These efforts to make mass shooters sound like they’re ultra-violent op-ed writers is tiresome in the extreme. The Buffalo shooter is a despicable racist who should be executed, but the media are trying to mold him into an acolyte of a talk-show host they dislike.
“In short, the manifesto is a rant from a 4chan addict, obsessed with ‘the Great Replacement,’ CRT and white grievance,” writes NBC News’s Ben Collins (He’s the “senior reporter, dystopia beat.”)
It would also be true to note that the presumed shooter is, according to his online manifesto, an anti-conservative environmentalist who says, “We were born from our lands and our own culture was molded by these same lands. The protection and preservation of these lands is of the same importance as the protection and preservation of our own ideals and beliefs.” He says, “sure,” he’s a left-winger and maybe a socialist, “depending on the definition,” but explains that he rejects conservatism because it’s “corporatism in disguise.”
I’ve been a bit slippery with the above; the shooter also says he’s a fascist, and my reference to his being “sure” he was left wing comes from this passage:
Are you “right wing”?
Depending on the definition, sure.
Are you “left wing”?
Depending on the definition, sure.
Are you a socialist?
Depending on the definition. Worker ownership of the means of production? It depends on who those workers are, their intentions, who currently owns the means of production, their intentions and who currently owns the state, and their intentions.
In short, the manifesto, while certainly political, is ideologically all over the map, as was the Unabomber’s. Whoever your ideological boogeyman of today’s discourse is, this person doesn’t link up to him very easily.