Church massacre

[Gob]

[Gob]

The ad, which covered the headline, was spruiking a ladies night at a local gun range.

"$30 gets you everything," it trilled. Everything included "50 rounds of ammo", a "pistol or revolver" and a "range pass" for shooting.

The Post and Courier was quick to apologise for carrying the ad on the day after the murder of nine of the city's citizens, including the pastor and state senator, Reverend Clementa Pinckeny and the arrest of 21 year old suspect Dylann Roof.

[Scooter]

Just because the victims actually do matter:

[Scooter]

Shooters of color are called ‘terrorists’ and ‘thugs.’ Why are white shooters called ‘mentally ill’?

This racist media narrative around mass violence falls apart with the Charleston church shooting.

By Anthea Butler June 18 at 1:00 PM

Police are investigating the shooting of nine African Americans at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston as a hate crime committed by a white man. Unfortunately, it’s not a unique event in American history. Black churches have long been a target of white supremacists who burned and bombed them in an effort to terrorize the black communities that those churches anchored. One of the most egregious terrorist acts in U.S. history was committed against a black church in Birmingham, Ala., in 1963. Four girls were killed when members of the KKK bombed the 16th Street Baptist Church, a tragedy that ignited the Civil Rights Movement.

But listen to major media outlets and you won’t hear the word “terrorism” used in coverage of Tuesday’s shooting. You won’t hear the white male shooter, identified as 21-year-old Dylann Roof, described as “a possible terrorist.” And if coverage of recent shootings by white suspects is any indication, he never will be. Instead, the go-to explanation for his actions will be mental illness. He will be humanized and called sick, a victim of mistreatment or inadequate mental health resources. Activist Deray McKesson noted this morning that, while discussing Roof’s motivations, an MSNBC anchor said “we don’t know his mental condition.” That is the power of whiteness in America.

U.S. media practice a different policy when covering crimes involving African Americans and Muslims. As suspects, they are quickly characterized as terrorists and thugs, motivated by evil intent instead of external injustices. While white suspects are lone wolfs — Mayor Joseph Riley of Charleston already emphasized this shooting was an act of just “one hateful person” — violence by black and Muslim people is systemic, demanding response and action from all who share their race or religion. Even black victims are vilified. Their lives are combed for any infraction or hint of justification for the murders or attacks that befall them: Trayvon Martin was wearing a hoodie. Michael Brown stole cigars. Eric Garner sold loosie cigarettes. When a black teenager who committed no crime was tackled and held down by a police officer at a pool party in McKinney, Tex., Fox News host Megyn Kelly described her as “No saint either.”

Early news reports on the Charleston church shooting followed a similar pattern. Cable news coverage of State Sen. and Rev. Clementa Pinckney, pastor of Emanuel AME who we now know is among the victims, characterized his advocacy work as something that could ruffle feathers. The habit of characterizing black victims as somehow complicit in their own murders continues.

It will be difficult to hold to this corrosive, racist media narrative when reporting on the shooting at Emanuel AME Church. All those who were killed were simply participating in a Wednesday night Bible study. And the shooter’s choice of Emanuel AME was most likely deliberate, given its storied history. It was the first African Methodist Episcopal church in the South, founded in 1818 by a group of men including Morris Brown, a prominent pastor, and Denmark Vesey, the leader of a large, yet failed, slave revolt in Charleston. The church itself was targeted early on by fearful whites because it was built with funds from anti-slavery societies in the North. In 1822, church members were investigated for involvement in planning Vesey’s slave revolt, and the church was burned to the ground in retribution.

With that context, it’s clear that killing the pastor and members of this church was a deliberate act of hate. Mayor Riley noted that “The only reason that someone could walk into a church and shoot people praying is out of hate.” But we need to take it a step further. There was a message of intimidation behind this shooting, an act that mirrors a history of terrorism against black institutions involved in promoting civil and human rights. The hesitation on the part of some of the media to label the white male killer a terrorist is telling.

In the rapidly forming news narrative, the fact that black churches and mosques historically have been the targets of racial violence in America should not be overlooked. While the 1963 Birmingham church is the most historic, there also was a series of church burnings during the 1990s. Recognition of the terror those and similar acts impose on communities seems to have been forgotten post-Sept. 11. The subsequent Islamophobia that has gripped sectors of media and politics suggests that “terrorism” only applies in cases where the suspects are darker skinned.

