Standing in line at the California Science Center the day of the mass murder at Sandy Hook Elementary school, my students wondered aloud about the race of the shooter. “More than likely he was white,” they agreed. As the only people of color waiting to be admitted to the exhibit, their open question about race elicited visible unease from a group of elderly white women across the line from us.
According to a Mother Jones timeline of mass shootings from the 1980s to the present, the majority of American mass murderers have been white males. The most infamous young killers—the Columbine High shooters, Jared Loughner, James Holmes, and now Adam Lanza—share a common cultural theme and national narrative. “Deranged” loners who came from lower to upper middle class nuclear families, their murder sprees forever shattered white suburbia’s veneer of normalcy. Over the past decade, the post-mass murder mantra has been grindingly familiar—“this couldn’t/shouldn’t/wouldn’t happen HERE, in our idyllic (white) suburban community.” Catastrophic violence is implicitly marked as the province of the other, the inner city, the cesspit jungle where poor children (of color), according to GOP sage Newt Gingrich, have no work ethic and thus no “habit of I do this and you give me cash, unless it is illegal.”
And yet, methodically plotted acts of epic violence committed by young white males with mini arsenals aping video game assassins are increasingly the hallmark of “HERE”. So no doubt the elderly white women’s unease came from a sense of deep existential displacement. When you’ve been suckled on Ozzie and Harriet, its “hard” to have your whiteness referenced as a source of violence; especially by people of color.
As the unraced universal subject, white people are simply unaccustomed to being explicitly identified as white. For many, the tired colorblind party line of white privilege means that just talking about race is racist. Universal means normal, and even the most heinous white criminals (Gacy, Bundy, Dahmer, and the list goes on) are humanized by a back story of psychoanalysis, cable TV biopics, books, and pop culture reportage. The wages of whiteness means not having to know the classic people of color ritual—i.e., that when big crime news breaks its pro forma for many African Americans and Latinos to find out the race of the perpetrator and then those of the victims. If the perpetrator is white there is a collective sigh of relief that Middle America won’t have another dark savage, immigrant or Muslim community to demonize. If the victims are of color, there is a short window before the media’s attention fades (ala the August massacre of six at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin) and shifts to more important matters like Lindsey Lohan or missing white girls.
Black and brown children learn very early on that perceptions of race and criminality are intimately connected. In high school when my friends and I found ourselves at the business end of Inglewood PD officers’ rifles because someone in our car “looked” like a burglary suspect, it was a rite of passage initiation. The killing of African American teenager Trayvon Martin was a lightening rod because American youth of color saw the failure to bring his killer to justice as symptomatic of the devaluation of their lives. Guilty until proven innocent, youth of color never have the privilege of being universally perceived as the “nice” boy (as Lanza has been described) or girl next door that wouldn’t hurt a fly.
According to a 2010 Blair-Rockefeller survey, many whites in post-racial America believe that blacks and Latinos are more lazy, unintelligent, and untrustworthy than either whites or Asians. If white Middle America views people of color as not having “white” values and “white” aptitude levels, then it’s no mystery why mainstream media pathologize people of color as naturally criminal and violent. Black criminality can be boiled down to a rancid stew of shiftlessness, absentee fatherhood, and irresponsible motherhood. Latino criminality stems from too much babymaking and gangbanging. But like the moribund immigrant urban jungle of 19th social reformer Jacob Riis’ nightmares, it’s the “inner city” that’s the guilty co-defendant.
Nonetheless, mass murder in an urban context is rare and mass shootings in schools of color are virtually unheard of. Homicide is a leading cause of death for young African American men. But contrary to the rap stereotype of Glock-toting men of color, an overwhelming majority of people of color are pro-gun control, while the majority of the white electorate is not. The high school assailants in the Littleton, Colorado, the Jonesboro, Arkansas; and Santee, California shootings were steeped in a NRA besotted gun culture that fetishizes readily available firearms as the ultimate medium for violent white masculinity.
However, these youth were instantly transformed into symbols of troubled, tragically “misunderstood” teens. National conversations about the perils of bullying dominated the airwaves. It was accepted that these tragic figures were “our boys,” our recklessly wasted youth. It was conventional wisdom that preventive mental health resources could have minimized their inner turmoil. As the bloggers Three Sonorans note in their piece, “White Privilege and Mass Murder in America,” “whenever white men commit mass murders it is just a freak isolated incident, but when we look at other crime statistics for minorities the reason given is that it is something innate to their culture, to their family. It is those people.”
With Columbine there was tacit understanding that these boys’ acts were symptomatic of a potentially imperiled national heritage. Conversely, any time violence erupts in a black or Latino context it’s a racial indictment, an indictment of a community, not a reflection on the rogue acts of lost boys from salt of the earth homes.
