Victor Davis Hanson has put a list together of the 10 Things That We’ve Learned from the Trayvon Martin Tragedy. Number nine was one that I haven't seen noted elsewhere:
9) Most who editorialize so passionately on this case, black and white, live in cities, but most likely as far away from those neighborhoods and inner-city schools where murder is an epidemic as they can. They are engaging in de facto profiling in every aspect of their and their childrens’ lives, based on general perceptions, personal experience, and statistical data. Profiling and stereotyping are for others; a “good” or “safe” area is for the more sensitive and educated.
Unfortunately, if past experience is any guide, none of these lessons will actually be learned by most and we'll go through all the same gyrations and hysteria when the next such racially or politically tinged tragedy takes place.