This time, I hope that reporters and newscasters will ask the questions that get to the root of acts of racially motivated violence in America. Where did this man, who killed parishioners in their church during Bible study, learn to hate black people so much? Did he have an allegiance to the Confederate flag that continues to fly over the state house of South Carolina? Was he influenced by right-wing media’s endless portrayals of black Americans as lazy and violent?

I hope the media coverage won’t fall back on the typical narrative ascribed to white male shooters: a lone, disturbed or mentally ill young man failed by society. This is not an act of just “one hateful person.” It is a manifestation of the racial hatred and white supremacy that continues to pervade our society, 50 years after the Birmingham church bombing galvanized the Civil Rights Movement. It should be covered as such. And now that authorities have found their suspect, we should be calling him what he is: a terrorist.

The usual suspects will dismiss this as the ravings of a hysterical black woman. But of course will not be able to credibly refute a single word.

[MajGenl.Meade]

I had no idea Scooter was a hysterical black woman... but maybe it's self-identificaiton

[MajGenl.Meade]

... but actually the hysterical maundering is rather easily dismissed with facts.

The Beltway sniper(s) were not called terrorists or thugs - they were black though. They certainly terrified people. They weren't thugs.

I've not seen any black criminals characterized as terrorists, but I may have missed that. Certainly anyone who looks into the history of Bureau of Freedmen schools in eastern Maryland is aware of white terrorist activity between 1863 and 1870. But no, I don't recall "black terrorists"... unless perhaps we're going back to MOVE? But that's a long while ago. Is this murdering white boy a terrorist? I don't think so - he's a murderer motivated by racism, apparently.

I believe murderers motivated by racism are in fact mentally disturbed people - are not all murderers departing from acceptable norms? Did he intend to continue similar acts - in which case he would be a terrorist - with an aim to spreading fear and alarm? No. He committed this heinous crime for reasons that are not yet clear.

Thugs I think of as being tough guys, usually in public in groups, attacking people or property with the sole object of destruction. They have no political agenda. Was this white kid a thug? Maybe. But apparently the article doesn't want him to be called a thug particularly.

So what he has done should not be dismissed. Nor is it excused by any speculation about his mental and emotional stability. But hysteria is not really a substitute for thought.

[BoSoxGal]

This:

[MajGenl.Meade]

I note that CNN referred to the killer as a "terrorist" this a.m. I guess it makes people feel better, especially comedians like Stewart, to use one word rather than another.

I was in a historically black church for Sunday service in Hampton, Va in May - it doesn't feel odd to me at all to be the only white guy among hundreds of black people. But I'll admit, if I walked into the same church this coming Sunday, I might wonder if anyone felt uneasy with my being there.

As to me, those nine people are (trite and/or self-serving as it may sound to some) my brothers and sisters in Christ and I feel their loss as damage to the entire family of which I am part.

[Guinevere]

They are your brothers and sisters in humanity. We all feel their loss.

[liberty]

I note that CNN referred to the killer as a "terrorist" this a.m. I guess it makes people feel better, especially comedians like Stewart, to use one word rather than another.

I was in a historically black church for Sunday service in Hampton, Va in May - it doesn't feel odd to me at all to be the only white guy among hundreds of black people. But I'll admit, if I walked into the same church this coming Sunday, I might wonder if anyone felt uneasy with my being there.

As to me, those nine people are (trite and/or self-serving as it may sound to some) my brothers and sisters in Christ and I feel their loss as damage to the entire family of which I am part.

General, it is a Christian thing ( My brothers and sister in Christ ) I suspect many if not most here don’t get it.

[liberty]

They are your brothers and sisters in humanity. We all feel their loss.

But in humanity you can pick an choose. Do you feel the same when a tornado takes out a redneck trailer park? Some how, I feel that some here don’t.

[Crackpot]

Says the unrepentant bigot.

[Lord Jim]

The record shows that what perpetrators are "called" has much more to do with the nature of the acts they commit, then their race. I don't recall Colin Ferguson, (Not the actor; the black Long Island Railroad shooter who killed six and wounded 19) being called a "terrorist". (He was frequently referred to as "mentally ill".)

Nor was Wayne Williams, ( the African-American Atlanta serial killer who murdered 23 children) ever called a terrorist.

Nor are any of the black gang bangers who just in the time since this horrible tragedy in Charleston occurred have in all likelihood collectively killed more than nine African Americans, called terrorists.

Michael Brown stole cigars.

No, Michael Brown was attempting to grab a police officer's gun...

Whenever anyone (like Ms. Butler) continues to include Michael Brown in their list of recent injustices done to black people they might as well just say "I am an intellectually dishonest person who cares nothing at all for actual facts; all that matters is advancing my agenda"....

