GUNN

Colored Killers Need Understanding Too, Right?

Another mass shooting and another mass media faux investigation attempting to answer the question; why and how did this happen? One thing is for sure, if the answer to the question is possible mental illness than you can bet the perpetrator of the mass shooting most likely is white. You see the narrative goes like this; Black or Latino men who commit crimes (like drive-by-shootings) are thugs or monsters. Brown men (of Middle East origin) who commit crimes are terrorists or evil doers. White men who commit mass shootings suffer from mental illness and the country as a whole is to blame because we failed to act in a timely manner by not properly diagnosing them and getting them the help they needed.
 
There is a sort of empathy and humanizing concerning these non-minorities mass shooters. The media researches and investigates their schooling, family life and attempts to examine them on a psychological level in hopes of understanding what went wrong and why they acted so violently. For the Black and Brown there isn’t really an in depth analysis. The solution is the same; lock them up and throw away the key or bomb them to oblivion.
 
Take for instance the report by Howard Spivak M.D., director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division of Violence Prevention. In 2012 Dr. Spivak presented his research to a congressional briefing detailing how up to 30% of inner city youth may suffer from PTSD. Two years later and this issue goes viral because one reporter echoed the phrase “Hood Disease” on air. Now this real and serious issue has been marginalized by the media and the “pull yourself up by your boot straps” naysayers.
 
When some of these inner city kids grow up to commit crimes, the media wants to know how many babies did their mother have out of wedlock and was their father in the home. We are told to stay away from them and the cities they dwell like Detroit, Chicago, Oakland and Baltimore. When folk of color kill or are killed, there isn’t any massive media coast to coast coverage or outrage to Congress demanding change with better gun controls.
 
Economic disparities and racism are very real problems in our societies. Separate and unequal education, housing and employment are some of the results of these prejudices. Any logical thinking person can conclude those suffering within these conditions can have or develop psychological and mental damage. To solve the epidemic of violence in the inner cities and communities of color, we would first need to examine the root causes but denial is much easier. As long as the coloreds are killing the coloreds, the world and the media seems to not care.