Don’t Talk About His “Bad Day”, Talk About Theirs
Let’s Talk About What Makes A “Bad Day”
Let’s just be clear about this. This was not “a really bad day for him”.
It was a hate crime, perpetrated by a mentally disturbed and radicalised white 21-year-old male.
What a “Bad Day” is
A “Bad Day” is getting to school and realising you forgot the coursework you spent all night finishing.
A “Bad Day” is simply not being able to do anything with your hair in the morning.
A “Bad Day” is having a pointless argument with a loved one and having to spend the day dwelling on how dumb you feel for the things you said.
What a “Bad Day” isn’t
A “Bad Day” isn’t developing an addiction your upbringing hasn’t prepared you to deal with.
A “Bad Day” isn’t watching so much pornography that you no longer see women as real people.
A "Bad Day" isn't being so damaged by your culture, religion, and society that all your problems are someone else's fault.
A “Bad Day” isn’t fleeing the police, with the intent to commit more murders, until they literally have to run you off the road.
But, most importantly, a “Bad Day” isn’t a reason to go out, buy a gun, and murder eight human beings.
There is so much we need to unpack
There is so much that needs to be explored about the tragedy in Atlanta. Too much for me to focus on here.
So I’m not going to go into how the media and police are desperate not to say “terrorist”, simply because the attacker is white.
I’m not going to go into how the police refuse to say this was a racially motivated hate-crime even though Asian-owned businesses were specifically targeted.
I’m not going to go into how the police captain in charge of the investigation has a history of sharing racist material online.
I’m not going to talk about how this is the logical continuation of centuries of right-wing politicians using people of “foreign” descent as scapegoats. (It’s not that long ago since the US enacted the Chinese Exclusion Act, and less than a century since it was fully repealed.)
I’m not going to go into all the hundreds of excuses given by the police for murdering people of colour - including for minor traffic violations and literally being asleep in their own bed - but when a white male kills eight people, leads the police on a 150-mile manhunt, and allegedly intends to commit further murders, they merely say “He was pretty much fed up, and kind of at [the] end of his rope, and yesterday was a really bad day for him and this is what he did.”
I’m not going to go into any of this, because these are things you should be aware of already. You shouldn’t need articles and news reports to know all this, and I’m not going to give you a handy 1000 word summary.
Because I just don’t have the time to do any of it justice.
You should be putting in the effort to be aware of all of this already. Sorry White People, we have no excuse to ignore all this because it's not our experience.
What we can expect to hear next
So, over the coming days and weeks, what can you expect to see in the news?
You can expect to hear people blaming pornography, as if porn is some insidious, corrupting force that young men are utterly unable to resist.
You can expect to hear people saying they never thought he was capable of something like this because he was a good Christian boy. (Just a heads-up: if a teenager is known for carrying a bible around with him in school at all times, that’s a RED FLAG!)
You can expect to hear people say the words “massage parlour” as if it means “brothel”.
You can expect to hear the insinuation that these women were “probably” sex workers, and so somehow deserved it.
You can expect to hear people insinuate that at least the white man who allegedly committed this crime wanted to “help” others by “eliminating” the temptation of massage parlours, so at least he had good intentions.
You can expect to hear people pull out examples of sexual crimes committed by people of colour against white people.
What we should be talking about next
While I'm depressingly certain we'll hear all the above within the next month - or at least until the next mass shooting - what is it we should actually be talking about?
How about how fundamentalist religion isn’t preparing children to deal with real-world issues such as mental health and sexuality.
How about how mental health awareness and treatment aren’t taken seriously enough.
How about how a man with clear mental health issues was able to buy a gun and kill eight people with it on the same day.
How about how misogyny leads to women being seen as less than human.
How about how racism makes this problem even worse for women of colour.
How about how a lack of decent sex education leaves teenagers and children exposed to the dark side of pornography when they have not been taught the critical skills required to process it.
How about how sex work is looked down on, and that too many people feel sex workers are somehow “asking for it” when anything happens to them.
How about how thousands of hate crimes are being committed against people of Asian descent, and exactly which politicians and media organisations are responsible for this.
Don’t Say His Name
The white male who - allegedly - committed this hate crime is broken. From the things I’ve read, they have serious mental health issues. They needed recognition and treatment, and they couldn’t or wouldn’t find it.
Don’t say his name. Don’t share his photo.
Instead, share the photos and names of the victims. The ones who did nothing wrong.
When - and if - this person gets the help they need, when they prove to us that they recognise what they did and truly desire to do what little is possible to make amends for this act, then we can use their name. When they can be a lesson for the rest of us.
A warning of what happens to people when we allow these things to happen.
Don’t Think Of His “Bad Day”. Think of Theirs.
Don’t talk about his “Bad Day”. It wasn’t a “Bad Day”. It was a radicalised white male having a mental breakdown and willing committing a racially motivated hate crime.
Talk instead about the day the victims and their families have had. The days they will continue to have for the rest of their lives.
Think about the Asian community and the days they have been having for years. The days they know are still coming.
And think about what you can do to stop it from happening again
The Cut have collected a selection of resources for those people wanting to help the survivors on the tragedy, as well as how to assist their own community, which I thought I’d share there.
I haven’t gone through these myself to check on their validity or quality, so please use your own judgement before donating your time or money.
