Capitol Report
By State Representative, Leon D. Young
Leon D. Young
There are many in this country that labor under the Pollyannaish impression that America has at last turned the corner in terms of manifesting genuine racial empathy, and is truly accepting of different cultures and ethnicities.
But, in truth, America has become increasingly more xenophobic – not less, as unsuspecting individuals now find themselves at greater risk of being physically assaulted (if not killed) merely for their “perceived ethnicity” and religious beliefs.
The recent tragedy in Chapel Hill, North Carolina serves to underscore this point.
Just last week, three young, university students, were senselessly gunned down in their own apartment by an irate, white neighbor. Their crime?
The fact that they looked foreign and of Muslim descent.
Craig Stephen Hicks, 46, who has described himself as a “gun-toting” atheist, was charged with three counts of first degree murder.
The police have said that the shooting appeared to have been motivated by “an ongoing neighbor dispute over parking,” but that they were investigating whether religious hatred had contributed to the killings.
The victims’ families, however, described the fatal incident in a totally different vein – as a hate crime.
According to Namee Barakat, the father of male victim, Deah Shaddy Barakat, “To have him come in here and shoot three different innocent people in their head – I don’t know what kind of person that is.”
But, here’s what we do know about the alleged shooter. Hicks had a proclivity for being angry and confrontational, according to a number of sources.
Moreover, he had earlier run-ins with several of his neighbors, sometimes while wearing a handgun on his hip.
Hicks was currently unemployed, but was studying at a local technical college to become a paralegal.
It remains to be seen what actually prompted Hicks to go on his shooting rampage, but I find it most interesting that of all the people he had altercations with, in the end opted to lash out at three students of Arab descent.
The deplorable actions by ISIS terrorists have been well chronicled in this country and around the world, but that doesn’t give Hicks (or anybody else) a license to play vigilante.
In the final analysis, one thing is certain: Xenophobia is alive and well in River City, America has a lot of explaining to do.