Young black males are killed in disproportionate amounts on a semiregular basis. The public support of bringing justice to another slaughtered black boy is not only appropriate, but is a requirement for the type of social awareness that lends itself to change.

The reason so many people are up in arms about the shooting of Martin is multidimensional.

The public involvement with this case was not just contempt for George Zimmerman, rather it was a refusal to allow Martin’s name to just end up on a list of child victims who were slaughtered and forgotten about.

The justice system has a role: to be neutral and convict criminals. However, this process is open to corruption and bias. The justice system cannot always objectively deliver justice through legal means. Justice is not merely relative, but there are several ways to understand it in a given context. We cannot understand justice without understanding values. In an objective sense, justice involves fairness and righting wrongs.

After Martin was killed, everywhere I went people were talking about the shooting of another black boy. We might never have all of the evidence to prove that Zimmerman was a murderer with intent, but he no doubt killed Martin.

Just to point out a few facts: Martin was a 17-year-old black male who was unarmed at the time of his shooting. Fact: Black males have the highest death rate and the lowest life expectancy.

The claims that there are no facts surrounding this case are misinformed at best. The claim that the killing of another black boy is somehow divorced of any racial aspects fails to acknowledge the social and political conditions we live in.

We do not live in a postracial society. Martin did not live in a postracial society. This case is not postrace.

The public involvement in this case and the pressure it brought to revisit minority struggles is part of what it takes to head toward a postrace society. The avoidance of these very real social conditions is grounded in the ignorance that fuels racist ideologies.

The ethnicity of Zimmerman does not free him from the actions he took and does not negate the possibility of Zimmerman engaging in racist behavior. Bringing up the issue of minority equating allows individuals to miss the more pressing issues at hand.

Would this outcry be happening if a black man shot a white man? Would it be called a hate crime? Questions such as these fail to recognize the supremacist undertones they consequentially represent, since they are rhetoric.

The thought experiment of looking at society in a reversed manner does not capture the actual situations. It is fallacious reasoning and a persuasion technique.

The better question: are these the types of questions we should be asking? I prefer to allow people to decide that for themselves. This is not a game of “who can commit the hate crime.”

The questions I would like to ask are: Why do black boys die at alarmingly high rates? Do they have a right to merely exist? What must we do to make social progress from events such as this shooting?

I write this on behalf of all the people who decided to put their hoods up and were awake enough to realize that we have social problems, citizen involvement is the key to social change and that no matter what happened the night of Feb. 26, another black male does not need to die on account of “looking suspicious.”

Racial conditions are more complex than people often are willing to recognize. They require intensive social research and awareness. I encourage the public outcry and awareness that followed the death of Martin.

Kimberly Harris is a State News guest columnist and philosophy senior. Reach her at harri747@msu.edu.