I Feel Like An A**hole Saying This To A Lawyer

Medium’s comment system is a funny thing. As the OG Medium crew will remember, it’s possible to “clap” for comments that you like. The writer of the comment will then get a notification, letting them know that somebody appreciated what they wrote.

And occasionally, like today, this means I’ll be happily reminded of a conversation I had months ago.

In my article, The Race To Focus On Race, I wrote about the Atlanta spa shootings that took place back in March 2021. 6 Asian women and a white man and woman were killed, a Latino man was seriously injured, and in the days following the atrocity, the racial motivations of the shooter were treated as if they were self-evident. Even though they were far from it.

I argued that this growing instinct to apply a racial narrative to stories makes it harder to understand (and therefore solve) problems. KL wasn’t convinced.

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KL:

An extremely interesting read. I agree that it's important to have these considerations before we come to conclusions. But I'd be curious as to your thoughts regarding the interconnectivity of these issues. Religious fundamentalism in the west, for example, often goes hand in hand with white supremacist rhetoric. So too does the fetishisation of asian women with misogynistic violence. I think it would be a mistake to too readily separate these issues, especially for a writer like yourself, who is rightfully concerned with nuance.

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Steve QJ:

I think it would be a mistake to too readily separate these issues, especially for a writer like yourself, who is rightfully concerned with nuance.

Hi there! I'm not trying to separate these issues, but it's precisely because I'm concerned with nuance that I'm saying that the correct response is to be led by evidence rather than weaving a story out of common narratives.

Some people are already so convinced that this was a racist attack that there's absolutely no convincing them otherwise. This despite the fact that we currently have no evidence that the attack was racially motivated, limited evidence that it WASN'T racially motivated, and clear evidence that there were other motivations in the mix.

I'm not arguing that I know any better than anybody else what was going through the killer's head. We're all waiting to see what evidence is found. It's perfectly possible that something will be revealed in the coming weeks which proves that he was specifically targeting Asians. If that happens, then we have our answer.

But while we don't, why would the correct approach be to assume racial motivation because some people fetishise Asian women, or because white supremacy and Christianity have been known to be bedfellows?

To me, this makes no more sense than assuming that every guy with an Asian girlfriend is a fetishist, or that every Christian is a white supremacist. The fact that six of the victims were Asian gives us a point of enquiry of course. But jumping straight to absolute certainty that the attack was racially motivated is, I think, a mistake.

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KL:

Hi back! Well I suppose the real uncertainty in my reply is the concept of “too readily”, because I agree considerations have to be thought through but I’m also curious as to what kind of evidence would be sufficient? What does “led by evidence” mean in this context? And to what extent are we all aware of the social and societal influences which dictate all of our actions, violent or not?

So many racial questions are dismissed due to “lack of proof” and it is definitely concerning that a situation like this has the potential to be explained away like so many other things. The answer of course could be that it’s all of those things or it could be none of those things. But I think, in the contemporary context of the increase of anti-asian rhetoric, the typical demographic of the people working at the targeted places (one was literally called “Youngs Asian Massage Parlour”), combined with the fact that the majority of the victims were of asian descent, doesn’t feel as much of an example of jumping to conclusions as it may seem. I don’t think it’s an assumption, I think it’s a conclusion based on evidence and context. It could, of course, be wrong, but that’s true of any conclusion. And then there’s the question of why it’s better practice to assume no racial motivation.

While I don’t disagree with you that it’s wrong to claim that we do (or even can ever really) know 100% what the true motivation was, I’m not sure I agree that’s what’s happening here for the majority of people. And, granted, I’m not American so I could be missing some of this unquestioning certainty (and I don’t doubt it exists in some pockets, because it always does!) but arguing against that position in particular feels perilously close to strawmaning to me.

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Steve QJ:

to what extent are we all aware of the social and societal influences which dictate all of our actions, violent or not?

This kind of nails it for me. None of us can argue that any action we take is totally free of racial or gender or any other form of bias. Human beings are bias machines. But when we talk about motives, we're talking about conscious motives.

If I happen to have an argument with an Asian guy tomorrow, even if we have that argument in his shop called "The Asian Store", my conscious motivations wouldn't be racist. They'd have nothing to do with the wider context of the violence being perpetrated against Asian Americans. We'd just be two humans who had a disagreement about something.

The framing you're suggesting removes this possibility from human encounters, and is why I think that the default assumption should be that the interaction between people isn't racist. This isn't an attempt to REMOVE racism from the possible motivations. But as I say in the article, if we assume that racism is the basis for violence in any interaction that involves more than one race, we tempt ourselves to look past an enormous range of other factors which might help us better fix the problem.

You're right that racial questions can be dismissed because of a "lack of proof". All kinds of crimes are dismissed because of a lack of proof. And don't get me wrong, this is infuriating. But you're on a terrifyingly slipperly slope if your solution to this problem is to just go with the explanation which feels right in your gut. The presumption of innocence, as frustrating as it can be, is the cornerstone of a legal system that works (I feel like an asshole saying this to a lawyer😅I'm sure you understand this far better than I do). [Editor’s note: KL’s bio mentioned that she was a lawyer]

Also, in this case, it's the reason why the white woman and the white and Latino man have been all but written out of the story. The narrative is being shaped by a presumption that hasn't been proven at all in this particular case. And when I say proven, I'm not asking for some lofty standard of evidence, just something more than the fact that he shot up an Asian business that we know he was already frequenting for years.

For instance, even if we suppose that he went to Asian massage parlours because he finds Asian women irresistible, does that make the attack racist? Would it still be racist if he found blondes irresistible and did the same thing in a parlour that was full of Scandinavian women? Is the focus really race in that scenario? Or is the misogyny and religious fundamentalism which made him shift the blame for his "sins" onto these women the key factor?

Was there a reason like price or location (perhaps far enough from his home that he didn't think he'd be seen going in) or are there more Asian parlours than those run by any other race in his town? These are all questions that we can answer fairly easily, and they'd give is a much clearer picture.

To repeat, I'm not denying that the crime could be racially motivated. Not at all. I'm saying let's have answers to basic questions like these before acting as if we know what was going through the killer's mind.

Wow, sorry this was so long!

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We saw a similar problem more recently in the Kyle Rittenhouse case. Many readers were so convinced that the shootings were evidence of white supremacy, that most of them hadn’t even attempted to figure out whether this made any sense. 

Presenting facts that disturbed this narrative, such as the fact that all the victims were white, or that only one of them was related to the BLM protests in any way, or that every one of the people Rittenhouse shot, physically attacked him first, simply got you painted a racist.

But thinking can’t become yet another thing that’s presumed to be racist.

Thinking helps us understand (and thereby solve) problems. We should be encouraging each other (especially those we disagree with) to think carefully and then challenge us. We should be looking for the flaws in our own logic as hard as we look for them in other people's. We should be willing to listen with an open mind.

That’s how we make our own ideas stronger. It feels like, of all people, a lawyer should be on board with that.