Hate speech and hate crimes are sociological, not just psychological. It's ridiculous to look at one of these crimes from the shortened perspective of the point of the gun to the victim. It's much bigger than that. That's why I think it's a misconception to conclude any racist who takes someone's life "acted alone" or is "a lone wolf".
I hear this repeated in the media over and over again and it's just anti-intelligent. Even if James Von Brunn, the self-proclaimed white supremacist who walked into the Holocaust Museum today and killed a guard was not accompanied by others with guns, or doesn't appear to be part of a planned larger conspiracy to commit violence, he's part of a society in which hatred is brewed daily.
You don't have to be holding a gun to be an integral part of the racist mob mentality that drives one person or several people to commit hate crimes.
Murder is only one result of terror. There are no lone wolves when it comes to terror.
It's bigger. The origins of a hate crime should be viewed as an integral part of an actual hate crime. We can't just look at the final act of a terror play.
Instigation is critical here. We need to make a serious assessment of those who disguise their hate speech as free speech.
It's all connected.
