and probably many others, back in the day.

The only small consolation is that back then he would have been duly aquitted by all-white juries, if he had even gone to trial. I trust that this will not happen today.

For what that is worth.

Mexicans yesterday. You have Lindsey Graham sidestepping this today by repeatedly replying that this was an attack against religion. The implications that our President is not American - it never ends. These right wingers fuel this racism constantly and walk away from the problem when these tragedies occur. Enough is enough.

rapist . USA just listens and reports on Trump without distain and lets this hate be said pretty much without shame.
What kid would be listening to Trump? If his parent was listening and nodding yes to all the Trump vitriol why would he think Trump and the parents he trust could be wrong? Nowhere perhaps does he hear any rebuttal to Trumps racist message . No outrage in the media.
Mexicans must be rapist . Maybe he will grow up to be the hero that stops them all from raping
white women.

I really thought that this country was so much further along than it was. When our President was elected a creepy underbelly of racism was exposed to the light. It shocked me and what this young man did shocks me. I don't understand it. It breaks my heart.

That's the source of most of the fantasies about committing acts of extreme violence to trigger a race war. It's also heavy on fears of black men raping white women. And it continues to be a popular item at places like Stormfront.

As I just noted on another thread, Roof's roommate said he was heavily into "segregation and other stuff." So what was the other stuff? Apparently something even more socially unacceptable than segregation.

I think there's a lot yet to come out about Roof.

It is not enough to say "White men" and leave it at that.

All these guys have mothers and fathers.

Yes, they are monsters but they were not born that way, they were taught it.

As the song (King and I?) has it "you have to be carefully taught." To have such a streak of hatred for people different from yourself seems to me to almost require being raised by small-minded, bigoted, and hate-mongering parents, probably full of fear, insecurity, and a sense of unfulfilled entitlement themselves. [Note to self: obviously republicans] Possibly but not necessarily lacking full mental capacity, whether through low IQ, lack of curiosity, inbreeding, or even environmental factors. [Ditto] The "frosting," unfortunate term here, would be a broken parental marriage or two and the implicit breaking of trust that can involve, especially for impressionable children.

But to actually act on such a poisoned attitude to your fellow humans takes even more than that. Sociopathic and psychopathic personalities are from what I read disturbingly common, and the associated lack of empathy and remarkable ability to fit in and seem normal most of the time is well-established. These personality types more commonly are far more clever than this sad person, not uncommonly coming to occupy major corner suites in huge corporations due to their horrifying combination of hyper-congeniality when useful and dagger-in-the-back skills. Paging Donald-the-Whispy.

I can only speculate as to how hatred might have turned to active rage in this case. Experiencing parental failure to manage anger or even overt violence is one obvious clue. Another is affection for weaponry, overcoming feelings of insecurity and dramatically changing the mindset from "how can we learn to get through our disagreements" to "I don't have to take crap from anyone, including you folks different from me who I have been schooled to be terrified of. In fact, armed as I am, I can now take the initiative even when there is nothing in the way of an actual threat."

And of course that latter part is also no small issue when it comes to crimes of violence by police.

Admittedly just my speculation.

You want to understand this, I suggest you read some white supremacist sites; I suggest David Duke, the KKK (main group), Stormfront, and the National Vanguard (the last two are also neo-Nazi groups). The "they rape our white women" is still a very popular theme, but you have to understand they consider any "race mixing" a form of rape, except when it is a white man and a black woman. I do suggest you read it and suspend logic, otherwise you will end up with a raging migraine.

The internet has allowed this type of bigotry to resurface and let's others know there are those "like them". So it isn't that it ever went away, you just had to know where to look or stumble into it (which can be scary as shit!).