Happy 19th Birthday, Jordan Davis

Today would have been the 19th birthday of Jordan Davis.  

He wanted to become a Marine with his best friend after he graduated from high school.   He was a kid who dealt with the typical stuff you deal with growing up in your teen years.   He had a girlfriend who stayed on him to pull his pants up, Don Lemon.

He had both a mother and a father in his life.   He was into sports   He wanted to be successful and someday own a Dodge Challenger.   

But because of a November 2012 encounter with a white male who had a problem with the volume of the music he and his friends were listening to in the parking lot of a Jacksonville area convenience store, he will never get to accomplish that dream or any other dreams he might have had. 

Jordan is now dead, his friends are haunted by the memory of having 10 bullets fired at them by an angry white male, and yesterday they witnessed the justice system in Florida fail once again to recognize their humanity.

Once again white supremacy reinforced what Chief Justice Roger B. Taney said over 150 years ago in the Dred Scott v. Sandford Case.  

Oh you're not familiar with what Taney wrote?   Let me refresh your memory as to what the then Chief Justice of the US Supreme court said in his March 6, 1857 opinion in that case.

"...beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations, and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect."

Any doubts that John Roberts, the current US Supreme Court Chief Justice, the Teapublicans, the conservative movement or other people who share his gender and ethnic background don't harbor the same racist beliefs?  

We know from his jailhouse letters that Michael Dunn sure did and felt comfortable enough to express it.
In one of the letters addressed to his “baby,” Dunn wrote:

The fear is that we may get a predominately black jury and therefore, unlikely to get a favorable verdict. Sad, but that’s where this country is still at. The good news is that the surrounding counties are predominately white and Republican and supporters of gun rights.”

In a letter addressed to his grandmother, Dunn claimed that all Blacks in jail acted like thugs:

“The jail is full of blacks and they all act like thugs. This may sound a bit radical but if more people would arm themselves and kill these (expletive) idiots, when they’re threatening you, eventually they may take the hint and change their behavior.”

In other letters he spoke about the Duval County district attorney trying to deny him the right to a “speedy trial” and all the boys in the SUV with Davis being “thugs.”

Naw Michael Dunn, we know who the 'thug' was in this case.  Just look in the mirror.  You are the thug who has for now gotten away with the murder of a then 17 year old kid who will have no more birthdays because you felt threatened by Jordan Davis' existence in this world.
       
You are the thug who causes nightmares for every Black parent who lies awake at night fearful their son or daughter will be similarly killed by white males who 'feel threatened' with or without a police badge. 

You, Michael Dunn are the thug who stokes the fears of African-American parents they may experience the pain Jordan Davis' parents are feeling today about the loss of their child and that Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton experienced February 5.

Dunn is the thug who has caused fear in our African-American children's ranks that they will be shot to death and unjust Stand Your Ground laws and predominately white juries filled with vanillacentric privileged people will allow the perpetrators to get away with it.    

Happy birthday, Jordan and rest in power.  We will not rest until those odious ALEC inspired Stand Your Ground Kill A Black Child With Impunity laws die and our kids are free to live.