And while all sorts of horrible incidents are being reported on Twitter and Facebook… well, anyone can say anything on Twitter and Facebook. The bulk of these stories are “friend of a friend” told me types. But if men were really going around pulling knives on Muslim women on public buses in Trump’s name, there would at least be local or campus news reports of it. Same, too, for the alleged wave of transgender teen suicides which keep getting mentioned in media but for which no one can offer any evidence.
I point all of this out not to mock or attempt to diminish the fear or dismay any individuals feel right now but to put things in perspective. The “hate acts reported across the country” in the wake of Trump’s victory seem mostly relegated to graffiti at a few schools and one carjacking which may or may not have had anything to do with racial or religious prejudice. Less dramatic acts of racism—name calling, derogatory comments made in passing, etc.—do seem to be bubbling up more frequently this week, if the sheer number of such anecdotes shared online means anything. But while that’s a shame in and of itself, it’s also a world apart from the wave of “hate crimes” and violent attacks that many are conjuring up right now.
Pushers of this “rampant racist crimewave” in Trump’s America story will dismiss posts like this one, and anyone who challenges their narrative, as naive, enabling of racists, or unconscionably non-empathetic to non-straight, white, Christian Americans. But I’m not the one trying to stoke false terror in vulnerable people or over-hype America’s levels of hate for pageviews and Twitter faves.
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