Should Have Let Us Grill
“McCloskey” is a relatively rare name. However, this week it has become a household staple forever linked to an incident where an affluent white couple brandished firearms at a group of Black Lives Matter marchers passing through their gated community in Saint Louis. The protesters were on their way to demonstrate in front of a politician’s home. Mark McCloskey, flanked by a self-proclaimed “egotistical” lawyer, appeared on Fox News’ Tucker Carlson and CNN’s Cuomo Prime Time to describe what happened, where he recounted hearing chanting coming closer as he was dining alfresco with his spouse. Reportedly, as the marchers got closer, the couple scrambled into their mansion to grab his rifle and her handgun because there were no police in sight. The couple then moved on to their front lawn, shouted at protesters, and waved guns as the march moved past their property.
In interviews, McCloskey described the moment as “the storming of the Bastille,” where he rationalized his behavior by saying he believed he would be murdered, his house would be burned down, and then his pets would be killed. Normally, one might not describe their home as the Bastille, but the McCloskey’s live in an enormous concrete fortress, which would have made for significant protection from an on-coming “horde” as he described the protesters.
McCloskey’s framing, of course, is dangerous vigilantism, which has now become the norm in so many cities and towns in the US after false stories circulated on social media alleging that members of Antifa were being paid to travel to remote towns to do damage. Perhaps the most stunning aspect of the whole scene is its surrealism. Their exaggerated response and utter lack of “trigger discipline” (basic gun safety) makes the video appear as a dark comedy. The video is akin to watching a remake of Falling Down, the 1990s flick starring Michael Douglas as a man who just could no longer take the pressure of everyday life in Los Angeles. As a result, the entire scene has become fodder for hundreds of memes, where the McCloskeys represent out of touch “boomers” who “just wanted to grill.”
I Just Want to Grill
The “I just wanna grill” meme began several years ago as a reaction to media coverage of social ills such as racism and police brutality. It’s indicative of an attitude, as old as the US itself, where individuals seek to disentangle their personal lives from public issues — a privileged fatigue of calls for social justice. Tocqueville noted, “Individualism is a mature and calm feeling, which disposes each member of the community to sever himself from the mass of his fellow-creatures; and to draw apart with his family and his friends; so that, after he has thus formed a little circle of his own, he willingly leaves society at large to itself.” Jokingly riffing on the concept of the “red pill,” some describe their political disinterest as “grill pilled.”
Enter “Boomerwaffen”
Just as soon as the video was posted, memes began to circulate drawing on the “I just want to grill” template, but quickly morphing into much more insidious sub-themes about the radicalization of older white Americans. Utilizing the retro-future aesthetics of popular “fashwave” memes, which includes slight distortions, overexposed color, and sinister one-liners, the McCloskeys images are now immortalized within the far-right memesphere, where edgy internet users are mocking them, and white supremacists celebrating them. The “awakened” boomer appeals to a romanticized view of America’s past, where Black political expression was hidden behind the glare of 80’s hyper-capitalist consumerism. The McCloskeys are an avatar of white separatist world views, armed and unrepentant.
Sticky memes based on breaking news events invite high participation both from out-groups and in-groups that repost for entertainment. They are also a way to transmit undercover meaning to those who understand the many different connotations interlaced in the visual language. Boomerwaffen, for example, is a new far right term for older people who are radicalized by civil unrest and engage, at times, in outrageous social acts or terrorist attacks, such as the attack on the Pittsburgh synagogue and the man who mailed pipe bombs to Democrat politicians and journalists. The designation is a play on Atomwaffen Division, a neo-Nazi group known for terrorist murders and wearing skull masks, and the Boomer meme, which popularly refers to those in the boomer generation. In addition, Boomerwaffen also refers to “veteran” white supremacists who have frequented neo-Nazi messageboards for decades and use the term “Alt Right” earnestly. One meme, in particular, drew the couple on the cover of the infamous white supremacist text, The Turner Diaries.
While there have been studies that track how older populations consume news, which demonstrate that older people are more likely to share junk news online, we suspect that mainstream news coverage of the recent protests is also shaping the reactions of those who encounter protesters in their neighborhoods. When a crowd marching elicits an armed response from civilians (as we continue to see in other cities), the issue isn’t just one homeowner safety and distorted threat perceptions, it is also indicative of a deeply fearful and distrusting society, where even those who would usually call on the police have lost trust in the institutions that are meant to protect them.
The ironic mocking and celebration of the McCloskeys in memes amongst the left and the right also signals something significant about the state’s tolerance for violence in this moment. While attempts to drag the McCloskeys and dox them did occur, a preponderance of the memes focus on white vigilantism and the boldness of white people to take extrajudicial action, which is the very definition of racism put forth by Ruth Wilson Gilmore. She writes, “Racism, specifically, is the state-sanctioned or extralegal production and exploitation of group-differentiated vulnerability to premature death.” Social media companies should take note of how memes like these glamorize violence, even as they use humor, parody, and irony as a rhetorical strategy to reach new audiences. The threat of political violence against Black Lives Matter protesters isn’t funny.
