TW: discussions of violence, gun violence, anti-Blackness, distortion of mental illness.
This week's opening thought: I grew up in Detroit, Michigan, in the 80s and 90s. At that time, Detroit was considered the most dangerous city in the United States. Its homicide rate was astronomical, with much of it attributed to gun violence. Growing up, my siblings and I grew accustomed to ducking and seeking cover at the sound of gunshots. As with most things related to the intersections of poverty, classism, systemic oppression, white supremacy, and anti-Blackness, politicians and pundits viewed gun violence in Black communities as an issue of values and upbringing. My community, Black communities, were told that the lack of fathers in our homes, a deficiency in morals, and a lack of “American values” were the catalyst for the gun violence in our neighborhoods. We were blamed for the gun violence in our communities, which increased the danger my community faced.
Then Columbine happened.
White U.S. Americans were shocked when the Columbine High School massacre happened in the Spring of 1999. As the news cycle ran with the story, the white shock became excuses and rationalizations for why two young white men killed thirteen people. White media ran with the narrative that these young white men had “lost their way.” Suddenly mental health and other conditions mattered because these young men “were raised by good families.” They were “good young men” who shouldn’t be judged too harshly for their murderous actions.
Fast forward to 2023, and the United States of America has had 199 mass shootings in less than five months. White men perpetrated all but a handful. The same excuses are used for their heinous actions over twenty years after Columbine. Meanwhile, Black communities are still facing the same hurdles with policing on physical and moral levels as poverty and generational trauma ignite gun violence in oppressed communities.
The wildest part of these two completely different narratives and treatments around gun violence in Black and white communities?
No one ever wants to talk about the damn guns.
In all this, the proliferation of and access to guns are never labeled as the issue they are.
After the past few weeks, with a mass shooting occurring almost every 48 hours, I'm confident that guns matter more than human lives in the United States. I'm more confident than I've ever been. Why?
Because whiteness has proven that it doesn't care about white lives over the right to own a gun and use it as you please.
And if whiteness will make excuses for white people gunning down other white people and white children while going out of its way to look past the elephant in the room?
Then the rest of us are chopped liver.
Once again, if whiteness won’t deal with its sh— and the harm it causes- we all suffer.
But you know, morals and a good upbringing and whatnot.
