Can you remember the days of Martin Luther King? Freedom Riders? Those halcyon times when civil rights leaders didn't dress in track suits and the folks fighting in the trenches (not to mention the real victims of prejudice) were good honest hard working folks who just wanted a fair shake in this great country? If you can't, well I guess given the last year's events, that is understandable.Meet, Renato Hughes, Jr. (22), the latest cause celeb of the now terminally morally bankrupt civil rights (shame) movement. So what did Mr. Hughes do to earn his status as a victim of discrimination? Well, he and two associates are alleged to have broken into a house at 4 a.m., demanded marijuana from the owner, and then proceeded to beat the homeowner's son so badly that:
"[He] suffered brain damage from the baseball bat beating he took during the melee. The 19-year-old lives in a rehabilitation center and can no longer feed himself." [1]
The homeowner responded by shooting each of Hughes' two associates in the head- yet somehow Hughes made it out alive. Where is the racism you ask? Well, the local prosecutor is charging Hughes with the death his two unfortunate associates under the "Provocative Act doctrine." The Provocative Act doctrine makes any person who provokes a violent act where it was "reasonably foreseeable that the criminal enterprise could trigger a fatal response from the homeowner" liable for those who die as a result. [2] Since this is what an AP writer thinks the doctrine means take the definition with a grain of salt- possibly a whole shaker full.
Of course, the local NAACP has wasted no time responding to this blatant act of racism and has issued the following statement (paraphrased by the AP writer):
[Warning: Reading the following statement may induce either fits of laughter or a long bout of despair. Proceed at your own risk.]
"The Rev. Amos Brown, head of the San Francisco chapter of the NAACP and pastor at Hughes' church, said the case demonstrates the legal system is racist in remote Lake County, aspiring wine country 100 miles north of San Francisco. The sparsely populated county of 13,000 people is 91 percent white and 2 percent black." [3]
Indeed, how can we stand by when innocent burglars and thugs are charged with criminal conduct!? How can we stand by when thieves and hooligans don't have the same rights as everyone else?! If they can charge someone who commits a violent home invasion with a crime under this doctrine, who will they charge next? The Jews? Soccer moms? Left-handed midgets with Tourette's Syndrome?!
This calls to mind another group of Civil Rights icons. No, not the freedom riders. Think bigger? Also think more recent. Have you already forgotten about the Jena 6?!
Those brave young men who, despite overwhelming odds of six to one (there were six of them), engaged in a fight with another student. They were even brave enough to "kick and stomp his body" while he lay unconscious on the floor. [4]
The young man in the picture (Mychal Bell) is of course a wonderful upstanding civilian who helps old ladies across the street. Unfortunately, when he isn't helping old ladies with their groceries he has taken some small detours into the world of violence. Sadly, before he fought for freedom by kicking an unconscious young man he had already been arrested and convicted in the previous year for "attacking someone," and was subsequently found to have "committed three more crimes while on probation." [5] As someone still working on my first criminal conviction, I must say I am doing my best to empathize. I did get a parking ticket once. Does that count?
Although, I must conclude with one question. Which is worse. The NAACP supporting these violent thugs as Civil Rights icons OR...
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Wait for it...
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Here it comes...
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THIS!!!!
Gotta love the medallion! I just wonder, a medallion that big must have magical powers. Right?