As my students and I left the Science center, bracing for more news about the scope of the attack, it was clear that the tragedy would dominate the news for weeks to come. The senseless slaughter of children from the “perfect” town may finally prompt serious bipartisan legislation to curb the barbaric gun lobby. But it will not prompt analysis of the violent masculinity at the heart of whiteness. And if any of these nice white boy shooters had been black the national sentiment would have echoed the biting comment made by my student Jamion: “Send those niggers back to Africa.”
Sikivu Hutchinson is the author of Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars. and the forthcoming Godless Americana: Race and Religious Rebels due in 2013.
You said it! Thanks for saying what so many of us are thinking and feeling right now.
Well done, Sikivu! I will be sharing this on my FB page!
What is troubling is also the immediate vague reference to the shooter having had some kind of a ‘developmental’ disorder without any real kind of evidence!
” But it will not prompt analysis of the violent masculinity at the heart of whiteness…”
That’s a shockingly racist statement!
Imagine if in an article about crime in black areas, someone concluded that there was a ” But it will not prompt analysis of the violent masculinity at the heart of blackness…” lol!
the real answer:
all of these school massacres, without exception , have been committed by young men who were over medicated, often from an early age, with powerful psychotropic drugs – antidepressants, ritalin, etc.
one of the known side effects of these drugs is increased risk of suicide and violence.
the UK has even banned the use of certain of them , like Paxil, on children because the risk is so severe.
For whatever reason – cultural, economic – black parents do not overmedicate their children at nearly the same rates as white parents.
in this way they have spared their children the opportunity of going violently berserk like the white boys.
I guess so missed the point. She was saying exactly that about how violence in black and latino males is explained in the media as that it has everything to do with their race.
There’s nothing racist about the statement, it’s an observation
One of the most dangerous side effects of NOT medicating some of the children you refer to is a far more increased risk of suicide and violence (I speak as a parent who medicates her child). Can you imagine the widespread violence if some of the white boys weren’t on meds?
DENIAL
There’s no excuss for crime no matter the color.. however,dont blame “mental Illness for a excuss for murder… If it was a black manor young man who commented that crime at that school would be labled as a MURDER.Really the meds…..
I agree with you, but there is a statistical correlation between mass murder, male and medication. Approx. 55% of these crimes are caused by males that are deemed “crazy” and are (were) medicated. Fortunately, these crimes are statistical anomalies, representing 1%-2% of all murders.
The author forgot to mention that when mass killing happen, although it is more likely to be a white male, that is only because white non hispanic’s are the majority in this country.
Interesting Criminology Figures:
African Amer. men commit 22% of mass murder, but AA’s only comprise 12% of the US population(half of which are women). White men commit mass murder 62.9% despite white people composing 66% of the population (half of which are women). 16% other.
We know that minorities are overrepresented in mass murder we just don’t know why. Far too many variables, though mental health might be a cause.
Thank you for this very important essay, Sikivu Hutchinson. Here is another written by Tim Wise that is a part of this crucial conversation. Make note of the date of publication here — 2001. And still….
http://www.timwise.org/2001/03/school-shootings-and-white-denial/
I don’t have to imagine this, since people write things like this in the mainstream media regularly. Google the words “black crime America” and click on virtually any link.
Finally,you and few other people are saying what needs to be said. There is pathology attached to white privilege that makes it a danger to any American, and yes, that includes other white people as well.
I take objection to the notion of ‘the violent masculinity at the heart of whiteness’–prejudice is prejudice, whatever the sex or skin colour of the person displaying it–but otherwise I thank you for a very worthy piece
Russell, this author depicts how our current media reports as well as cultural bias between the races – generalizing of course … the thing to note here is that 72% of these mass killings since the 80′s are caucasian middle class male ~ historically, the white male has perpetrated on many groups, for example:
The consistent demographic of the perpetrator – caucasian male.
