The Making of Monsters

While I’m certain literally no one cares about my opinion on this, and undoubtedly better pieces on this topic are being crafted as I sit here, I want to say this: the Tsarnaev case is probably the case that has firmly cemented my stance in the “anti death penalty” camp. Before today my opinion wavered. Perhaps it will waver again- I hope my life is long enough to see my opinion change on this and many topics I find compelling.

I no longer believe in the death penalty, partially because I don’t believe an eye for an eye solves anything, and strive (and frequently fail) to make that a practice as well as a theory in my life, but also because living out the rest of his life (which could be many years since he’s only 21) in a 84 square foot cell in Supermax in Colorado, where he was locked in that cell for 23 hours a day, could probably begin to convey to him the depth of the loss the families of those he killed will suffer the rest of their lives. He dies and his suffering ends.

And, since there’s an automatic appeals process for the death penalty, this case will drag on for a handful of more years, putting his face in the news AGAIN so the survivors and victim’s families are triggered by it over and over again. I don’t think the existence of the death penalty is even remotely the worst issue our country is facing at the moment, but I do think it’s one part of the problematic way our country deals with violence, crime and the degree to which certain offenses are prosecuted and sentenced.

Tsarnaev will be granted a reprieve from having to think about the reality of his choices, whereas other offenders convicted of much less egregious crimes, non-violent crimes, will spend their entire life in jail or get out of jail to find there are no viable choices for them other than recidivism and habitual incarceration. They have no education, are returning to communities plagued by poverty and violence, can’t get a job even if there were jobs to get (which there often aren’t) and the system intended to help them make a transition to a productive and lawful life is staffed by egregiously overworked and underpaid social workers.

And, of course, let’s take a minute to acknowledge the gutwrenchingly absurd injustice of the fact that Tsarnaev was brought into custody alive and relatively unharmed, whereas unarmed black people committing no crimes whatsoever with no prior criminal records, or committing minor infractions lie are extrajudicially executed by police and vigilantes every 28 hours.

Slavery followed by Jim Crow laws followed by the patently, intentionally racist “war on drugs” has painted a picture of black people, specifically black males, being an ever-present danger in our society. Some lunatic on twitter just today tried to convince me an unarmed black child of 18 years of age shot and paralyzed by a vigilante simply for being in a car with a white woman was “feral”. That was his exact choice of words. A young man who was not only ever even vaguely associated with criminal activity, but who excelled academically, and in athletics, and who came from a prominent family in the Tulsa area, his parents serving on the City Council. If a white child with his credentials — which have been, of course, omitted from any description of his attempted murder by mainstream media — was paralyzed in a similar incident, it would be a story deserving of national media attention. It would be regarded as a tragedy, flattering pictures of him would be everywhere, and the “security officer” who shot him, who was not even an actual police officer and was found to have marijuana on his person at the time of the shooting, a crime for which he was not charged,would be demonized.

I do not gain any positive feelings from hearing of Tsarnaev’s sentencing other than that I know many families of victims of the bombing are pleased with the outcome, and I don’t wish to invalidate their choice to seek the death penalty for him. I am fortunate enough to have not lost anyone close to me to that sort of violence. I am certain if I had a loved one who was taken from me in a violent, dehumanizing manner, I would have a hard time not wanting to end their killer’s life myself. Families who lost loved ones, or saw their loved ones suffer traumatic, life-changing injuries in the Boston Marathon are entitled to want to see Tsarnaev receive whatever they feel is just retribution for his acts. I do not at all want to seem like I am minimizing their loss or their feelings.

But, you know who else has had family members taken from them in what they see as a senseless act of violence? Rekia Boyd’s family. Michael Brown’s family. Trayvon Martin’s family. Freddie Gray’s family. And, a list of others that could scroll seemingly endlessly herein, a list that grows every day. Do you think they see whomever killed or permanently disabled their child, or sibling, or spouse, or friend any differently than the marathon victim’s families view Tsarnaev? Again, I have the luxury of not knowing, and I hope and pray I retain that luxury for my lifetime.

I don’t think or pray about it often, to be frank, because as a middle class white woman I am not painted with the same brush society would paint me with were I a black male. I live in a neighborhood and frequent areas relatively untouched by violence, because I have the means to do so. I have not done anything extraordinary with my life that would justify this other than having been the recipient of a lucky roll of the genetic dice, born with the “right” color skin to a “good” family in a “good” town.

I have benefited, directly, from the system of white supremacy in this country in innumerable ways: an education consisting of multiple degrees funded by my parents-generational wealth. A privilege I hope to be able to provide to my own children, children who will go to good schools, because I live in a good neighborhood, because I have the means as a result of mine and my husband’s professional careers but also because, to be perfectly transparent, my parents provided me with money to help purchase our home. Just because I was their kid, and they could. Not because of any real merit of mine. I benefit every day in seemingly smaller ways: not being followed around stores, even if I’m looking at stuff I damn well can’t afford. I’ve talked (and frankly, flirted) my way out of several speeding tickets. In contrast, friends and colleagues of mine who are black or have black children, male children especially, people who are kind and bright and hard-working and law-abiding and whose children are the same have said, more times than I can count, that anytime their son is without of their range of sight they say a prayer. Their worry-which for some is truly debilitating-is not unjustified.

Do I think Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is a monster? No. Not because I’m capable of seeing the good in all people. In fact, I fail that test daily, often more than once. Not because I think radicalized Islam is not a threat to the world. In his testimony, officer Darren Wilson described Michael Brown as “a demon”. I wasn’t there, I didn’t live that experience, but just like when I look at Tsarnaev’s picture, I don’t look at pictures of Michael Brown and think he looks much like a monster either. As an educator, oftentimes in the faces and descriptions of both young victims or perpetrators of crimes all I can see is how much they remind me of a current or former student and even if that kid made my life difficult every single day for an entire year, all I can think is “God, I never want to see his/her face in one of these types of pictures.”

I don’t think Tsarnaev he is a monster because I think unless we as a culture stop the “othering” of anyone who does not fit in the box of whatever it is we happen to believe in, whether those beliefs are founded in loving people or hating them, for reasons they can or cannot control, we will never see an end to violence. The violence of poverty, of racism, violence committed by the mentally ill, violence committed because of hate, self-inflicted violence committed by LGBT children, violence committed in the name of any and all Gods.

I don’t think Dzhokar Tsarnaev is a monster who deserves to die because I think he is a human being. That I am a human being, that my neighbors and coworkers and students are human beings. That the people who piss me off on the internet and cut me off in traffic are human beings. I don’t think Dzhokar Tsarnaev is a monster. I condemn his actions, I think he deserves to suffer severe consequences for those actions. But he is not the monster. Creating monsters for the sake of separating the “us” from the “them” is.