Weekend Reading: Ahmaud Arbery, Kyle Rittenhouse's Acquittal, Terror in Charlottesville, and More
The best reporting and writing from the past week, and context to understand it.
There’s a lot of great journalism out there. Every week, in a format short enough that it won’t be clipped by your inbox, we aim to share some of the best, with additional context for understanding the biggest news of the day. This is a weekly digest of stories you can savor and reporting you can rely on.
Guilty Verdict for Ahmaud Arbery’s Killers Is a Welcome Sign of Progress, Jesse Washington, The Undefeated
Equal parts a haunting reminder of the contextual reality of blackness in America and a hopeful eye toward the future after a positive day in the Black Lives Matter movement, Jesse Washington’s essay was a fitting summary of a saga that was bigger than simply Ahmaud Aubrey’s story.
🗄️ From 2020: Twelve Minutes and a Life — Mitchell S. Jackson, Runner’s World: No excuse is needed to reshare this Pulitzer Prize-winning (and National Magazine Award-winning) piece on running, as a pastime, for black Americans.
Peoples, I invite you to ask yourself, just what is a runner’s world? Ask yourself who deserves to run? Who has the right? Ask who’s a runner? What’s their so-called race? Their gender? Their class? Ask yourself where do they live, where do they run? Where can’t they live and run? Ask what are the sanctions for asserting their right to live and run — shit — to exist in the world. Ask why? Ask why? Ask why?
🗄️ From 2020: Ahmaud Arbery Will Not Be Erased — David Dennis Jr., Atlanta Magazine: David Dennis Jr. begins his story about Ahmaud Arbery with an ugly truth: “Black people disappear in America.” He goes on to highlight the state of Georgia’s ugly past in that respect.
In 1982, James Baldwin flew from Paris to Atlanta to write about the trial of Wayne Williams, the man believed to have been responsible for [the Atlanta Child Murders, where at least 29 black children and young adults went missing]. His reporting eventually became the 1985 book, The Evidence of Things Not Seen’ about America, race, and how a country allowed Black bodies to continue to disappear. “Black death has never before elicited so much attention,” Baldwin wrote, noting that “this is not the first time such a devastation has occurred: It is the first time that Authority has been forced to recognize the devastation as crucial.”
📖 The System Only Worked Because It Was Pushed — Adam Serwer, The Atlantic: Much like Jesse Washington’s piece in The Undefeated allowed for room to celebrate the administration of justice while tempering a potential desire to see the guilty verdict as a huge step forward, Adam Serwer points out an uncomfortable truth: The trial very nearly didn’t happen at all.
Of Course Kyle Rittenhouse Was Acquitted — Adam Serwer, The Atlantic
There is a paradox of fragility here, in which a moment of fear — perhaps one imbuing the deceased with supernatural strength — is invoked to justify homicide, and the dead who would be alive but for this moment of terror subsequently become a symbol of the frightened man’s valor. At a certain point the logic of this sort of “self-defense” becomes indistinguishable from a custom that simply allows certain people to get away with murder. This is the legal regime that a powerful minority of gun-rights advocates have built — one in which Americans are encouraged to settle their differences with lethal force, preferably leaving as few witnesses capable of testimony as possible.
📖 Kyle Rittenhouse and the Scary Future of the American Right — Zack Beauchamp, Vox: In Adam Serwer’s piece, he writes: “It is one thing to argue that the jury reached a reasonable verdict based on this law, and another entirely to celebrate [Kyle] Rittenhouse’s actions. Much of the conservative media and the Republican Party, however, don’t see the killings as ‘wrongful’ in any sense, instead elevating Rittenhouse as the manifestation of retributive violence against their political enemies.” Zack Beauchamp’s piece for Vox looks into reactions on the right, from citizens to politicians, and uncovers ugliness.
Immediately after Kyle Rittenhouse’s acquittal on Friday, the fringe right’s online forums lit up with celebration — and among some, a belief that they too can kill without legal consequence. On Telegram, a secure messaging app popular with extremists, the leader of a neo-Nazi group wrote that the verdict gives “good Americans legal precedent and license to kill violent commies without worrying about doing life in prison if we defend ourselves in a riot.”