MASS KILLINGS not necessarily Gun Related
US govt ordered mass killings of Native Americans
Mass killings of African Americans
Mass killings of women – the witch hunts and currently DAILY MURDERS of women & girls
GUN RELATED
Mass shootings
1700s
Boston Massacre
1800s
Dawson Massacre
New York City draft riots
Haymarket affair
1900s
Columbine Mine massacre
Kansas City massacre
Peoples Temple massacre
San Ysidro McDonald’s massacre
GMAC massacre
2000s
Indianapolis mass murder
Knoxville Unitarian Universalist church shooting
Binghamton shootings
2009 Pittsburgh police shootings
Fort Hood shooting
2011 Tucson shooting
2011 Grand Rapids, Michigan mass murder
2012 Tulsa shooting
2012 Aurora shooting
Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting
School shootings
1960s
University of Texas massacre
1970s
Olean High School shooting
California State University, Fullerton massacre
Cleveland Elementary School shooting
1980s
49th Street Elementary School shooting
Hubbard Woods School shooting
Cleveland School massacre
1990s
University of Iowa shooting
Lindhurst High School shooting
Bard College at Simon’s Rock shooting
East Carter High School shooting
Wickliffe Middle School shooting
Blackville-Hilda High School shooting
Richland High School shooting
Frontier Middle School shooting
San Diego State University shooting
Hetzel Union Building shooting
Bethel Regional High School shooting
Pearl High School shooting
Heath High School shooting
Westside Middle School massacre
Parker Middle School dance shooting
Thurston High School shooting
Columbine High School massacre
Heritage High School shooting
2000s
Buell Elementary School shooting
Lake Worth Middle School shooting
Santana High School shooting
Appalachian School of Law shooting
John McDonogh High School shooting
Red Lion Area Junior High School shooting
Case Western Reserve University shooting
Rocori High School shooting
Red Lake Senior High School massacre
Campbell County High School shooting
Platte Canyon High School hostage crisis
Weston High School shooting
Amish school shooting
Virginia Tech massacre
Delaware State University shooting
SuccessTech Academy shooting
E.O. Green School shooting
Northern Illinois University shooting
Central High School shooting
University of Central Arkansas shootings
2010s
University of Alabama in Huntsville shooting
Ohio State University shooting
Millard South High School shooting
2011 Virginia Tech shooting
Chardon High School shooting
Oikos University shooting
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting
Thank you for writing this, I’ve been talking this up as well as the use of mental illness as the omnipotent red herring, as if this is an individually isolated incident based on bad brains.
I’ve never read you before and I don’t normally go to any site that has ‘feminist’ in it because I find it typically unbalanced and unfair to men through gross generalizations.
You almost cleared that admitted prejudice in my reading – a prejudice, I might add, that feminists might want to consider because up to a point men like myself are in agreement with you on many issues. As Russell rightly pointed out, you lost me at ‘the violent masculinity at the heart of whiteness’. Fortunately you left that til the last paragraph and, honestly, I wish you hadn’t used it at all. But if that is how you truly feel, you should write it.
And so – agreeing on everything else, I will respond: ‘the violent masculinity at the heart of whiteness’. This would imply that there is a violent femininity, all things being equal – because we are, yes? – and then there’s the ‘whiteness’, the perpetuation of our American ‘caucasian’ stereotype that has no basis in science (really, look it up).
It does seem very peculiar that after such a well thought and well written piece that you would practice the inverse of what you preach in one line, a venomous one, perhaps thinking no one who would find it venomous would be about.
Thank you for the opportunity to not criticize your writing – for that is quite a treat – but the thought behind that one line. Be well.
I think you’re missing the point. This isn’t about something innate in race or gender. It’s about the effects of privilege, both white privilege and male privilege, on these young men and how that is exhibited in mass killings. It is a privilege that makes some young men feel that they are entitled to something, and if they do not receive it then they will share their pain with many others and get theirs in terms of infamy. This is obviously a generalization, but certainly one worth looking in to.
Consistent demographic of violence: MALE
Yes, some women are violent.. however, the numbers are extremely few compared to their counterpart. And when a woman acts out violently, it is NEWS throughout the world.
The consistent demographic of the perpetrator of the following – caucasian male.
