A Compelling Story Is No Replacement For The News
The news is increasingly "the fiction" in a way it didn't seem to be in the past.
Crying racial discrimination when it isn't the case is happening more and more. A community will obviously be anguished when a number of their members are killed, but race might not be the motivation -- and didn't seem to be in the murders in Atlanta. Yet, while listening to audio news while making coffee the other day, I heard both President Biden and Vice-President Harris coloring it that way.
The murderer, per what accounts there are, seems to have been targeting sex workers -- due to his own inability to control himself sexually, to stay out of massage parlors. If other evidence shows up, I'm of course going to revise that supposition.
Sullivan has a really good piece, "When The Narrative Replaces The News: How the media grotesquely distorted the Atlanta massacres":
We should not take the killer's confession as definitive, of course. But we can probe it -- and indeed, his story is backed up by acquaintances and friends and family. The New York Times originally ran one piece reporting this out. The Washington Post also followed up, with one piece citing contemporaneous evidence of the man's "religious mania" and sexual compulsion. It appears that the man frequented at least two of the spas he attacked. He chose the spas, his ex roommates said, because he thought they were safer than other ways to get easy sex. Just this morning, the NYT ran a second piece which confirms that the killer had indeed been in rehab for sexual impulses, was a religious fanatic, and his next target was going to be "a business tied to the pornography industry."We have yet to find any credible evidence of anti-Asian hatred or bigotry in this man's history. Maybe we will. We can't rule it out. But we do know that his roommates say they once asked him if he picked the spas for sex because the women were Asian. And they say he denied it, saying he thought those spas were just the safest way to have quick sex. That needs to be checked out more. But the only piece of evidence about possible anti-Asian bias points away, not toward it.
And yet. Well, you know what's coming. Accompanying one original piece on the known facts, the NYT ran nine -- nine! -- separate stories about the incident as part of the narrative that this was an anti-Asian hate crime, fueled by white supremacy and/or misogyny. Not to be outdone, the WaPo ran sixteen separate stories on the incident as an anti-Asian white supremacist hate crime. Sixteen! One story for the facts; sixteen stories on how critical race theory would interpret the event regardless of the facts. For good measure, one of their columnists denounced reporting of law enforcement's version of events in the newspaper, because it distracted attention from the "real" motives. Today, the NYT ran yet another full-on critical theory piece disguised as news on how these murders are proof of structural racism and sexism -- because some activists say they are.
Mass killers, if they are motivated by bigotry or hate, tend to let the world know:
The suspected attacker in Pittsburgh allegedly said he wanted to "kill Jews" while rampaging inside a synagogue. Police said the man charged with killing people at an El Paso Walmart told them that he was targeting "Mexicans" that day. And the man who massacred Black parishioners inside a Charleston church detailed his racist motivations at length.
This mass murderer in Atlanta actually denied any such motive, and, to repeat myself, there is no evidence for it -- and that has been true from the very start.
Yet:
Nikole Hannah-Jones, the most powerful journalist at the New York Times, took to Twitter in the early morning of March 17 to pronounce: "Last night's shooting and the appalling rise in anti-Asian violence stem from a sick society where nationalism has been stoked and normalized." Ibram Kendi tweeted: "Locking arms with Asian Americans facing this lethal wave of anti-Asian terror. Their struggle is my struggle. Our struggle is against racism and White Supremacist domestic terror."When the cops reported the killer's actual confession, left-Twitter went nuts. One gender studies professor recited the litany: "The refusal to name anti-Asianess [sic], racism, white supremacy, misogyny, or class in this is whiteness doing what it always does around justifying its death-dealing ... To ignore the deeply racist and misogynistic history of hypersexualization of Asian women in this 'explication' from law enforcement of what emboldened this killer is also a willful erasure."
...None of them mentioned that he killed two white people as well -- a weird thing for a white supremacist to do -- and injured a Latino. None pointed out that the connection between the spas was that the killer had visited them. None explained why, if he were associating Asian people with Covid19, he would nonetheless expose himself to the virus by having sex with them, or regard these spas as "safer" than other ways to have quick sex.
They didn't because, in their worldview, they didn't need to. What you see here is social justice ideology insisting, as Dean Baquet temporarily explained, that intent doesn't matter. What matters is impact. The individual killer is in some ways irrelevant. His intentions are not material. He is merely a vehicle for the structural oppressive forces critical theorists believe in. And this "story" is what the media elites decided to concentrate on: the thing that, so far as we know, didn't happen.
