Zaevion Dobson Is Dead ... Why Aren't We Hearing About It?

Most mornings, Carlos and I have breakfast while watching Good Morning America … or one of those shows … on the tiny flatscreen atop the refrigerator.

Yesterday, the big story was Steve Harvey naming the wrong winner of the Miss Universe pageant. It was good for a giggle; it was good for some jokes on Facebook and Twitter. That was it.

But this morning the story was still there, along with a list of conspiracy theories as to how, and why, Harvey had misread the card with the winner’s name on it. It was all so shocking …

Shocking, to me, because this was still “news.” I mean, it seems we go from one day talking about downed jets and mass shootings and terrorist plots blowhard politicians to a two day news cycle about an error in a beauty contest?

As I sat at the table railing about that to Carlos, I asked about the news story we hadn’t heard this week, on any news channel that I had seen … the story of Zaevion Dobson.

Don’t know who he is? Well, that’s because Miss Colombia, and the entire country it seems, rate the top of the news list in America.

Zaevion Dobson was … was, so you know where this is headed … a high school football player from Knoxville who was killed last week in yet another random shooting spree in this country.

Zaevion Dobson was fifteen. Zaevion Dobson died because, as three men with ties to gangs, began shooting at schoolchildren last week, children out celebrating the upcoming holiday, Zaevion Dobson jumped on top of three girls to save them from being shot and he died in the process.

But by all means, let’s ask Perez Hilton what he thinks about MissUniverseGate.

One little girl, probably talking to her friends one minute about what she wanted for Christmas, suddenly found herself underneath Zaevion Dobson as the bullets flew. And, when it was all over, Zaevion Dobson was dead. Now Zaevion’s mother, Zenobia Dobson, will bury her son the day after Christmas.

And where’s the outrage? Sure, we have a lot going on this country; a woman’s crown was removed after two minutes because of an error, but where’s the outrage?

No one is talking. Is it because Zaevion Dobson is just another dead black kid, murdered as a result of gun violence? Or, is it because we are now so desensitized to murder in the streets that we just cannot be bothered to talk, or even care, about it?

And I have yet to hear one single political candidate for the presidency, on either side, mention Zaevion Dobson‘s name perhaps because his murder wasn’t an act of terror and so there are no poll points to be gained.

But try telling Zenobia Dobson that it wasn’t a terrorist who murdered her boy. Ask her where the terrorists live and she might say ‘Around the corner.’ Ask her what she would want this Christmas and you know she’d say she wants her son back, alive and safe, and tearing open a Christmas gift this Friday morning

But we don’t care about the Zaevion Dobsons of the world because a beauty queen lost her crown.

Ain’t that America?

Zaevion Dobson died saving the lives of three friends.

Zaevion Dobson has his whole life ahead of him.

Zaevion Dobson deserves to be talked about.

Something needs to be done.

Slate