So when I see that case still being cited in that way it's a red flag that tells me to be highly suspicious of anything else the author has to say.

And for the record, I've characterized the Charleston killer as a "Twisted evil fuck", not "mentally ill"... I have no desire to "humanize" him; he's an evil creature (I think evil in this case really is the best word to use) and the day he is executed I will be happy to see that justice has been done.

[rubato]

Shooters of color are called ‘terrorists’ and ‘thugs.’ Why are white shooters called ‘mentally ill’?

This racist media narrative around mass violence falls apart with the Charleston church shooting.

By Anthea Butler June 18 at 1:00 PM

While I would concede her general point that black suspects are treated differently in the press than white ones are I would say that in this case the suspect has a good chance of being mentally ill. Time will tell. It could be that his motives are principally terroristic with little or no effect of mental illness but we cannot know that right now.

And her point is not universally true either:

Timothy McVeigh was called a terrorist, and worse. The Unabomber was called a terrorist. Eric Robert Rudolph was called a terrorist. "White Aryan Resistance" were convicted of being a terrorist group and had to pay damages to the family of an Ethiopian victim of terrorist violence in Portland Ore.


yrs,
rubato

[rubato]

But speaking of terrorism what can you say about a state government which is nakedly racist and and demands the right to make terrorist threats against its black citizens?

By Justin Wm. Moyer The Washington Post June 19, 2015

After Dylann Storm Roof allegedly shot up an AME church in Charleston, S.C., killing nine people, two flags were lowered more than 100 miles away in Columbia, the state’s capital. Atop the South Carolina State House, the US flag and South Carolina’s palmetto flag flew at half-staff as the manhunt for Roof ended with his capture in North Carolina and prayer vigils were planned. The show of respect would have been appropriate even if one of the state legislature’s own — state senator Clementa C. Pinckney — had not died in the attack.

But a third flag within view of the State House — the Confederate stars and bars — flew as high and as proud as ever, flapping in the breeze on a sunny day.

This looked bad.

Roof was photographed wearing flags himself — of defunct white supremacist regimes in South Africa and Rhodesia — and drove a car featuring a Confederate flag license plate. The Emanuel AME Church shooting and its description by authorities as a ‘‘hate crime’’ were tragic enough to be compared to the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., a murderous act that claimed the lives of four young African American girls and helped bring about passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1964.

And yet, as a pastor and members of his flock lay dead and the Supreme Court dealt a blow to those who wish to display Confederate flags on license plates in Texas, South Carolina seemed to be flaunting its heritage of slavery as the first state to secede from the Union. It was deplorable enough, critics said, that the flag was there in the first place.
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But, it seemed, no one — particularly not South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, R — could do anything about it. This was a matter of law.

‘‘In South Carolina, the governor does not have legal authority to alter the flag,’’ a Haley spokesman told ABC on Thursday. ‘‘Only the General Assembly can do that.’’

That seemed strange. On public property all across America — not just at state houses but at schools, libraries, DMVs and tollway plazas — flags are presumably raised and lowered without reference to or permission from legislative bodies.

But South Carolina has been fighting about its capitol’s Confederate flag for decades. Indeed, the flag first went up on the capitol dome in 1962 in defiance of the burgeoning civil rights movement. A cultural war fought a century after the first battle of Fort Sumter followed.

‘‘The flag issue . . . has convulsed the state’s political culture for years, as black and white residents argued over whether the Confederate battle flag is a symbol of slavery and oppression, or of a noble Southern heritage,’’ The New York Times wrote in 2000.

The same flag was flown to celebrate the acquittal of the murderers of Emmitt Till by an all-white jury.


yrs,
rubato

[Big RR]

Well, I think we should give those who lost friends and family a time to mourn before we start to use this horrendous act to make political hay either for or against gun control/2nd amendment, or racism for that matter. There will be plenty of time for that later.

[Lord Jim]

I watched the scumbag's arraignment earlier. They took the unusual step of allowing representatives of the families to make statements. (Scumbag was watching on video from jail; they could see him too.)

I was really struck by the tone of the statements that were made. It has only been two days since their loved ones were taken from them by this callous piece of filth, and there was deep sorrow and grief in their voices, but there was no viciousness or ranker expressed. A couple even said they forgave him. They talked about refusing to hate. Some said they were praying for him...

