Would anyone expect anything else from a Rupert Murdoch owned organization? It’s grotesque!
Thanks. I did a bunch of research on the subject ages ago, and the pattern is that, aside from some form of trauma triggering an event (which is common with almost all mass shootings), mental illness is rarely a contributing factor. Of course, one place in England decided to try giving criminals psychological therapy while they were incarcerated and discovered that many criminals had some psychological trauma to their past and working on it helped, but none of what they had rose to what we would term mental illness (schizophrenia, Asperger’s).
Well, I guess that settles that.
It’'s just plain stunning. These racists just don’t even try, anymore.
This bullshit is what passes for intellectual thought from a national newspaper owned by Rupert Murdoch.
Hope that clears it up for you.
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Strawmen.
It’s all conservatives have, really.
Ok well if it’s not institutional racism, then how does WSJ want to handle the outrage of denied entitlement, evinced by individual racists who lash out in anger that “their” institutions have been taken away by who they clearly view as an unworthy horde?
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The Mainstream Media is complicit in this crime against black people. That much is VERY obvious to everyone except the most hardcore racists. Charleston was a watershed moment in American history, and it has shone a huge spotlight on all the racism inherent in the MSM. Fox is just the tip of the iceberg and lots of other racist media outlets are just as bad.
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My my my, tell me more Mr. Wizard. Does Mr. Peabody and his side kick Sherman hold the same opinion?
The bit about institutionalized racism concerns de jure racism. I would argue than any time a Republican legislature passes laws to suppress the black vote they are engaging in de jure racism even if their motive is to suppress Democratic votes. What we are dealing with is de facto racism. That is clearly evident all across the country, not just in the South and is exploited by Republicans and media outlets. For them to deny it exists is laughable. That is probably why the WSJ editorial doesn’t try.
That said racism is much less accepted now than it was in the 1960s. No one can deny that America has come a long way, but no one can say with a straight face that we don’t have a long way to go.
The common denominator of the three young killers is they were isolated, unoccupied young men with untreated mental issues. Maybe we should look at the problems of young men.
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Asperger’s is not mental illness.
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Most people have some form of mental anxiety due to trauma . It helps to explore it but to say they are all insane is ridiculous …This killer planned it, so did Lanza, The Columbine killers, Loughner ,Holmes et al… It is the ready availability of a weapon that gives these brainwashed terrorists the where with all to carry out mass killing. The Hate screed of the right does not help.
Very Interesting read on racism…
I am well aware that Asperger’s is not a mental illness. Please read what I said:
we would term mental illness (schizophrenia, Asperger’s).
“We (society) would term mental illness.”
The problem is that in discussions like this, Asperger’s becomes a “mental illness”. Honestly, most people wouldn’t know a person with Asperger’s if we walked up to them and slapped them in the face. I say ‘we’ because I have Asperger’s. Or as I tend to put it, I have ASD. So does one of my cousins. I function pretty well unless I get overly emotional, but right now, I’m struggling with the trauma of living a life where no one knew or understood what was wrong with me and so I had society constantly attacking and teasing me. Thing is, despite all of that, I never once wanted to shoot up a school or a church or anything like that.
And yet, society would say that I’m mentally ill.
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Both Holmes and Lanza had diagnoses of mental illnesses. Having a mental illness or being neurodivergent does not mean that one is predisposed or even probably going to go on a mass shooting. In Lanza’s case, a lot of external influences caused him to become a danger to others, and had he been given adequate treatment and help, he likely would never have done what he did. Same with Holmes. Even for someone who is mentally ill or is neurdivergent/non-neurtypical, there almost always has to be some external influence which causes the violent acts.
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Pass the sunchips, would ya Cracker?
WSJ…the water boys for the NRA. I challenge them to come down from their ivory towers, walk the streets and neighborhoods in the deep south (and not the pretty, sterile, havens, but the really gritty white areas) and then repeat their ignorance.
Are they parsing this in some tricky way? Clearly, this man’s mental illness was provoked by race-baiting that he was exposed to on a regular basis. Much of that comes from rightwing media which IS a social institution, Meanwhile, the attempts to roll back voting privileges in a way that targets minorities is a revival of the attempt to institutionalize racism once again. And many in the GOP use “dog whistle” soundbites to hint at their feelings about minorities. If GOP leadership participates in this sort of rhetoric, how can WSJ say racism is not still part of governmental structure, especially in red states where public institutions lower class minorities rely on are underfunded and where gerrymandering of representational districts marginalizes the power of minorities. Finally, law enforcement practices in certain areas clearly shows that racism exists and is still part of our governance.
Racism exists and still has much power. I hate that white conservatives won’t stand up and admit it. They are the ones “leading from behind.” As long as they have the rightwing media to “catapult” this propaganda, the impetus to change will be diminished.
This is an early test for the Murdoch boys–will they rein in the lies and spin and promote the truth? Not looking good so far.
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When I read the WSJ, which I try not to do, I see Rupert Murdoch’s lips moving as if in some bizarre Orson Welles movie.
Adding qualifiers like ‘institutionalized’ to racism is just a debating trick to marginalize and misdirect discussion.
The 21 year old murderer was a racist. His statements confirm it clearly. Period. Now, how do we move forward understanding that?
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The editorial board of the Wall Street Journal on Friday suggested that "institutionalized racism" was not a driving force in the massacre of nine people Wednesday
Correct. It was institutionalizable racism. For leaving out that, I suggest the WSJ editorial board is part of both the former and the latter.