify the murder of a Black man.
Racist lynching and ‘vigilantism’
By some estimates, nearly 3,500 Black people were lynched between 1882 and 1968. In nearly every case, the victims were accused of murder, attempted murder or rape; the mob considered themselves “defenders” of the white community. This justification was ratified at the highest levels of government. Over 200 anti-lynching bills came before Congress over this period, but because Black men were depicted as dangerous rapists and murderers, not a single one passed. When the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill was discussed in Congress in 1921, the House Minority Leader called it a “bill to encourage rape.”
On Dec. 22, 1984, Bernhard Goetz shot four young Black men with an unlicensed pistol while riding the subway in New York City. The brutal attack was prompted by two of the young men saying to Goetz, “Give me five dollars.” Three were shot in Goetz’s initial burst of fire, and the fourth was shot seconds later as Goetz said, “You seem to be all right, here’s another.”
The case ignited controversy similar to the murder of Trayvon Martin, with civil rights activists demanding justice for the four young men and a variety of right-wing forces lining up behind Goetz, who argued that he was acting in self-defense, and that he had a reasonable fear of the young men. In the end, Goetz was found not guilty on all charges except one related to his unregistered hand gun.
When the police murder Black and Latino youth, their first explanation is that they feared for their lives. In the case of Amadou Diallo, they said his wallet looked like a gun. With Sean Bell, they said he was trying to run over the police with his car. With unarmed Ramarley Graham, killed last month in the Bronx, the police are claiming he had a gun.
In each instance, we see that “self-defense” and the “fear” of one’s safety have been used to justify racist murder.
Self-defense of the oppressed
Of course, there is a long history of genuine self-defense by working people and especially oppressed sectors engaged in struggle. In the 1950s, the Monroe County NAACP, under the leadership of Robert Williams, organized the successful armed defense of the Black community from Ku Klux Klan terror. The Deacons for Defense protected mass demonstrations and helped inspire the Black Power movement.
Even leaders who supported non-violence as a strategy and philosophy understood the importance of armed self-defense. After his home was bombed in 1956, Martin Luther King Jr. applied for a license to carry a concealed gun. His advisor Glenn Smiley called King’s house “an arsenal.”
In these occasions of “self-defense,” the ruling establishment sings a different tune. In response to the Black Panther Party organizing armed patrols to defend the oppressed neighborhoods of Oakland from the police, the California legislature passed one of the first modern gun control laws. When right-wing militias or white middle-class homeowners possess guns, they are called defenders of the Second Amendment—the “right to bear arms.” When left-wing organizations or the oppressed exercise the same rights, they are portrayed as reckless and violent criminals.
While the problem of gun violence is not to be diminished, gun control laws operate under an extreme double standard and are aimed at depriving oppressed people of their right to self-defense. Black and Latino urban areas, encircled by hostile and well-armed police, are left either defenseless or (if armed) criminalized.
Revolution as an act of collective self-defense
George Zimmerman was not acting in self-defense when he murdered Trayvon Martin. He was an aggressor who shot him out of racist hate. If Martin did indeed fight Zimmerman, this must be defended as the legitimate act of self-defense.
We can take this a step further. Capitalism is a system that was built on racist ideology, and continues to scapegoat, super-exploit and demonize the most oppressed sectors of the working class. This leads directly to situations like the murder of Trayvon Martin, which is far from an isolated incident. As we fight to bring his killer to justice, we must ask the question, what can stop the trend of racist murder?
The Party for Socialism and Liberation believes in revolution to create a government run by poor and working people that can directly eliminate the material roots of racism, undo centuries of racist indoctrination and create a new police force that serves the interests of the people rather than the 1 percent. We are taught to fear revolution because of its violent implications; in fact, by eliminating a system that thrives on daily violence, it represents our ultimate act of self-defense.
