February 15, 2008

NIU Shooting: what's wrong with White culture?

Please excuse the title if it's a tad disrespectful.

The NIU shooting is definately as strange as it is tragic. If you read a little bit about the gunman, you'll find that those who knew him didn't find anything troubling about him. He studied criminal justice and according to the Associated Press he was interested in political violence and even social justice. There was also no suicide note.

So all we can really do is ask, "Why did he do it?" Because white people aren't violent, are they? Nice, hard working white guys don't do bad things. If Kazmierczak (the NIU gunman) were black, how many headlines would read "What's Wrong with Black Culture?" How many pundits would be asking the same thing?

I'm trying to balance out the universe in some way. I know that this guy was nice, had no criminal record and no history of mental illness, so the question of "Why on earth would he do this?" is certainly a valid one. It's just that I know a black man of the same reputation committing this crime would surely be villainized in the media. So, to keep everything equal, I'm just going to leave it at this: what's wrong with white people (like me) ?

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