“That Conversation about Race” category archive
A Shunning City on a Hill 0
In the Roanoke Times, a descendant of pilgrims who came to America on the Mayflower pens a stunning rebuke to the cold-hearted callousness of Kirstjen Nielsen, Secretary of Homeland Security, and by extension, to the administration in which she serves. An excerpt:
Gradations 0
In a larger discussion about the “warrior gene”* (follow the link–it’s worth your while), Elie Mystal explains the hierarchy of charges involving causing the death of another person.
- First Degree Murder = You killed people.
- Second Degree Murder = You killed people, opportunistically.
- Voluntary Manslaughter = You killed people, but I understand.
- Involuntary Manslaughter = You’re such a dumbass that you actually killed people.
- Self-Defense = You killed black people.
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*The short version is that a certain gene, if present, alters body chemistry so as to make a person less able to resist impulses. The occasion of Mystal’s post is that the theory is being floated as a mitigating circumstance in a particularly horrific killing. Mystal is arguing that the law already recognises mitigating circumstances.
License To Kill 0
Field explains how to distinguish a “good guy with a gun” from a bad guy with a gun.