The phenomena of a huge swath of the nation empathizing with Trayvon means that something similar is going on and has been going on for a long time everywhere. This engagement with Trayvon’s case will have its greatest impact to the degree that we trace that emotional knot (of fear, disgust, frustration, and urgency) that arose because of the circumstances of Trayvon’s killing to those similar circumstances in our own lives and in our own community - the existence of which has “allowed” us to empathize with Trayvon in the first place.

I Am Trayvon Martin; Who Are You? By Wilson Riles BlackCommentator.com Guest Commentator

As a 65 year old African American male, I identify with Trayvon Martin, the 17 year old youth that was killed in Sanford, Florida, on February 26. Despite the age difference, I visualize myself in his shoes, walking down the dark street near a gated community, talking to a girlfriend on the phone, and discovering that I am being followed by a man in a truck who turns out to be a person like George Zimmerman. Who else, among us, can truly identify with this young man? President Obama, who only had daughters as I did, identifies with Trayvon a bit more distantly: as if Trayvonwere his son. I guess that as an American child in Indonesia, Obama safely and successfully negotiated this genre of cultural boundaries, but he realizes and identifies with the fact that there are more lethal dangers with such crossings for young black males living in the US. The extent of one’s identification – which is somewhat like the degree that one empathizes with something – ranges from no identification at all to that degree of identification that another 17 year old African American male in Florida might bring to the case. Out of this sense of empathy or identity, interlaced with the emotions of fear, disgust, frustration, and urgency, some people have been moved to take action as this cause is reverberating through the public media. Political and governmental procedure is such that there is little of great impact that can be done to help bring justice to Trayvon’s specific case. The Police Chief of Sanford has suspended himself after a “no confidence” vote of the Sanford City Council; the Florida State Attorney General is investigating; and the Federal Justice Department is investigating as to whether there has been a Civil Rights violation. The outpouring of testimony and heated demonstrations across the country will have little effect at this point on the availability of justice for Trayvon and his family. However, this degree of pre-“occupation” of the public “spaces,” this amount of moral recoil, this amount of disturbance in our emotional “sea” deserves a broad correction that goes beyond Sanford and Florida. The phenomena of a huge swath of the nation empathizing with Trayvon means that something similar is going on and has been going on for a long time everywhere. This engagement with Trayvon’s case will have its greatest impact to the degree that we trace that emotional knot (of fear, disgust, frustration, and urgency) that arose because of the circumstances of Trayvon’s killing to those similar circumstances in our own lives and in our own community - the existence of which has “allowed” us to empathize with Trayvon in the first place. If we then take that knowing and turn it in to action, that is grace, that is co-creation most powerfully. The crosscutting forces of social systems, economic systems, political systems, and the criminal justice system, either advantages us or targets us for certain “treatment.” First, stipulating that systems are existentially collections of people, what we identify with and how we are identified, are the arbiters of every systemic response. Blind, ignorant, and self deceiving people may think that if you simply behave “right” and “work hard,” you have nothing to fear. These non-empathetic people are wrong. A corollary of that thinking is that true Floridians or true“Americans” act in a particular way and, when they do, they are “blessed” “Americans.” These blind believers are wrong. Trayvon’s case and many, many, many others put the lie to these deceptions. Other deceivers believe that if we would only stop talking about racial and other differences, in an effort to reach a color-blind society, the result would be the disappearance of individual and systemic biases. This is a self delusion; no human behavioral phenomenon has ever disappeared when we stopped talking about it. Frightfully, this delusion is also dangerous. In this conception, the incidence of violations will be hidden and the norm becomes a bland (white) stance that is very boring and unattractive; it is absolutely unrealistic and will not happen and should not be attempted. So the questions remain: where are we headed and what effective action can a person take no matter one’s gender or skin color, or where in the country we are? I think the first step is to accept the truth that the elements for similar injustice exist in every community in the country to some degree. Step two is to accept that we all– to some degree or other – receive advantages from the biases of our social, economic, political, and criminal justice systems; and we all – to some degree or other – are targets of these systems and the individuals that exercise these systems. Clearly exercising the system’s logic does not necessarily mean that one is officially an agent of the system, a la Mr. George Zimmerman. However, we are all both positively and negatively impacted at some time, in some way. At this moment, there is no need to have a competition on the rankings of oppressive practices or to acknowledge with whose oppression we identify the most. The social psychological dynamics are the same even if the historical evolution of the syndromes is different. We can all only move from our unique collection of identities – howsoever those identities harmonize or not. It is that identity harmonizing pattern that is unique to humans and that displays integrity and rationality. Who are you? Take action in your community by exposing injustices at their roots, by facilitating the opportunities for empathy for all humans, and by correcting the insensitive, unjust laws and processes that are taking place just around the corner. The salient injustices associated with the Trayvon Martin case are race and the crookedness of the criminal justice system but injustices of class, gender, ability, age, academic status, richness or poverty, sexual identity, nationality, and language-facility work in similar ways. Let’s break down those dynamics for each situation and that will have an impact on eliminating those dynamics everywhere. An injustice anywhere opens the doors for injustice everywhere. Social science tells us that we are a multiplicity of identities. Instead of seeing ourselves as a single personality, we all consist of multiple characters or micro-personalities, each one with its own viewpoint, emotions and ambitions. The mother who feeds breakfast to her children, for example, has quite different concerns and opinions from the woman taking part in a boardroom discussion two hours later, and from the woman she will be with her husband that night. Yet all three may share the same body, and none is any more “authentic” than another. I am of African, Native American, and European ancestry. I used to speak a little German as well as “American” English. I am male, a father, a husband, a politician, an administrator, a former football player, a teacher, and a community organizer. The most important step that we can take is to realize that other human beings – all other human beings – are also a multiplicity of identities and we can always be empathetic with all of them to some degree. Remember that empathy is not the same thing as sympathy; many people can have more sympathy for a dog or a seal pup than they have for other humans. Realize that we can – by many degrees – have our best empathy with another human being and within the human family. In today’s world, our ability to switch from one micro-personality to another, according to what is demanded of us, is a huge strength. It is a strength provided that one’s various micro-personalities work together in harmony rather than against each other or through confusion. The grounding of personality is in beliefs, values, and our artistry of presence. If your bed rock beliefs and values are split or are in conflict, no artistry can for long present a display that has integrity or rationality. Too much identification with imperfect systems – like the rapacious Global Capitalist economic system, like the racist Criminal Justice system, like the oligarchic political system, etc. – leads to uncorrected injustices, insanity, self blindness, and self deception. Rather, it is both personal harmony and community harmony that are all of ourgoals. I am Tryvon Martin; I affirm his life and rededicate mine to bring about harmony in my community. BlackCommentator.com Guest Commentator, Wilson Riles, is a former Oakland, CA City Council Member. Click here to contact Mr. Riles.