Saturday, October 3, 2015

Weekend Semi-Open Thread: A Refresher. Aggrieved White Male Entitlement Syndrome and the Oregon Mass Shooter Chris Harper Mercer

As is our habit and tradition, please do consider this a weekend semi-open thread.

I am working on a longer piece about masculinity, violence, race, and last week's most recent mass shooting spree by Chris Harper Mercer in Oregon.

The police authorities are being silent about Mercer's purported manifesto. We do know that he likely had white supremacist leanings, may have been a Satanist, and that his writings may have featured virulently racist ramblings about black men and sex. Mercer is a product of the "Men's Rights" and other semi-intellectual sewers where insecure men go to stroke one another.

Guns, race, violence, and masculinity are highly correlated (if not unitary) with one another. The question is not if these variables are in play with Chris Harper Mercer but rather how.

I have written about these questions in regards to both Dylann Roof and Elliot Rodger.

http://www.salon.com/2014/05/29/elliot_rodgers_half_white_male_privilege/

Sociologist Michael Kimmel, who has been a guest on The Chauncey DeVega Show, also has some essential thoughts and insights on matters of race and masculinity to offer:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-kimmel/americas-angry-white-men_b_4182486.html

Joan Walsh, former Editor of Salon, also offered the following comments on Elliot Rodger that will likely also apply to Mercer:

http://www.salon.com/2014/05/29/elliot_rodgers_half_white_male_privilege/

How are you putting together the puzzle in plain sight that is Chris Harper Mercer? Why are the police concealing evidence about Mercer? By comparison, if Chris Harper Mercer was a "Muslim" terrorist there likely would have been a press conference and info dump about his motives, manifesto, and life. Why the difference with Mercer?

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