Adam
"Alleged New Zealand shooter is ‘lucid’ and understands charges, lawyer says"
Were we supposed to assume he wasn't? Is this just more of the usual "when a white man commits an act of terrorism, he must be 'crazy'" or was there an actual reason to suspect he might not be "lucid?"
M. Grégoire
@ink_slinger
Remember the guy who shot Gabrielle Giffords? He was crazy.
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-language-and-literature-of-jared-loughner
Apparently the Virginia Tech killer was a bit crazy too. And then there are people who obsess about mass murder -- lucid, but not quite normal either: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/10/19/thresholds-of-violence
It's a reasonable question to ask.
Adam
@mpjgregoire If it was asked across the board, I'd agree. But there definitely seems to be a pattern, at least in the media, of ascribing mental illness to white shooters far more often than to those of other races (and also trying to give them a sympathetic backstory, even when they're not described as mentally ill). Maybe the courts actually ask this about all defendants, but you wouldn't know it from typical media reports.
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