“I was scared of the black cat crossing the road in front of me, but I’m not superstitious.” Most of us would conclude from this quote that its author harbored some level of superstition. Why else would he/she feel scared? The cat offered no real threat.

So why did George Zimmerman feel Trayvon Martin was somehow a threat to the community—or even to himself. Now many pundits and journalists have already weighed in. I don’t intend to explore the validity of the “stand your ground” law in Florida as it was presented by the trial judge in her jury instructions. I will not question the verdict reached by a jury panel of six who labored with the appropriate application of the law’s reasonable doubt requirement. Likewise, I’m not going to criticize the Stamford police department’s delay in issuing an arrest warrant. Nor will I criticize the prosecutor’s case in chief: strategically it ignored racial profiling (allowing the defense team to characterize it as appropriate); and tactically it failed to force Mr. Zimmerman to testify in his own behalf in lieu of introducing his unsworn, recorded accounts of his actions. No, instead of re-litigating and rehashing the many perspectives on this case—which is already being discussed in practically all media and from every possible angle, I’m going to accuse myself of racial profiling. In fact, I’m going to accuse you too, my patient readers. We are all guilty!

Unless you are raised in a black family or have had close relationships with African-Americans, your attitudes about people of color have been formed by your personal experiences and the cultural imprinting of your community. In other words, a white man or woman normally will never truly understand what it means to be black in America. But what we can understand—and are obligated to understand—is our own reaction to black people. If you are the average white American, you already have been conditioned to accept certain stereotypes about your fellow black citizens. News reports of inner city violence or movies that exhibit black male violence merely serve to substantiate those stereotypes. On the other side of this equation, African-Americans also suffer from cultural conditioning. If Mr. Zimmerman was telling the truth, Trayvor Martin confronted him and asked, “Do you have a problem with me?” As an opening remark, this question could be no more confrontational than “can I help you?” If instead it was uttered in a threatening tone, it would display the similarly conditioned attitude exemplified by George Zimmerman. It’s likely that both men felt threatened by the other—and for no rational, objective reason. We all need to learn how to defuse confrontational situations, whether experienced as road rage, workplace antagonism, or an unexpected, potentially threatening exchange with a complete stranger. The first step, however, is to be aware of our instinctual or conditioned response. There is no way to overcome racism or any other form of prejudicial (AKA, profiling in legal terms) action without self-awareness.

Sometimes we rest too easily on our alleged progress in the aftermath of constitutionally enforced oppression and slavery. Certainly, we can all celebrate the achievements of the XIV and XV Amendments (re: civil rights and black suffrage), the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Voting Rights Act that followed. The moral boundaries of American society did indeed expand through the course of the twentieth century. If it will continue to expand in the twenty first century, we Americans will need to become more aware of our unexamined behavior towards each other. Only then can we both change as individuals and continue to transform as a society.

Our recent celebration of Independence Day inspired me to reread the Declaration of Independence. My first thought was to assess its relevance to our current state in America. Of course, we are no longer besieged by a foreign tyrant; and its enumerated grievances against a foreign power are no longer applicable. But its declarations still resound with a clarion call to action: “the right of the people to alter or abolish” any form of government deemed destructive of certain unalienable rights, among which are “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” Although Americans are not in the same plight as Egyptians, we do have a right to alter our government wherever it impedes one of those unalienable rights, many of which are further specified in our Constitution. These words were preamble to a revolution and justification for America’s Declaration of Independence. In our form of democracy, activism is not only justified. It is required. So, if government derives from “the consent of the people,” as the Declaration intones, then every citizen is required to understand his/her rights and to hold elected officials responsible for their safeguard. I think we all understand in general terms what “life and liberty” entails. But when we consider the right of the people to “keep and bear Arms,” are we cognizant of the second amendment context for the necessity of a “well -regulated Militia” to maintain “the security of a free State?” We do, after all, have law enforcement and a standing army to protect us from a foreign invasion. Certainly we all benefit from the first amendments’ freedoms of religion, speech and the press. But how do we explain our legislators’ application of religious interpretations to issues of homosexuality, same sex marriage, or abortion? It would appear that this amendment assures that no person can be forced to engage in any of these activities against his/her religious convictions. Equally, it assures the freedom of those who do not share these religious convictions. The fifteenth and nineteenth amendments state that the rights of citizens to vote “shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State” on account of race, color, sex, or previous condition of servitude. How does this mandate stack up against the whim of some state legislatures to abridge voting laws to curtail the vote of minorities?

Before I close this blog, I want to make one final comment on the “pursuit of Happiness.” A careful reading of the Declaration reveals what Jefferson meant. Also, his life gives an even more strident testimony of his intent. For Jefferson and for the signers of the Declaration, the happiness they considered our unalienable right was a common dedication to the public good. Of course, they foresaw a future nation where everybody had an equal opportunity to pursue their life goals. But this pursuit was seen as the necessary adjunct to the general welfare of the state. “It is the Right of the People to . . . institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their (the people’s) Safety and Happiness.” So with our freedom comes responsibility, not only to ourselves but to each other.