RONALD TAYLOR, rd like you tornmeet Buford Furrow; Buford, this isrnRonald. You gus have so much in common.rnFor one thing, von both hit thernheadlines. Buford Furrow became arncelebrit)- of sorts in August 1999 when hernshot up a Jewish communitv center inrnLos Angeles. Buford’s a real Aran hero,rngoing up against all those imarmedrnschoolgirls, and then taking out a mailmanrnwho happened to be Filipino. Backrnin March, Ronald Taylor did prettyrnmuch the same kind of deed in Wilkinsburg,rnPennsylvania, when he decidedrnthat the janitor was a racist for not fixingrnhis door quickly enough, and \ ent out tornshoot down any white men he could see.rnHe killed three men, the first being 71rnyears old, before trying to take hostages inrna building containing a daycare center, arnsenior center, a hospice: Now why didn’trnyou think of targets like that, Buford?rnThere’s lots of people there who couldn’trnfight back. The other person I supposernI’d like to have here as well is BenjaminrnSmith, who made a lot of news last Julvrnwhen he went on a rampage in the Midwestrnand started randomly shoofing Jews,rnblacks, and Asians, though he also hadrntlie decency to shoot himself in tlic end.rnPity: If he were here, that would havernmade it a trifccta, wouldn’t it?rnThe three of you would have so muchrnto talk about. For one diing, all of you fitrnthe classic profile of mass killers —lonersrnwith serious problems with drink andrnpsych wards. All of you also decidedrnalong the way that your problems werernthe fault of some outsider who could bernblamed for keeping vou loneU and miserable.rnAnd there was no shortage of peoplernwho could tell you things like that—rnNazis and Chrisfian Identih folk for thernwhites, Nation of Islam fantasists forrnblacks. Ronald was shouhng that he wasrn”out to get all white people,” and in hisrnspare time, he carefully drew up a “SatanrnList” of businesses owned by vhites,rn.sians, or Jews.rnI hough Ben and Buford are white,rnand Ronald is black, the three of yournrealK seem like brothers under the skin.rnThere is one strange thing, though — peoplernreact to you so differentlw Mter therntwo white killers carried out their attacksrnlast summer, there was a national upsurgernof soul-searching about “haterncrimes,” and about how these just representedrnthe disreputable end of a vast spectrumrnof white racism which also includedrna lot of national politicians. Somernwriters suggested that this kind ot haternshould be seen as a nrental illness in itsrnown right, so that haters should be putrnawa’ before they could actually pull therntrigger. Alvin F. Poussaint, a learned doctorrnfrom Harvard Medical School, suggestedrnthat “It’s time for the AmericanrnPsychiatric Association to designate extremernracism as a mental health problem.”rnAs to who the racists are, there wasrna fair consensus on that too, since racismrnin this context can only mean whiternracism. Didn’t you know there is, literally,rnno such animal as black racism? Startrnsuggesting there is, and some bright sparkrnwill quote a much-used academic definitionrnwhich explains that it can only bernracism if it is used to enforce existingrnpower relationships, and blacks don’trnhave power, so the can’t be racist,rnQ.E.D. So all the haters are white men.rnAs the Philadelphia Inquirer headlined,rn”Wliite males and mass violence: Manyrnheterosexual, white men feel entided tornsuccess. Social changes, coupled withrnpersonal failures, drive them to rage, expertsrnsay” (August 15, 1999). Heterosexual,rnmale, and white: If eer there was arnpowder keg w aiting to go oft . . .rnBut things were just different withrnRonald Taylor. C^ertainh’ the FBI investigatedrnit as a hate crime, and people didrnuse the term, but it w as jn.st put in such arndifferent context, or rather, a lack of context.rnWhile the crimes of Messrs. Furrowrnand Smith were blamed on systematicrnwhite racism, Taylor’s were attributed to,rnwell, systemafic white racism. The localrnNA’KCP said that, while the crimes werernappalling, the’ had to be seen as “the resultrnof racism, hate, mistrust and poorrncommunication coming on the heels ofrnpublicized local incidents imolvingrnblack men killed b white police” (andrnrecall, racism alwas means whiternracism). You could only understand Taylorrnin the context of racial profiling andrnthe acquittal of the four police officersrncharged in the shooting death of AmadournDiallo. Nobody commenting on fire attacksrntried to la’ au- blame on the blackrndemagogues who have done so much tornpoison race relations in this country,rnsuch as I ,ouis Farrakhan, Al Sharpton, orrnConrad Muhammad.rnIt’s often interesting when readingrnstatements about race to see what bizarrernresults emerge when we invert the ethnicrnlabels, and the Taylor case was no exception.rnOne state NMCP ofl^icial declaredrnthat “I don’t know what drove this man torndie point where he couldn’t take it anymore,”rnbut Ta’lor’s frustrafious revealedrnthe “seething of racial anger” in her community,rnconcerns that need to be addressedrnurgently. Funny, if anyone hadrnsaid an thing like that about Buford Furrow,rnhe would probably have beenrnhowled down as a racist.rn— Philip ]enkinsrnBjU, R.LP. Although the Greenville,rnSouth Carolina, haven of fundamentalismrnis still holding classes, the New-rnWorld Order’s steamroller has flattenedrnthe life out of Bob Jones Universitv. I’mrnreferring, of course, to the recent abandonmentrnof BJU’s ban on interracial datingrnand marriage on campus. Thernschool’s president, Dr. Bob Jones, III,rngranted the dispensation on Larry KingrnLive, after intense scrufiny in the nationalrnmedia following the squabble amongrnRepublican presidential candidatesrnGeorge W. Bush, John McCain, andrnAlan Kcycs.rn”I want to proe to the world that wernare not racists,” said Dr. Jones. As to thernaeeompanving charge of being “anti-rnCatholic,” he added, “We don’t haternCatholics at all —we love them and wantrnto see tiiem come to Christ.”rnThe fact that some Bible-thumpingrncracker still believes, as a Protestant, thatrnthe Roman Catholic Church has rejectedrnthe pure Gospel has sent the media intornconvulsions. The candidates, ofrncourse, fell into line, condemningrn”racism” and “anti-Catholieism.” Conservativernpundits responded with storiesrnabout BJU’s loss of its tax-exempt statusrnand President Reagan’s failed (butrnvaliant) effort to restore it. Liberals, inrnturn, demanded that Congress censurernBob Jones llniversit)’.rnThe real story, however, is that BJUrncaved. Wooed by the national media andrnfatigued by fiieir own commitments, theyrnabandoned the “rule [they] never discuss”rnin exchange for a table crumb,rntossed by George W. Bush.rnStrict, self-proclaimed “fighfing” fundamentalists,rnunlike evangelicals like JerryrnFalwcU, tvpicalK’ carr’ their premillennialrnpessimism to its logical conclusion:rnThe Church is a life raft amidstrnthe storm’ w aters of a dying culture;rntherefore, we should get as many onrnboard as possible, and let the storm ragernon. Separation from “the world” hasrnbeen the idenfifsing mark of fundamentalismrnsince the 1940’s and 50’s.rnEarlier in the 2()th century, when WilliamrnJennings Bryan won his court casernb/C;HRONICLtSrnrnrn