Race in America
Harry Bruinius, Christian Science-Monitor, May 20, 2015
The shootout in Waco, Texas, Sunday between two outlaw biker gangs that left nine members dead has led to a controversial question: What if they had been black?
In the immediate aftermath of a shooting that a local police sergeant called “the worst crime scene, the most violent crime scene I have ever been involved in”–and which involved gang members shooting at police–photos show the gang members sitting at their ease, texting, near police officers. Some ask if that would have been the case if the rival gangs had been in some big city, dressed in gang colors and hoodies, having brass-knuckled, stabbed, and shot at each other–and police.
Media coverage has featured little talk about absent fathers or whether subcultures of violence and masculinity are bred in the type of restaurant where the shootout took place, which features waitresses with ample cleavage and barely-there shorts. Would that have been true if it had happened at a hip-hop gathering or an urban strip club?
To many, such attempts to compare the melée in Waco with the civil unrest in Baltimore or New York or Ferguson, Mo., strains reason and evidence. What happened in Waco was in no way a riot. It was a deadly bar fight, plain and simple.
Harry Bruinius, Christian Science-Monitor, May 20, 2015
The shootout in Waco, Texas, Sunday between two outlaw biker gangs that left nine members dead has led to a controversial question: What if they had been black?
In the immediate aftermath of a shooting that a local police sergeant called “the worst crime scene, the most violent crime scene I have ever been involved in”–and which involved gang members shooting at police–photos show the gang members sitting at their ease, texting, near police officers. Some ask if that would have been the case if the rival gangs had been in some big city, dressed in gang colors and hoodies, having brass-knuckled, stabbed, and shot at each other–and police.
Media coverage has featured little talk about absent fathers or whether subcultures of violence and masculinity are bred in the type of restaurant where the shootout took place, which features waitresses with ample cleavage and barely-there shorts. Would that have been true if it had happened at a hip-hop gathering or an urban strip club?
To many, such attempts to compare the melée in Waco with the civil unrest in Baltimore or New York or Ferguson, Mo., strains reason and evidence. What happened in Waco was in no way a riot. It was a deadly bar fight, plain and simple.
