Thursday Grambling’s SGA and FSUB committee rallied a march, beginning at the flagpole and ended on the yard, to show their respect for the unsolved, unjust murder of Trayvon Martin.
On Feb. 26, 17 the nation was captivated when Martin, a 17-year-old African American male, was wrongfully killed in Sanford, Fla. by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old bi-racial Latino and Caucasian.
Student of Grambling State University sported hoodie sweaters while carrying packs of skittles and cups of iced tea. As the protestors marched, chants of “Justice for Trayvon,” was sparked by Andrew Smith, a double major in psychology and mass communication.
When the participants made it to their destination they sang “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” SGA president Channing Gaulden then began giving a speech where he charged the students of Grambling with the task of taking one another by the hand and simply guide one another down the path that tends to “gets little rocky at times”.
Gaulden empathically expressed his thoughts about the student driven tribute to Martin on Grambling’s campus, “It is truly humbling and touching that we can come together as one unit to stand for not only what is right but what is fair,” said Gaulden, SGA student body president. “Grambling State University student body is wholistically on board to endure the justice and equality of Trayvon Martin case”
Zimmerman, who hasn’t been arrested due to lack of concrete evidence, admitted to the killing but said it was in self-defense, after an allegedly scuffling with Martin. Zimmerman said he was punched in the nose, knocked down and had his head slammed into the ground, however, in a police surveillance video taken the night that Martin was killed shows that he was unharmed.
Innocent people die every day, so Martin being murdered isn’t the outrage in this case, the fact that Zimmerman isn’t in jail is what causing controversy in today’s society.
“We are going to do everything in our power to show that we are aware of the unjust,” said Jonathan Allen, Grambling’s junior class senator. “Sometimes it takes innocent people like Trayvon Martin to expose a guilty system.”
