"If Trayvon Had Only Answered In an Appropriate Manner There Would have Been No Problem"

[patrice]

144. Yes and perhaps you will yeild that, amongst all possible reactions to this answer, that particular

form of the message is more likely to elicit additional emotional effects in the message recipient that certain other forms of the message, such as "That's none of your business ... " are less likely to elicit compared to "That's none of YOUR FUCKING business."

Of course, ALL adults absolutely bear the major burden of the responsibility for whatever transpires between themselves and others and especially for what happens between themselves and minors.

And yes!!, youngsters, by virtue of their lack of breadth and depth of experience, MUST!! NOT!! be punished for their lack of the realization that their own responses to such arbitrarily assaultive challenges can perpetuate, and thus magnify, the SAME reflexively diminuitive assertions of personal power that are initiated by the assailant, in their own responses to that assault, e.g. "none of YOUR FUCKING business".

The interaction thus becomes about a particular, more aggressive, form of autonomous action rather than prioritizing autonomy itself which CAN assert itself in an extremely wide variety of other more effective modes.

Let me be clear; it is the adult's responsibility to figure this stuff out, to apply it appropriately, and to foster this understanding amongst others, especially with socially active minors.

Too bad there weren't any authentically adequate adults present that night and that those who SHOULD have functioned in that role, the neighborhood association and the police department, CHOSE plausible deniability, a.k.a. passing the buck to a less than adequate scapegoat who fucked it up horribly, rather than doing the right thing by their own responsibilities, such as being aware that Zimmerman was carrying a lethal weapon and accepting their own accountability for facts that they KNEW about Zimmerman, such as his hair trigger call-rate.

This horror **IS** Zimmerman's fault, but he didn't get into this situation ALL BY HIMSELF and the very same abdication of responsibility that we see in prioritization of personal insults over successful/effective outcomes is reflected in the roles that were abdicated by the community in this situation.