Oh, and by the way, about that supposedly "white supremacist" hate against Asians:
Of those committing violence against Asians, you discover that 24 percent such attacks are committed by whites; 24 percent are committed by fellow Asians; 7 percent by Hispanics; and 27.5 percent by African-Americans. Do the Kendi math, and you can see why Kendi's "White Supremacist domestic terror" is not that useful a term for describing anti-Asian violence.
So here's what I don't get... the Policeman goes on TV and basically says the guy isn't a racist, he's a sex maniac. So it's not racism it's misogyny.
And people are like, "How dare the Policeman defend him and cover up for him".
What confuses me is the implication is he did it because he hates sexy women makes it all OK and understandable.
Saying he did it because he hates sexy ladies is NOT defending him!!!!
NicoleK at March 21, 2021 10:23 PM
Mel Chen considers CNN's coverage.
Crid at March 21, 2021 10:31 PM
I don't know Atlanta geography. If he drove to the three most geographically adjacent massage parlors, I'd agree.
If he drove past other targets and specifically targeted Asian massage parlors, I'd disagree.
Has any reporter in the Atlanta area done that basic analysis?
Kevin at March 21, 2021 11:56 PM
So much of this is the Democrats/media trying to get Asians on their side. So they have pushing a narrative of hatred between Asians and Whites while covering up Black on Asian violence. Just like they have been doing with Jewish and to a lesser extent Hispanic.
The community thoughts are split betweeenthe young woke who swallows it and everyone else.
Police have to also be shown as racist at any opportunity. This shooting if not looked at too closely was a gift to the media who like with J Smollette will run with it for a month.
Joe j at March 22, 2021 6:42 AM
Has any reporter in the Atlanta area done that basic analysis?
Shhhhh! That's an awful lot like work. But since you ask, I'm curious, and I have *checks notes* 5 minutes to spare:
https://bit.ly/3caWRtw
I'm going to say it is extremely likely that he passed more than a few other AMPs on the way to Atlanta. Skimmed this article to get names to feed into google maps
https://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-news/before-killing-spree-georgia-let-an-industry-that-fetishizes-asian-women-flourish/O2KAW7XBYFB2FBXIUF3ML33JXU/
Shockingly, none of the streets contained "Peachtree".
I R A Darth Aggie at March 22, 2021 7:26 AM
I've been thinking on the differences in how Millennials and Boomers deal with dishonesty.
Millennials have the concept that dishonest is the base state. That is normal. Someone who is honest or even less dishonest stands out to them. That is why Bernie Sanders has such attraction to the generation. He may be an incompetent nut but compared to his peers he is a comparatively honest incompetent nut. That makes him stand out as special.
Boomers are vastly different. I've been observing that boomers more or less demand you tell them the lies they want to hear. They get horribly offended when you point out even really blatant lies. And they get horribly offended when you call them a liar. Millennials by comparison seem more likely to be confused by the accusation. For them the accusation is more like commenting on the insignificant and commonplace.
Which has lead me to a rather odd observation. The boomer generation appears to use common sets of lies to demark group membership.
This isn't a left/right thing. Right wing boomers love to lie about drugs. Left wing boomers about race and other things. This is a generational thing. Boomers don't like to change or confront their lies. Millennials by comparison will tell you anything you want. Want to hear water is dry, want to hear up is down, sure sure. A millennial will happily change their lies based on the social situation.
Clearly much of this isn't fully fleshed out. But as we see the media turnover from the boomer generation to the millennial one I expect the dishonesty to become more fluid and more blatant. As NicoleK pointed out the police didn't defend the perp. Still the complainers don't care about that. They wanted a specific lie and were annoyed they didn't get what they wanted.
Ben at March 22, 2021 8:06 AM
“Millennials have the concept that dishonest is the base state. That is normal. Someone who is honest or even less dishonest stands out to them. That is why Bernie Sanders has such attraction to the generation. He may be an incompetent nut but compared to his peers he is a comparatively honest incompetent nut. That makes him stand out as special.”
I think Millennials and Boomers are equally taken in by someone who talks a good line, even with a proven record of policy failures, because they are equally unable to evaluate the workability of utopian schemes. Most of them would not know the difference between a lie and the truth if it bit them in the ass. They don’t have the tools to objectively evaluate anything.
In other words, they are human, inclined to believe and say whatever causes them the least intellectual and social discomfort at the moment.
