Those who lament the not guilty verdict remain fixated on skin color. The only reason this confrontation resulted in a trial at all is because it could be framed as profiling, as if profiling is bad, and turned into an opportunity to agitate one color against another. Pitiful.

What is forgotten or ignored is what the not guilty verdict means. It means that you cannot violently beat someone without fear of consequence. Regardless of why another person is following you, you cannot choose to turn against them and hammer them with your fists and expect nothing bad to happen to you.

For the sake of discussion, I’ll concede the point that profiling is bad. I don’t think it is, but just for the moment, let’s say it is. And let’s also concede that Zimmerman was profiling Trayvon. That he recognized an anomaly in his neighborhood and decided to investigate. Trayvon still chose to confront Zimmerman, chose to harm the man who was following him. He didn’t have to do that. He chose to. And in choosing to do so he set in motion the path that led to the not guilty verdict and what that verdict means.

You cannot choose to commit bodily harm without fear of consequence. Sometimes that consequence is your death. Consider the consequence before you make the choice.

It is understandably easy to be overcome by America’s present situation. A leader who seems to think it is perfectly acceptable to change and ignore laws he doesn’t care for, even when they are his own laws (see Obamacare waiver for Obamacare requirement to implement business mandate by 2014 and unilateral declaration of war against Lybia). Add to that this leader’s cabinet members duly implementing their own agendas irregardless of what’s desired by or best for Americans (see EPA coal emissions regulations, Department of the Interior contempt of court denials of oil exploration leases, IRS stonewalling of discrimination discovery, Attorney General in contempt of Congress for stonewalling discovery in regards to Fast and Furious and Benghazi, etc).

In this climate, I have seen some people declare that they are not celebrating Independence Day this year. They will not be displaying their flag. That we are no longer America.

To those people I ask, “What is America?” Is it the lawless actions of a few privileged people? Or is it the unwavering spirit of freedom that cannot ever be destroyed, even if the society created to protect it is being shaken to its core?

Those who are whittling away at America as a beacon of freedom want nothing more than to see no flags today, to see evidence that they are breaking the American spirit, that our warriors have nothing left to fight for, that those who paid the ultimate price, did so in vain.

Well, I won’t let them have my spirit. I will fly my flag. I am not broken. I will resist.