Sunday, April 15, 2012

The Solomons at Newsweek now weigh in on the Dedmon case

Newsweek magazine sent a reporter down here to get the "real" story about the Dedmon case. The reporter spends most of the article discussing the question of whether Deryl Demon was racist:

“I was young and dumb, ignorant and full of hatred,” Dedmon told the court. But just what did that hatred mean?

I went to Mississippi to find out, and what I discovered was deeper, scarier, and more complex than a single country boy gone bad or even simple, pre-civil-rights-era racism. In fact, the kids in Dedmon’s social circle don’t think they’re racist at all. Sure, many use the N word, sometimes even in anger. But they say they don’t mean it in a racist way, any more than the town’s monument to the Confederate dead is meant as a call to arms. “It’s heritage, not hate,” says Trevor, echoing a common defense of Southern pride. The trips to west Jackson, he and others believe, were driven by social status—reveling in the lawlessness of poor neighborhoods—not skin color. Surprisingly, besides the boys’ mothers, their black friends tend to agree.

The Dedmon case is shocking for many reasons, but none more disturbing than this belief that a churchgoing white teenager could kill a blameless African-American man he called a “xxxxx” and not be a racist. By all legal definitions, what he did was a hate crime. And yet it also appears to have been a chillingly unacknowledged one—an extreme example of white people doing racist things while rejecting the R word itself. David Duke. George Wallace. James Watson. Michael Richards. Don Imus. The list is long and always growing, the rolls swelling in banal and not-so-banal ways. At root, all this “nonracism” reflects a national confusion—now that police dogs and burning crosses are behind us—about just what a 21st-century racist is.." Article

Posted by Kingfish at 7:05 PM

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

There used to be a national magazine called Newsweek. Wonder where it went. Sold Subscriptions and everything. You could pick them up when you bought your U.S. News and World Report. Or Look. Or Life. Or Mad.

April 15, 2012 at 7:30 PM
Anonymous said...

I'm sure that one of the last remaining Clarion Ledger
veterans is having chest pains now that Newsweek
stole his next article.

At the same time, multiple orgasms are probably occurring at an undisclosed fondren print shop.

April 15, 2012 at 8:04 PM
Ironghost said...

Newsweak finds something confusing? I'm stunned.

April 15, 2012 at 8:59 PM
Avery Wiseman said...

I almost didn't read the full article, but now I'm glad I did. Thanks for posting that. Most (even around here) fail to comprehend that this crime and the mentality that fostered it is more nuanced than 60's-style racism. This whole event always seemed like a weak actor from a higher status class (middle class suburbanite) taking aim at a weak victim in a lower status class (poor urbanite). Hate crime laws do not capture the divisions and prejudices these days. That's why they're a "blunt instrument" as the author notes. It's really too bad Newsweek is irrelevant these days because that is an article people should read.

April 15, 2012 at 9:37 PM
Shadowfax said...

Observing society from that lofty perch again, are you, Avery? Mimosa?

April 16, 2012 at 5:08 AM
Anonymous said...

In a free society, I think it a very bad idea to criminalize " thought" and that, in the end , is what hate crimes laws do.

That said, if a society accepts hate to the point that our children see humans who are different ( in any way) as less worthy of life, we ought to give that some thought rather than dismiss it or get defensive.

We have blurred the line between being personally threatened and seeing everyone who doesn't think or look like us as a threat. Today, we hate individuals we've never met with the same passion once reserved for those who personally did us injury.

We villify public figures with whom we have nothing more than philosophical or life style differences, for Pete's sake. And, we expect children and young people to understand the difference in the threat levels?

And, to confuse children more, we claim to be Christians while we are villifying some public figure when love and compassion is Jesus' message.

Children need clarity and consistency not mixed messages.

April 16, 2012 at 7:54 AM

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If you get tired come relax at the Fox News Tent. To gain admittance to the VIP section, bring either your Republican Party ID card or a Rebel Flag. Bringing both will entitle you to free drinks.Get your tickets now. Since this is an event for trolls, no ID is required, just bring the hate. Bring the family, Trollfest '07 is for EVERYONE!!!

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