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Culture War Roundup for the week of April 1, 2024

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That isn't very surprising, it's basically the impression I got from the Chicago news, though I wouldn't usually use the phrase "mass shootings" for "got in a feud and shot up the place" or "gang based violence killing several people." The people of the Northern Migration cities basically know it's black-on-black crime, in neighborhoods that have been hard to police forever, back to mafia violence and unsuccessful prohibition, and likely before.

I'm willing to believe the Minnesotans were genuinely shocked, they actually believe in restorative justice and sending troubled teens to spend more time in lakeside centers to smell the pines, and urban decay seems pretty new to them.

But, yeah, it's a trope that it's uncouth to mention when shooters are black.

Do the people in the northern migration cities know it’s black violence? It seems this has been so sufficiently scrubbed that I suspect many are not the least bit aware it’s black violence. I don’t have good evidence of polling on black crime in northern cities but my guess the typical voter in those places would way underestimate black crime and by orders of magnitude exaggerate police on Black Death rates.

Many in those cities could not morally acknowledge something even if they knew it was true. I don’t have polling on the issue but I wouldn’t be shocked if it would be as far off as the famous COVID data Bill Maher cities where half of liberals thought it was a death sentence of something.

The people I knew in Chicago did. But they or their parents are working class and close to the neighborhoods in question. The Irish, Polish, Black, and city worker neighborhoods know. They're mostly people who had to keep working in person through the riots and Covid. I don't have a good understanding of the wealthier neighborhoods. I've also know people who are intergenerational middle class and talk a lot about systemic injustice for work and status, but are weirdly racist in person.

The people I knew in Minnesota didn't talk about what happened in front of me at all, and just hiked or fished alone all through the Spring and Summer of Covid/Floyd.