MASS KILLINGS not necessarily Gun Related
US govt ordered mass killings of Native Americans
Mass killings of African Americans
Mass killings of women – the witch hunts and currently DAILY MURDERS of women & girls
GUN RELATED
Mass shootings
1700s
Boston Massacre
1800s
Dawson Massacre
New York City draft riots
Haymarket affair
1900s
Columbine Mine massacre
Kansas City massacre
Peoples Temple massacre
San Ysidro McDonald’s massacre
GMAC massacre
2000s
Indianapolis mass murder
Knoxville Unitarian Universalist church shooting
Binghamton shootings
2009 Pittsburgh police shootings
Fort Hood shooting
2011 Tucson shooting
2011 Grand Rapids, Michigan mass murder
2012 Tulsa shooting
2012 Aurora shooting
Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting
School shootings
1960s
University of Texas massacre
1970s
Olean High School shooting
California State University, Fullerton massacre
Cleveland Elementary School shooting
1980s
49th Street Elementary School shooting
Hubbard Woods School shooting
Cleveland School massacre
1990s
University of Iowa shooting
Lindhurst High School shooting
Bard College at Simon’s Rock shooting
East Carter High School shooting
Wickliffe Middle School shooting
Blackville-Hilda High School shooting
Richland High School shooting
Frontier Middle School shooting
San Diego State University shooting
Hetzel Union Building shooting
Bethel Regional High School shooting
Pearl High School shooting
Heath High School shooting
Westside Middle School massacre
Parker Middle School dance shooting
Thurston High School shooting
Columbine High School massacre
Heritage High School shooting
2000s
Buell Elementary School shooting
Lake Worth Middle School shooting
Santana High School shooting
Appalachian School of Law shooting
John McDonogh High School shooting
Red Lion Area Junior High School shooting
Case Western Reserve University shooting
Rocori High School shooting
Red Lake Senior High School massacre
Campbell County High School shooting
Platte Canyon High School hostage crisis
Weston High School shooting
Amish school shooting
Virginia Tech massacre
Delaware State University shooting
SuccessTech Academy shooting
E.O. Green School shooting
Northern Illinois University shooting
Central High School shooting
University of Central Arkansas shootings
2010s
University of Alabama in Huntsville shooting
Ohio State University shooting
Millard South High School shooting
2011 Virginia Tech shooting
Chardon High School shooting
Oikos University shooting
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting
There are a lot of good points in this article, but the overall premise is flawed. Per Mother Jones data, 72% of mass murders are by white males. 72% is exactly the proportion of whites in America.
You left out one other excuse for the Sandy Hook shootings that is being offered for mass consumption: Psychotropic medications (prosac, ritalin, etc.). I think satirist/comedic genius Mr. Paul Mooney summed it up best when he said, when whites commit crimes, the media, the courts, the white public at large will find a “medical”/”psychological” excuse for that criminal and his/her actions.
I’m paraphrasing of course…
Judge: “White person why did you shoot up everyone at your job?” White Criminal: I don’t know. I can’t remember…I think have multiple personalities. Judge: Hmmm, this is a case for further study and psychological research. Now flip the script and make the accused a black person. Judge: Black Person why did you shoot up everyone at your job? Black Criminal: I don’t know. I can’t remember. I think I have multiple personalities. Judge: Well, N#$#%a one of those personalities is going to jail, pick one. 100 years in jail should help your remember!
Just over thirteen years ago I wrote a piece that was published in METRO EXCHANGE, a NY newspaper predominately concerning black issues. COLUMBINE IN BLACK & WHITE is posted on my blog at http://9Percenters.blogspot.com/columbine-in-black-white_04.html It’s worth the read for those of you that have read Hutchinson’s NICE WHITE BOYS ….
A very telling and legitimate analysis and yes one that many of us have thought about and marveled at as we observe the dynamics of the media and citizenry whenever these mass killings occur.
I’ve shared this article on my blog for I find it a definite must read!
I like much of what is said here but the statement should read “the violence at the heart of humans”. Cruelty and murder knows no race or bounds or gender. How it is perceived may be different on an individual level and in reporting by the media. Statistics may indicate that you are more or less likely to do something based on your colour, gender, etc, but anger and violence lies in all of us, some just know how to control it better.
Interesting article, there is a lot of compelling information. Makes me wonder the real truth: that these young boys have this thing called a brain which for men in all honesty is not fully developed until @ age twenty eight. During the teenage years this puts their brains at tremendous risk of making poor decisions (Due to the lack of fully functioning and mature cerebral cortex withTHE AVAILABILITY OF mass murder devices and we have a bad scenario waiting to unfold).
Guns cost money, Money is common in white household, also guns are too.
