How can an 18-year-old be so filled with hate and rage?
Authorities say Payton Gendron, dressed in combat gear and armed with a shotgun and a semi-automatic rifle, opened fire Saturday afternoon outside a supermarket in Buffalo, livestreaming the attack on the internet. Ten people died, including a security guard and some ordinary folks running errands on a spring afternoon. Three others were wounded, and if Gendron hadn’t been apprehended, police say, he planned to kill more innocent people at another store.
It is no coincidence that most of the victims were Black.
Authorities say Gendron, who is white, picked a predominantly Black neighborhood for the attack, and traveled 200 miles to get there. He posted a racist manifesto online before the shooting, and a vicious slur was painted on the barrel of his rifle.
Responsibility for this crime belongs to the perpetrator.
But, for the sake of Aaron Salter Jr., Pearl Young, Heyward Patterson and the other victims of Saturday’s massacre, we cannot ignore the increasing frequency of hate-motivated violence in the United States.
On Saturday, it was Tops Friendly Market. Two years ago, the scene was a Walmart store in El Paso, where an armed man killed 23 people, most of them Latinos. In 2018, the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh and Chabad of Poway in Southern California were targeted. In 2016, a gunman slaughtered 49 people at Pulse, a nightclub in Orlando popular with gay people.
In his manifesto, Gendron said he was inspired by Dylann Roof, a white supremacist who killed nine Black people attending a prayer meeting at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.
Mass shootings are only part of the equation.
Here in the Bay Area and in many other cities across the country, brutal assaults on Asian people have been all too common since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, which originated in China. Antisemitic flyers turned up recently outside homes in Napa and other communities, and just last week we received a letter to the editor filled with vile antisemitic tropes and signed by a local resident who apparently is proud to share his poisonous views with the world. His screed won’t be published.
Racism and bigotry are nothing new, and they aren’t unique to America. However, conspiracies from the darkest corners of the internet are becoming mainstream. They are echoed by opportunistic politicians, even ranking members of Congress, and exploited for ratings by cable news outlets. One such notion is that white people’s political power is being diluted by intentionally increasing minority populations. Gendron promoted this apocalyptic vision of a “great replacement.”
For those who choose to act on white nationalist ideology, firearms are readily available. Gendron is barely an adult and reportedly threatened to shoot up his high school a year ago. Yet he was able to legally obtain an AR-15 rifle.
While we’re no less committed to red-flag laws and other gun safety measures, the sad fact is there are more firearms than people in this country. And the political will to restrict access, even for those who pose a clear danger, is sadly lacking.
No one who favors common-sense gun safety laws should wave a white flag. But waiting for them to solve the problem only ensures more violence. What can we do? Don’t tolerate the irrational hatred that permeates our culture. Change the channel. Call out racist and bigoted remarks. Take threats seriously — at home, at work, at school, in public places. If you see something, say something.
We grieve for the victims in Buffalo. To honor their loss, let us confront this epidemic of hatred and rededicate ourselves to America’s founding ideals of justice and equality for all.
(Jim Sweeney writes for The Press Democrat of Santa Rosa, Calif.)
