Thomas missed it

In a recent column, Cal Thomas disingenuously asks, “What’s different about Trayvon?” If Thomas could cast aside for a moment his deeply held reactionary views, he could easily answer the question without my help.

Those views, while not always blatantly racist, do embody a mindset of predictable disposition towards the profiling of racial stereotypes. In this case, Thomas fails to see that the killing of an unarmed African- American young man by a self-styled vigilante with a documented history of stalking young black males is indeed different from the other incidents of violent crime which he describes.

To those who live in African-American communities, this killing probably did not appear so different, because parents in these communities remember the wanton violence of the Civil Rights era, know the potential danger and accordingly raise their children to be on their guard. But for Thomas to mock the involvement of political leaders seeking justice, and to imply that racial tensions were exacerbated by the media’s wide coverage rather than by the horrendous event that transpired, are admissions of his lack of understanding of the inherent issues present in this tragedy.

Dan Lourie

Port Aransas