Spotted at church and once again behind bars in Arizona, escaped murderer Stacy Province is tied to last week’s slaying of an elderly couple at a campground in Santa Rosa, New Mexico. Were Mr. Province a minority or a Muslim, this story would be about race or religion. But "white" is the default setting for U.S. culture. So we just assume he is simply a dangerous criminal, not an example of the violent nature of white Christians.
Full New York Times story
There is a universal human tendency to generalize about people different from ourselves. We deny the individuality of "others" yet freely acknowledge the variability of character within our own group.
The anti-immigrant ethnic finger-pointing over the tragic deaths of Arizona rancher Robert Krentz and Sister Denise Mosier of Virgina demonstrate how this human frailty is being abused by a growing number of opportunistic politicians and pundits.
Raul Ramos y Sanchez