Isab at March 22, 2021 8:25 AM
I would have expected experience to establish dishonesty as the base state. Especially WRT political promises.
"Trust, but verify" as it were. None of us are immune to either confirmation bias, or hype-nosis.
I R A Darth Aggie at March 22, 2021 8:41 AM
With Boomers and lies, sometimes it used to be true, now less so.
i.e. "go to college and have it made" kind of used to be true. In that few went to college, (usually the exceptional) more likely for useful degrees,and could get good paying jobs after.
To Millennial, price of degree skyrocketed, value of degree dropped, too many go into "useless" subjects too many are average or below average students so they don't "have it made"
Joe j at March 22, 2021 8:48 AM
Telling wild outlandish lies seems like such an easy way to get power and manipulate the public, but of course it leads to distrust and cynicism. The Russia Russia Russia bs was so insane and the media just pretended it was true. Same with the Trump call to Georgia, the Kavenaugh hearings, and so many other things. Just completely made up hooey. To anyone with a reality base it appears that these people have lost their minds.
If you throw the police under the bus often enough you may run out of police when you need them.
cc at March 22, 2021 9:27 AM
"I think Millennials and Boomers are equally taken in by someone who talks a good line ..." ~Isab
I won't argue with that. My point was more on general folk and how boomers have 'hard' lies while millennials have 'fluid' lies. I was also finding it interesting how you can almost separate boomers into various groups based on the lies they want to hear. The lies act like badges of membership.
Though it may be more of an age thing. People do get less flexible as they get older.
"I would have expected experience to establish dishonesty as the base state. Especially WRT political promises." ~IRA
I don't think boomers felt like everyone was a liar. But I'm not a boomer, so what do I know. For millennials it isn't just politicians. It isn't just the news media. Your neighbor, the clerk at the grocery store, a school teacher, etc. Everyone is a liar. Trust no one anywhere.
Which bakes in like the fear of nuclear war did. You don't get rampant paranoia. No one has the energy to keep that up. Instead it settles into the ideology. Yeah someone could set off a nuke and yeah you are stupid to take what anyone says at face value. Water is wet and the sky is blue. Are you going to ask me how fingers fing next?
Ben at March 22, 2021 10:19 AM
I don't think this new Asian hate meme is going to have the success that the BLM promotion did. It lacks depth and the target demographic is not as consolidated or demonstrative.
Plus, as noted above, it's mostly lies; or at worst, copycat behavior driven by a widely publicized lie.
Still, one wonders at the purpose of it all. Democrats/media trying to get Asians on their side(JJ) - possibly. Though, Democrats/media are the reason Asians went from the lowest unemployment rate to the next-highest; Covid panic shut down so many small businesses. Most small business owners have noticed the hypocrisy and incompetence as applied.
Nope, it's got to be a play for Chinese hegemony; and the sold-out American press is on board. U.S. ideas of liberty are a stumbling block for authoritarianism. To weaken the country you use the press to encourage protest and rioting by the underclass; and try to install a sock-puppet like Biden in the Presidency.
Now that young Americans are trained in CRT, any criticisms of Chinese assertiveness will be cancelled as anti-Asian rhetoric. Khruschev was right . . . “We will take America without firing a shot. We do not have to invade the U.S. We will destroy you from within....” But the Russians couldn't afford good PR. The Chinese are rollin'.
s at March 22, 2021 10:56 AM
So San Francisco School Board member Alison Collins is under fire for tweeting back in 2016 that Asians are "house niggers" who use white supremacist thinking to get ahead.
Her response?
Repeatedly accuse President Trump of racism and refuse to step down.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at March 22, 2021 12:10 PM
Didn't the boomers not trust anyone over 30? Maybe because they thought they were liars?
NicoleK at March 22, 2021 1:29 PM
When they were under 30, sure.
Conan the Grammarian at March 22, 2021 2:52 PM
I always read that as don't trust your parents. Trust us instead.
But that was all well before my time.
On a different note I am feeling rich today. Our school district has issued laptops to everyone. Including kindergarteners. Yay. Now my kids can watch youtube instead of getting an education. What joy.
Ben at March 22, 2021 2:53 PM
If he drove past other targets and specifically targeted Asian massage parlors, I'd disagree.
Kevin, it had been my understanding that he was a customer at all three of the spas. Per an article I just found in the NYT, he was a customer at two of them, but they don’t yet know about the third one in the suburbs.
JD at March 22, 2021 3:05 PM
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