Wednesday, March 17, 2021

Atlanta Shootings Not Racially Motivated (?)

I was going to express skepticism about the racism hypothesis and its variants--especially the Trump caused it by saying 'Chinese virus' hypothesis--but I didn't get around to it before this was (tentatively) announced.
   As for the Trump said bad 'China virus' hypothesis: the victims seem to have been Korean, not Chinese. That counts against the hypothesis. Of course you can add an ad hoc hypothesis of roughly this kind: The shooter didn't know the difference between Chinese people and Korean people. That works, if true, and weakens the objection to some degree, but involves a new unproven assumption about the shooter. The Trump's words caused hatred of all Asians hypothesis seems a lot weaker to me.
   Also: most of the victims were female--and at least initially all were said to be. The racism hypothesis doesn't predict and doesn't explain that. So it's too general. 
   The media leaped to the hypothesis because they're absolutely salivating to pin anti-Asian attack/"hate-crimes" on Trump, not because it was particularly plausible.


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