Paramount Owes America an Apology for Jay-Z’s Trayvon Series – IOTW Report

Paramount Owes America an Apology for Jay-Z’s Trayvon Series

American Thinker: On Monday evening, the Paramount Networks aired the first part of a six-part documentary series on the death of Trayvon Martin called Rest in Power: The Trayvon Martin Story.

If multimedia impresario Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter had chosen to tell it, there was a story to be told here: a story about a boy bounced around among his biological parents and other relatives after his parents’ divorce; a story of a boy whose descent into drugs, guns, fighting, and burglary accelerated after his father left his stepmother, Alicia, his “rock,” when Trayvon was 15.

There was a story to be told of how Trayvon’s school shielded him from the criminal justice system – much as the schools in neighboring Broward County shielded Parkland’s Nikolas Cruz – even after Trayvon was apprehended at school with a weapon, a burglary tool, and stolen jewelry.

This cautionary tale of abandonment and betrayal was not the one Jay-Z chose to tell.  Instead, he submitted his audience to a TV hour of racially incendiary hokum shamelessly untethered from the inarguable facts of the case.  The next five hours will not be any better.

The testimony of Trayvon’s parents, Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton, dominated the opening hour.  Their grief seemed real enough, but instead of accepting responsibility for their son’s chaotic life, they projected their guilt onto the marginalized, dehumanized “other” of this story, George Zimmerman, the man who was forced to shoot Trayvon in February 2012 to save his own life.

The Martin family knew better.  By the time a deposition was taken with Tracy Martin a year after the shooting, Tracy, Sybrina, and the various attorneys representing the Martins were aware of Trayvon’s potential for violence.  What details Tracy may not have known, he learned during the deposition.

“Were you aware that he was suspended from school in the fall of 2011 for possession of the weapon and the jewelry?” George Zimmerman’s attorney, Don West, asked Tracy.

“Did Sybrina Fulton ever tell you in the fall of 2011 or in early 2012 that Trayvon was being considered for expulsion?” asked West again.  more

19 Comments on Paramount Owes America an Apology for Jay-Z’s Trayvon Series

  1. The state’s own “star” witness against Zimmerman, the “That’s retarded, sir.” friend of Martin’s who talked to him on the phone before he was killed, said that Martin was engaging in what is best described as “gay bashing” when he went out to stalk and attack Zimmerman. There was nothing decent nor heroic about Trayvon Martin. He’d probably be in prison doing a lengthy sentence on felony charges now or dead by the hands of another black gangsta if he didn’t get put down by Zimmerman first.

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  2. CBS was fawning all over his parents. How many people watched this? This is all part of the war on culture and decency. I am sick of seeing some “poor black” thug being treated as a messiah every night on tv.

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  3. Jay-z’s has been a race-baiter his whole life. It’s what his business has been built on. Dividing the nation has been his ticket to the good life so it’s no surprise that he (and Paramount) decided on this work of fiction. It will widen the gulf and make him lots more cash. The fact is if he had told a truthful account it would have helped both black and white better understanding of the huge problem in the black community today. But then Jay-Z couldn’t care less as he sits in his mansion behind the iron fencing and armed guards.

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  4. I had a conversation about a year ago with a black guy from “the hood” who wants to be a rapper and he writes his own songs. I told him he was good and wished him luck, but he said he would never be famous because he’s “not a fag.” He said rappers like Jay-z had to commit homosexual acts to get to the top and he “ain’t like dat.” This was before the Harvey Weinstein relevations, even.

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  5. @ Loretta- I hear “shtruggle,” I think Sean Connery.
    I have two Scottish buddies and they both talk like that, even though they’re not Edinbuggers like S.C.

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  6. I hate to say it, but Trayvon’s parents learned to love and care about him a lot more after he was dead than they did when he was alive. If they cared half as much when he was alive he wouldn’t be dead today.

    They’ll keep caring though as long as those trash cans are getting filled with money.

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