President Obama, making a surprise appearance on Friday in the White
House briefing room to address the verdict in the Trayvon Martin
killing, spoke in personal terms about the experience of being a black
man in the United States, trying to put the case in the perspective of
African-Americans. They were Mr. Obama’s most extensive comments on race
since 2008, and his most extensive as president.
“I think it’s important to recognize that the African-American community
is looking at this issue through a set of experiences and a history
that — that doesn’t go away,” Mr. Obama said in the briefing room.
“There are very few African-American men in this country who haven’t had
the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a
department store. That includes me.”
A jury on Saturday found George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch
volunteer, not guilty of second-degree murder in the killing of Mr.
Martin in early 2012. The verdict has elicited marches and protests
across the country, although there has been little violence. The killing
of Mr. Martin, an unarmed black teenager, ignited a national debate on
racial profiling and civil rights.
Mr. Obama issued a statement shortly after the verdict. But on Friday,
he talked more broadly about his own feelings about the verdict and the
impact it has had among African-Americans. “You know, when Trayvon
Martin was first shot, I said that this could have been my son,” he
said. “Another way of saying that is Trayvon Martin could have been me
35 years ago.”
He added: “I don’t want to exaggerate this, but those sets of
experiences inform how the African-American community interprets what
happened one night in Florida. And it’s inescapable for people to bring
those experiences to bear.”
Mr. Obama also said he and his staff were examining policy options, and
he raised questions about the wisdom of laws like Florida’s Stand Your
Ground law.
“I think it would be useful for us to examine some state and local laws
to see if it — if they are designed in such a way that they may
encourage the kinds of altercations and confrontations and tragedies
that we saw in the Florida case, rather than defuse potential
altercations,” the president said.
In his remarks, the president called on Americans to search their souls
on the question of race relations in the country, a topic that he has
confronted only sporadically as the nation’s first black president.
At the beginning of the month, Mr. Obama returned from a weeklong trip
to Africa, where he stood in the cell that Nelson Mandela had occupied
for 18 years before shattering South Africa’s system of racial
segregation to become that country’s president. In a speech in Cape
Town, Mr. Obama hailed the racial progress that country has made in the
last generation.
“You’ve shown us how a prisoner can become a president. You’ve shown us
how bitter adversaries can reconcile,” Mr. Obama said in South Africa.
“You’ve confronted crimes of hatred and intolerance with truth and
love.”
On Friday, he urged Americans to be honest with themselves about how far
this country has come in confronting its own racial history.
“Am I wringing as much bias out of myself as I can; am I judging people,
as much as I can, based on not the color of their skin but the content
of their character?” he said. “That would, I think, be an appropriate
exercise in the wake of this tragedy.”
The answers to those questions, Mr. Obama suggested, will help determine
how much progress America still needs to make. But he also predicted
that future generations will be more inclusive than the present one.
“When I talk to Malia and Sasha and I listen to their friends and I see
them interact, they’re better than we are,” he said, referring to his
two daughters. “They’re better than we were on these issues. And that’s
true in every community that I’ve visited all across the country.”
Mr. Obama had been under pressure from some African-Americans to weigh
in more forcefully after the verdict. For several days, his spokesman
deflected questions about Mr. Obama reaction.
culled from www.newyorktimes.com
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