The Atlanta Shootings
Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 10:04 pm
My thoughts on this are somewhat different from those of many other liberals:
1) The first shooting took place in Cherokee County, which is on the outskirts of what is considered metro Atlanta. It's considerably more conservative than the closer-in suburbs and voted for Trump 2-1 in the last election. I'm not familiar with the area where the shooting occurred. The second set of shootings took place in a part of Atlanta that has a number of similar "health spas," strip clubs, and adult emporiums, but it's also home to a number of popular restaurants and gay bars. People there tend to have a very laissez faire attitude towards the various businesses.
2) These massage parlors are brothels; the Atlanta ones at least operate generally without much hassle from the police. The women who work there are overwhelmingly Asian. Many of them are trafficked and pretty much forced to work there. Occasionally there's a bust for prostitution or for trafficking charges against the owners. White prostitutes generally operate out of motels or private residences and have to be scheduled in advance. Someone who's not very sophisticated (as this defendant seems to be) would have to either cruise for a streetwalker in some parts of Atlanta or visit a massage parlor.
3) Based on what I've read, this guy seems to have some major sex hangups and guilt trips. He probably visited the three places in question in the past, so when he decided to start killing prostitutes, it's no surprise he visited them. My guess is that almost all of the women he visited at any spa were Asian, not necessarily because of some desire on his part but because that's who was working at the places he knew about.
4) I just don't see this as an anti-Asian hate crime. I do see it as an anti-woman hate crime and I'm disappointed that very few people are concentrating on that aspect of the crime. These women "work" under terrible conditions but instead of focusing on the tragedy in their lives, many liberal are trying to shoehorn this into an anti-Asian crime.
5) Having said that, the behavior of the Cherokee County sheriff;s spokesman is abysmal. He characterized the killing as this guy "having a bad day" and sounded a lot more like a defense attorney outlining his strategy than a police spokesman. It also turns out that he promoted the sale of some tee shirts on his personal website last year proclaiming that COVID 19 was imported from CHY-NA. (He has since been relieved as the department spokesperson on the case.)
6) Although I don't think these shootings are anti-Asian hate crimes, I do think that a public discussion of the tremendous rise in such crimes over the last year is far overdue. Republicans and Trumpists who keep joking about the "Wuhan flu" and the "China virus" to deflect attention from their own failures in the pandemic are deplorable. And for Congressman Chip Roy to bring up stringing people up and lynching them in this hearing is utterly reprehensible.
1) The first shooting took place in Cherokee County, which is on the outskirts of what is considered metro Atlanta. It's considerably more conservative than the closer-in suburbs and voted for Trump 2-1 in the last election. I'm not familiar with the area where the shooting occurred. The second set of shootings took place in a part of Atlanta that has a number of similar "health spas," strip clubs, and adult emporiums, but it's also home to a number of popular restaurants and gay bars. People there tend to have a very laissez faire attitude towards the various businesses.
2) These massage parlors are brothels; the Atlanta ones at least operate generally without much hassle from the police. The women who work there are overwhelmingly Asian. Many of them are trafficked and pretty much forced to work there. Occasionally there's a bust for prostitution or for trafficking charges against the owners. White prostitutes generally operate out of motels or private residences and have to be scheduled in advance. Someone who's not very sophisticated (as this defendant seems to be) would have to either cruise for a streetwalker in some parts of Atlanta or visit a massage parlor.
3) Based on what I've read, this guy seems to have some major sex hangups and guilt trips. He probably visited the three places in question in the past, so when he decided to start killing prostitutes, it's no surprise he visited them. My guess is that almost all of the women he visited at any spa were Asian, not necessarily because of some desire on his part but because that's who was working at the places he knew about.
4) I just don't see this as an anti-Asian hate crime. I do see it as an anti-woman hate crime and I'm disappointed that very few people are concentrating on that aspect of the crime. These women "work" under terrible conditions but instead of focusing on the tragedy in their lives, many liberal are trying to shoehorn this into an anti-Asian crime.
5) Having said that, the behavior of the Cherokee County sheriff;s spokesman is abysmal. He characterized the killing as this guy "having a bad day" and sounded a lot more like a defense attorney outlining his strategy than a police spokesman. It also turns out that he promoted the sale of some tee shirts on his personal website last year proclaiming that COVID 19 was imported from CHY-NA. (He has since been relieved as the department spokesperson on the case.)
6) Although I don't think these shootings are anti-Asian hate crimes, I do think that a public discussion of the tremendous rise in such crimes over the last year is far overdue. Republicans and Trumpists who keep joking about the "Wuhan flu" and the "China virus" to deflect attention from their own failures in the pandemic are deplorable. And for Congressman Chip Roy to bring up stringing people up and lynching them in this hearing is utterly reprehensible.