On May 14, 2022, the city of Buffalo, New York, was the site of yet another mass shooting. Another shooting by yet another so-called “lone wolf”. Yet another killer who spouted fascist and racist rhetoric about a “theory” regurgitated by certain fascist media personalities and politicians. A domestic terrorist who does not deserve being named in this article.
And the thing I hear from politicians and media personalities is that “this isn’t us”. That we are somehow better than the violence and the rhetoric espoused by this so-called “lone wolf” killer and by the various media personalities and politicians. That this isn’t what America represents or what its people represent.
We keep saying it and saying it.
And yet... this really is us.
Not everyone, obviously, but there are enough people in America that do think the same way as our so-called “lone wolf”. Enough to justify and excuse the rhetoric being espoused and to defend their past statements as somehow not being “like” those of said “lone wolf” who will go unnamed. Enough for certain agitators to declare that these “lone wolf” incidents are somehow staged to frame the fascists and like-minded people.
To say that “not everyone in America is like that” is like when guys say “not all men are abusive sexist pigs” when confronted with accusations of misogyny. You’re not going to win, no matter how right you may be with the facts.
We have about one-third of Americans who blindly support a malignant nationalist narcissist with a history of supremacist leanings. Almost half the voters in 2020 voted to re-elect said narcissist, even with his supremacist leanings laid bare. It is only because of the quirk in how we elect U.S. Presidents that said narcissist is not in the White House as of this article.
When racists and/or nationalists marched in Charlottesville in 2017 with their polo shirts and tiki torches chanting “You will not replace us” and “The Jews will not replace us”, they were regurgitating the same “replacement theory” uttered by their German counterparts almost a hundred years ago. The same “theory” uttered by a young man who drove out of his way to an El Paso Walmart and opened fire in 2019 and murdered 22 people. The same theory uttered today by the so-called “lone wolf” in Buffalo. Instead of being condemned by “most people” in 2017, it went mainstream, with media personalities on so-called “conservative” media services regurgitating it and like-minded politicians running for office and getting elected and re-elected because of it.
One racial group’s peaceful protests are met with arrests and legislation that allow drivers to run said protesters over, while another racial group’s repeated acts of hostile and even violent insurrection are dismissed as “legitimate political discourse”. State governments dominated by the same political faction talking about “replacement theory” are passing laws that outlaw the discussion of race in schools. One state is going so far as to claim it is illegal – in business or school – to talk about subjects that make a certain dominant racial group feel “uncomfortable”.
Math books are even being censored. Math! Not just history or civics books, but mathematics!
Tell me again how we’re supposedly “better than this” and “this isn’t us”.
Let’s get brutally honest here... for a good portion of America, this *is* us. It may not be “most” or even “half”, but it is sizable enough to perpetuate nationalist and supremacist ideas. It is sizeable enough to enact nationalist and supremacist policies and legislation in certain parts of this country. It is sizeable enough for nationalist and supremacist ideas to be spread on mainstream media outlets, and not just through little email groups and dark web chat services.
For a good portion of America, this is us. They are cut from the same cloth as the tiki torch carriers in Charlottesville, and the shooters in El Paso and Buffalo. The very people who are behind nationalist and supremacist legislation passed in state houses and hypocritical policies in local governments. The same ones who listen and agree with the media personalities that continually spread that “replacement” theory and then vote for the politicians who talk about them on the campaign trail.
And no amount of denial by pundits and politicians will ever change that. The stains of our past are still there, being propped up and defended and codified and reinforced while the rest of us still say “this isn’t really us.”
No, it’s not “everyone”, but it is still sizeable enough to damn us all.
It shouldn’t be, though.
We need to stop saying “this isn’t us” and start saying “this should not be us”. This should not be who we are seen as. We should be better than this. We should be, but we’re not.
The first step in dealing with a problem is admitting that you have one. Saying “this isn’t us” is living in denial. Saying “this should not be us” means we know there’s a problem, and that we have to address before there is another El Paso or Buffalo incident.
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