This is a Roman culture. Romans built great colesiums to chill an watch violence and death over popcorn, The technology of killing and torture has an origin that seem male and Northern based. So my point is that it may not be as much due to race as it is wrong person wrong time. How we react to the situtation is totally determined by how we have been conditioned. We usaully don’t attribute the acts of one white person to the whole race unless it is a good thing. George Washington wasthe father of this country. However he owned hundreds of slave and did not free them. Yet we call this the land of the free. July forth can’t be independence dat because a significant portion of the population was held as slaves. Slap in the face to blacks (my great grand parents were slaves. I have a grandfather who was born in 1890, go back thrity years and what is still legal in America.) As it has been said this culture(Roman) loves violence. I don’t know many men who own guns to hunt because they are starving for food. What is the main driver for hunters, you see the truth is the Killing ape is bloodthirsty and hads a need to be wash in the blood of the living;)
I think the comment that if a black boy had committed these murders, the “national sentiment” would be “Send those n*ggers back to Africa” is over-exaggeration bordering on hyperbole. Racism exists, and attitudes toward blacks in America are far from friendly and trusting (as the linked survey indicates). And I both note and agree with the conclusion that such a crime committed by a white boy is a mental illness and such a crime committed by a black boy would likely be blamed on culture, poor parenting, etc. I even understand why someone who has experienced racism here, even been overwhelmed by it, would FEEL like that would be the sentiment of the nation. But it wouldn’t be. It just wouldn’t…sure SOME would say it, but they are not the mainstream, and they are shunned by popular and average culture (and they resent that shunning, too). While what we are now is not what we should be, we have made a LONG journey from the racism of the 1950s, where such a comment would go unnoticed. Someone saying, even in the event of a mass shooting by a black teen, “Send ‘em back to Africa” would be castigated by vocal antiracists, shunned and avoided by the more hesitant and non-confrontational average Joes and Janes, and absolutely figuratively butchered by the mainstream media, if they managed to get on the air at all. Such vocal, blatant racism is simply NOT socially acceptable. A black (or Latino) perpetrator of such a crime would not be given the same benefit of the doubt as Adam, but neither would it result in socially-sanctioned mass deportation, hypothetical or otherwise.
I am sure it’s aggravating and depressing to see such butchery treated with such understanding and suspect that it wouldn’t apply in your situation, or that of your brother or son. I am not saying NOT to be frustrated and depressed by that sadly true reality. What I *am* saying is to avoid letting that depressing truth take you down the domino line to despair. Our culture is NOT just a series of slippery slopes, and there IS a line of racism that mainstream America — yes, mainstream, white America — does not cross. Racism is real, it happens, and it’s enraging and horrible…but if we’ve come as far as we have from Martin Luther King’s everyday reality, we CAN keep going.
I’m sure that the area in which you live might lead you to think that people are not as racist as some say they are in this country, but places like that (usually metropolitan areas) are rare. Most places in this country are not progressive. America is still largely made up of nearly or purely white “all-American” towns of people who are blinded by their whiteness and the privilege it affords them. Since much (not all, but a lot) of mainstream America is still based on that culture (e.g. Standard American English is based on the Midwestern regional dialects), it is not a huge leap to say that those people constitute mainstream America.
“We have made a LONG journey from the racism of the 1950s, where such a comment would go unnoticed.” -True, racist statements are scrutinized, but mostly because it is harder for much of anything to go unnoticed these days. Technology has made information travel fast and to untold numbers of people very quickly, and the chances of someone saying this without backlash are slim to none. Still, for people with enough boldness, things like this are said time and time again not just in public, but even more so behind closed doors.
We have not progressed as a society because people just decided not to be racist. It took photos and footage of people being lynched, spat on, kicked, hosed and worse for some people’s consciences to be roused. From that came tougher anti-discrimination laws that forced people to coexist, although the people who committed those race crimes have largely still not gotten over their racial hatred. It’s even worse for those that up and went away to the suburbs. One of the main reasons we have suburbs is that white people don’t have to deal with “others,” so their prejudices aren’t going to go away.
The peoples of color have been maligned and portrayed as killers yet none and no other race has killed like the white race. They stick their heads in the sand and pretend “not me,” when it has always and continues to be “white people.” Do people of color start wars or is that white people? Do people of color make weapons of mass destruction? Do people of color make germ warfare? Was it people of color that invented the Atom bomb and dropped it on nations of people? Millions and millions of people have died under white people. It is white folks fascinated by death – do people of color dive out of airplanes, and ride dangerous waves, and bungee jump and do all the death defying antics that white people do? Nope. So, why is it that anyone is surprised when finally someone speaks up and tells the truth.
“Do people of color start wars or is that white people?” This question is so strange. Is your knowledge of history limited only to Europe? Your next 3 questions are technologial in nature. All 3 were white innovations but China, India, and others now have nukes. Iraq used chemical weapons on Iran and the Kurds.
This technology question is interesting. Its almost a shame that Europe had such an overwhelming technological advantage during the Age of Discovery. You can imagine it was similar to what an alien invasion of Earth would look like to us today. You see this giant ships appear from nowhere. From these ships come creatures you’ve never seen before wearing strange shining armor. When they come to meet you they are riding these giant beasts that tower over you. They carry mighty weapons that blow smoke and make incredibly loud noises. Imagine how powerless the natives must have felt. On the flip side, it most likely gave the Europeans an overwhelming sense of superiority. You start to realize how 250(!) Spanish could conquer an entire empire like the Incas. I’m sure the scenario played out in large parts of Africa as well.
I’m adding to the plethora of comments to just say thanks for a very important and socially conscious article. I have sent it to everyone in my address book