Stand Up and be Counted

I generally try to confine my posts here to issues where I have something to contribute… hard as it is to believe, I have usually put some thought into them. When news broke of the attack in Charleston this week, I kept quiet and let those involved do the talking.

In doing so I think I missed the other important part I could have played… being a voice of support and solidarity.

There’s not enough time in the world to write about every mass shooting in the US, I think it’s about three a week. But this one stands out: because of who was targeted, because of the motives, because of the response.

This was a political assassination, one of the victims was a state senator. He had just spent the day campaigning with Hillary Clinton. It’s not clear that the shooter knew that, but it’s certainly possible.

This was also clearly and obviously a racist, white supremacist hate crime. There has been an effort to ignore or deny this… but come on, there’s a manifesto. The last notable shooting in Charleston was the murder of Walter Scott, and it’s pretty clearly a white supremacist hate crime as well, but that one’s harder to prove. If nothing else manifestos are really good for establishing motive.

Fox News called this an attack on Christians in Church. Which is true, but highly misleading. When a White Christian attacks Black Christians in church, the religion might not be the most important factor. Neglecting to mention the race is not merely poor journalism but dereliction of duty.

The response… well, there’s an effort to remove the Confederate flag from the state capital. Which is… good, I guess? I’m shocked that they had it up in the first place. I suppose this qualifies them for an Extremely Low Bar Award. I’d prefer for it to be treated like the Swastika in Germany… displayed in museums and history textbooks, but otherwise banned for display.

The gun control angle is getting mostly ignored due to the futility. I suspect that once the deaths of 20 children in Newtown proved not enough to inspire any gun control, those attempts have been abandoned for this generation. I don’t even want to think about what sort of tragedy will be required to change that.

Oh, and one last thing: there’s absolutely no reason to think the shooter was mentally ill.So everyone can just stop calling it that, please and thank you. I know we’d all like to think that healthy people can’t be violent, but that’s just not the case.