[lbo-talk] [Fwd: Jena Ignites a Movement: Report from Yesterday's Demonstration in Jena, Louisiana]

Shane Mage shmage at pipeline.com
Mon Sep 24 20:10:58 PDT 2007


"Mr.WD" wrote:


>On 9/24/07, Joseph Catron <jncatron at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I mean, I haven't heard anyone seriously argue that the Jena
>> defendants did not, in fact, attach Justin Barker as a group and kick
>> him into a coma.
>
>He got beat up, but he was not put into a coma: the kid attended a
>party the same fucking night. And the kids who allegedly attacked him
>were charged with attempted murder...
>...On Monday, December 4, at Jena High, a white student - who
>allegedly had been making racial taunts, including calling
>African-American students "n-words" while supporting the students who
>hung the nooses and who beat up the black student at the off-campus
>party - was knocked down, punched and kicked by black students. The
>white victim was taken to the hospital treated and released. He
>attended a social function that evening.
>
> Six black Jena students were arrested and charged with
>second-degree attempted murder. All six were expelled from school.

So clearly, contrary to the racist sneers of Mr. Catron, the black students were within their rights and committed no crime whatsoever. The established legal doctrine is that "fighting words" justify a violent response. In the context of nooses on a tree in a KKK stronghold, "racial taunts" are obviously fighting words and nobody but a defender of racism would doubt that for a second.

Shane Mage

"Thunderbolt steers all things...It consents and does not consent to be called Zeus."

Herakleitos of Ephesos



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