I guess it shouldn't be that surprising, (after all these are deeply religious folks) but it was really quite amazing to me. These folks are much better people than I am. My statement would probably have been along the lines of, "I CAN HARDLY WAIT TILL YOU'RE ROTTING IN HELL YOU VILE PIECE OF SHIT!"

The contrast between the pure hatefilled evil of this creature and what he did, and the unbelievably forgiving goodness of the these folks, reminds me once again of the extraordinary range of behaviors and attitudes that we homo sapiens are capable of...

[rubato]

Well, I think we should give those who lost friends and family a time to mourn before we start to use this horrendous act to make political hay either for or against gun control/2nd amendment, or racism for that matter. There will be plenty of time for that later.

When someone is killed in a car crash we don't say that's its a bad time to talk about safety belts and airbags.

When a balcony collapses and kills several exchange students we don't say that its a bad time to talk about building inspections.

When people die from eating food contaminated with botulinum toxin we don't say that its a bad time to talk about food safety.

When an airliner crashes ... well &c.

It is only after mass gun deaths that we can't talk about controlling access to guns.


That is why years after Sandy Hook there are fewer restraints on transferring assault rifles to the criminally insane than there were before.


yrs,
rubato

[rubato]

I posted the above because I had seen this earlier today:
\

http://www.vox.com/2015/6/19/8807851/ma ... charleston

Maybe something will change; maybe this time we will manage to act. But it's difficult to be anything but pessimistic, and when I think about why that is, my mind goes back again to Virginia Tech and 2007, when the New Yorker's Adam Gopnik wrote what is, to me, the single most powerful paragraph I have read on the subject.

The cell phones in the pockets of the dead students were still ringing when we were told that it was wrong to ask why. As the police cleared the bodies from the Virginia Tech engineering building, the cell phones rang, in the eccentric varieties of ring tones, as parents kept trying to see if their children were OK. To imagine the feelings of the police as they carried the bodies and heard the ringing is heartrending; to imagine the feelings of the parents who were calling — dread, desperate hope for a sudden answer and the bliss of reassurance, dawning grief — is unbearable. But the parents, and the rest of us, were told that it was not the right moment to ask how the shooting had happened — specifically, why an obviously disturbed student, with a history of mental illness, was able to buy guns whose essential purpose is to kill people — and why it happens over and over again in America. At a press conference, Virginia's governor, Tim Kaine, said, "People who want to ... make it their political hobby horse to ride, I've got nothing but loathing for them. ... At this point, what it's about is comforting family members ... and helping this community heal. And so to those who want to try to make this into some little crusade, I say take that elsewhere."

Many things have been written and will continue to be written on America's gun ownership rate (the highest in the world), its gun violence (the worst in the developed world), and the political and social forces that keep this from changing.

What Gopnik captured was not just the horrific costs of gun violence or the frustrating politics of gun control, but the special sort of anguish that we inflict on ourselves in the United States by forbidding any meaningful conversation around the tragedies that unfold over and over again.

There is an unwritten American rule that the aftermath of a mass shooting is the wrong time to talk about gun control. Even Obama's comments on it, while urgent and even angry, carefully avoided mentioning gun control directly. As Gopnik wrote, this logic would be recognized as absurd if applied to anything else: "the aftermath of a terrorist attack is the wrong time to talk about security, the aftermath of a death from lung cancer is the wrong time to talk about smoking and the tobacco industry, and the aftermath of a car crash is the wrong time to talk about seat belts."

yrs,
rubato\\

[Lord Jim]

That has got to be one of the most moronic political cartoons I have ever laid eyes on....

The cartoonist must be an absolute imbecile. The idea that the confederate flag at the state capitol (whatever you think of it) is somehow responsible for "inspiring" (if that's the right word) this callous monster to gun down nine defenseless people would be laughable if this weren't so sad and serious. If the confederate flag had that kind of influence you'd think this kind of thing would be happening all the time...

I can just see it now..."The Confederate Flag Made Me Do It"...."The Confederate Flag Defense"...

Makes The Twinkie Defense sound reasonable...

The fact is that (thankfully) for a number of decades now, this kind of white on black racist murderous violence has been relatively rare. (Which is why this attracts so much press attention)

But there are definitely some folks who want to try to blow this thing into some sort of evidence that we're still living in the days of Bull Connor... I hear them nattering a way on the cable news stations all day long...

And also those who want to use this tragedy to advance all sorts of political agendas...

The fact of the matter is that while racism remains a real, ugly, and persistent problem, it is more in decline in this country than it has ever been in our entire history. And with each passing year its influence declines further.