🎧 The Acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse — Michael Barbaro, The Daily/The New York Times: If you were unable (or unwilling) to watch the entirety of the trial, perhaps you could use a refresher on what exactly happened in the courtroom.
📖 Kyle Rittenhouse, American Vigilante — Paige Williams, The New Yorker: Paige Williams wrote the definitive account of the aftermath of the events in Kenosha, Wisconsin, that led to Kyle Rittenhouse being on trial. But it’s so much more than just that.
Jury Finds Rally Organizers Liable for the Violence That Broke Out in Charlottesville — James Doubek & Vanessa Romo, NPR
More despicable behavior on trial and more decisions reached by jurors. White supremacists responsible for 2017’s Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, were found liable for conspiracy to the tune of $25 million.
Lawyers with the plaintiffs have acknowledged that one of the goals of the lawsuit was to diminish the ability of white supremacists to spread their message and influence by draining them financially.
📖 A 19th-Century Law Dismantled the KKK. Now It Could Bring Down a New Generation of Extremists. — Lyz Lenz, HuffPost: Although the plaintiffs won a $25 million verdict, the jury was unable to reach a consensus on federal charges that stemmed from alleged violations of the KKK Act of 1871.
After lying dormant for several years, the KKK Act is currently being used to sue conspirators in the January 6th Capitol riot, and in December of 2020, the NAACP filed a lawsuit against Donald Trump and the Republican Party under the act, alleging that they conspired to interfere with the voting rights of Black Americans in Michigan.
📖 White Supremacists Used Racist Slurs and Cursed in Bizarre Opening Statements for the Charlottesville Trial — Christopher Miller, BuzzFeed News: Christopher Miller did some great reporting from the trial, posting numerous updates throughout, but perhaps none captured what a sideshow the white supremacist/neo-Nazi defendants wanted the trial to be like his coverage of their opening statements.
“Check. Check. Check,” neo-Nazi shock jock Christopher Cantwell spoke into the courtroom microphone. Wearing a blue shirt without a tie or jacket, he proceeded to name-check Mein Kampf, drop the n-word, plug his far-right radio program, call himself “good-looking” and a “professional artist,” and blast antifascist activists all in a matter of minutes. Surprising nobody in the courtroom, Cantwell, who prepared for this moment with help from two other neo-Nazis in prison and spending evenings watching Tucker Carlson, said “I’m not a lawyer … [but] I'm the best attorney I could afford.” He added, “and I didn’t even stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.”
📖 Charlottesville Extremists Lose in Court, but Replacement Theory Lives On — Alan Feuer, The New York Times: Just in case you didn’t get enough outlandish political commentary from some relative around the Thanksgiving dinner table, here’s a doozy for you.
Four years after the event, the same ideas that made “Unite the Right” a lightning rod for hate groups are increasingly being echoed, albeit in modulated tones, by prominent figures in conservative media and politics. Chief among them is the great replacement theory, which holds that Democrats and others on the left are trying to supplant white Americans with immigrants and others for their own political gain.
More of Our Favorites From the Past Week
No Chips, No Problem: Why Old Video Games Are Better Than New Ones — Justin Heckert, 1843 Magazine/The Economist
The Tomb Raiders of the Upper East Side — Ariel Sabar, The Atlantic
Keanu Reeves Knows the Secrets of the Universe — Ryan D’Agostino, Esquire
Hayao Miyazaki Prepares to Cast One Last Spell — Ligaya Mishan, The New York Times Style Magazine
The Dave Portnoy Playbook — Reeves Wiedeman, New York
The Follow-Up
The news doesn’t stop. If you checked out last week’s edition and found the topics interesting, here’s a collection of stories published since.
The Effects of the Pandemic
📖 A Crisis of Childhood Grief — Anna North, Vox
Peak Newsletter
📖 Substack Is Now a Playground for the Deplatformed — Chris Stokel-Walker, Wired
The Next Academy Awards
📖 ‘Procession’ Isn’t a Documentary on Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church — It’s a Portrait of Survivors Reclaiming Their Lives — David Fear, Rolling Stone
The Postscript
This week, elsewhere on The Postscript.
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