THE UNWARRENTED DEATHS OF 3 YOUNG AMERICAN MUSLIMS

 

Three college honor students, are dead, due to the “road rage” of a hateful man.

It was so sad to hear of the horrible killing of the three American born Muslim college honor students in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. 

One of these young American Muslims had left a written statement as to how she loved being an American and living in America.  She had stated how, regardless of how they appeared different from others in their looks, their dress and their customs, they still all felt that they were being well accepted as American Muslims in their community.

Well, obviously, that wasn’t the case regarding their hateful neighbor that came to their apartment and killed all three of them by shooting them in the head.

As this case continues to develop, it seems to be that the shooter’s profile is more and more indicating that in reality, he is just a classic, violent, white extremists with a gun.

 

…The accused killer, Craig Stephen Hicks

At first, it was stated that the killing of the three Muslim students by the suspect, Craig Stephen Hicks, was due to a kind of “road-rage going ballistic”.  The initial story had said there was a history of the 46-year-old, white man, having verbal fights with the three Muslim students over an apartment parking space.  Yes, a parking space, located where both parties lived in the same apartment complex.

But after the story of the parking space dispute was offered, the story and the shooter’s profile started to become public.  The parking space explanation is now being replaced with an increasing demand that the shootings be investigated as a “hate crime”. 

As of today, the FBI is doing a preliminary review to see if an official FBI investigation is warranted.

Here is a thumbnail of the profile that is developing on the shooter, Craig Stephen Hicks.

Hicks’ social media posts show that he was an ardent atheist who equally mocked both Muslims and Christians.  He was a so called, avid defender of the US Constitution’s separation of church and state.  He was also a gun nut who posted pictures of his revolver on-line.

A Wall Street Journal reporter became involved and they have reported that the father of the two victims, sisters, “Said this man [Hicks] was hateful. He was always picking fights, and knocking on their door.  Multiple times he showed up brandishing his gun.” The Journal reporter also said Hicks obsessively called tow truck companies to have his neighbors’ cars towed, and once even met tow truck drivers in the street waving a gun.

As has been reported by Alternet News, “What we can safely say is that Hicks fits the profile of the most common type of domestic violent extremist—a white man with grievances and guns.”

The point that is being made is that the face of violent extremism in America since 9/11 is predominantly white, not a foreigner, and many times targets Muslims and Blacks.

But what is even more of an issue is what has been occurring since a black man was elected as our Chief US Executive.

Currently, there are 939 known hate groups operating across the United States.  This includes neo-Nazis, Klansmen, white nationalists, neo-Confederates, racist skinheads, black separatists, border vigilantes and others.

Since 2000, the number of hate groups has increased by 56%. This surge was initially fueled by anger and fear over the nation’s ailing economy.  Then it was the influx of non-white immigrants, and the diminishing white majority, as symbolized by the election of the nation’s first African-American president.

These factors have also been feeding a powerful resurgence of the anti-government “Patriot” movement, which in the 1990s had led to a string of domestic terrorist plots, including the horrific Oklahoma City bombing. The number of so called Patriot groups, including armed militias, skyrocketed following the election of President Obama in 2008.  The rise was a whopping 813%, from 149 “Patriot” groups in 2008 to an all-time high of 1,360 in 2012. The number had fallen to 1,096 in 2013.

“Quite a few reports agree, that more Americans have been killed by the radical right since 9/11 than by jihadists,” said Mark Potok, spokesman for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which tracks hate crimes and especially focuses on the radical right.

 

…Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center

“When you look at Chapel Hill, it seems to be a classic case of a very tangled up motive,” Potok said. “Who’s to say how much a parking dispute played, or how much this man’s antipathy toward religious people, or Muslims in particular, played a part. They [the deceased] women had told their father he [Hicks] said he didn’t like the way they dressed.”

As the Violence Policy Center has noted, Hicks had a state-issued concealed handgun permit and was a “champion of Second Amendment rights.” Moreover, the SPLC had just issued a report titled, “Age of the Wolf,” which focuses on how unstable individuals [such as Hicks], not organized groups, have become the predominant domestic threat.

The report examined extreme violence in American between April 2009 and February 2015 and found “that domestic terrorism and related radical violence—as opposed to terrorist attacks emanating from overseas" is what currently plagues America. The report comes as the White House has announced that it will be hosting a summit on violent extremism in the US.

Mr. Potok, also said that initially, domestic law enforcement did not want to believe that white people could be terrorist, or even violent extremist.  That was until Timothy McVeigh bombed the Oklahoma federal building in 1995. Then, they shifted gears and focused on many domestic anti-government and ideological groups. But then that focus changed again, after the 9/11 attacks in 2001, as law enforcement again saw radical Islam as the primary threat.

The writer, David Neiwert, wrote in a recent article, “Why Doesn’t American Media Freak Out When the Terrorists Have White Skin?“  Instead, we are having conversations in Europe and America about how to deal with Muslims.    

One would think that with a 56% increase in American hate groups, and an 813% increase in the so called American “Patriot” groups, there would be more emphasis on those concealed weapons carriers such as a highly visible and loud-mouthed, Craig Stephen Hicks.

But no, in the USA, apparently we will continue to focus on non-violent, non Christian individuals, that are of a different color, that dress differently and have different customs.  Those 3, non-violent American Muslim honor students did nothing wrong and are dead just because they were different from a white American male.

Copyright G.Ater 2015