Binkowski, Brooke. “George Zimmerman Gun Auction.” Snopes. Snopes, 12 May 2016. Web. 14 Nov. 2016. <http://www.snopes.com/2016/05/12/george-zimmerman-gun-auction/>.
After the death of Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman allegedly tried to auction off the murder weapon. Snopes fact checked the “alleged” auction, and found out Zimmerman did indeed attempt to sell his gun. He originally posted it on a gun auctioning website, that is under public domain for anyone. The company that runs the sight however encountered the auction, which started off at $5,000, and took it off their sight. When questioned about it they stated, “Listings on the GunBroker.com web site are user-generated, exactly like social media posts. Mr. Zimmerman never contacted anyone at GunBroker.com prior to or after the listing was created and no one at GunBroker.com has any relationship with Zimmerman. Our site rules state that we reserve the right to reject listings at our sole discretion, and have done so with the Zimmerman listing. We want no part in the listing on our web site or in any of the publicity it is receiving.”. Zimmerman made many claims on his post, such as the Smithsonian was in contact with him and had interest in the weapon. These statements were all found false, and the Smithsonian even added they would not be interested in this object in any of their museums.
It seems as if George Zimmerman, yet again took advantage of his limelight and tried to make some money off it. I was happy to hear that organizations like GunBroker and the Smithsonian denied him the satisfaction of getting any more attention.
This perfectly illustrates the extent that which our society accepts people like him. There were many bids on the gun itself, showing how controversial this event was. People clearly agreed that Zimmerman was innocent because the young man looked suspicious, while other clearly do not agree with that logic at all and see racism at work.
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