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The media botched early Columbine reporting so badly that most of the public still believes the central myths: that loner outcast Goths from the Trenchcoat Mafia targeted jocks as revenge for years of brutal bullying. None of that is true. 1/x
(In some versions, they also targeted Blacks, and/or Christians. Also untrue.) Recently, another myth has made more headway on the web, of these same killers driven by white supremacy. It’s a complex subject, but I’ll try to hit some of the high points in this thread. 2/x
A tweet the thread that provoked this captured the problem perfectly. After reading a notorious passage from Eric’s journal, the person replied that he/she could see in 10 seconds they were white supremacists. (I can’t find the tweet, so going from memory). 3/x
Yup. The 10-second read is the problem here. You could also post Eric’s rants about “white pieces of shit” (or “white POS”), and makes some persuasive ten-second twitter conclusions that Eric was an anti-white supremacist. (He wasn’t.) 4/x
The cops released 1,000 pages of the killers writing, and the scope of Eric’s hatred and the number of groups he lashed out against is breathtaking, from the serious to absurd: 5/x
…slow drivers in the fast lane, people who say ‘acrost’ or ‘expresso,’ rap videos, gays, country music, rap videos, Star Wars fans, and … “The WB network!!!! Oh Jesus, Mary Mother of God Almighty, I hate that channel with all my heart and soul.” 6/x
You can read page after page of his “I HATE” rants at my Columbine-Guide resource site. Eric and Dylan’s full journals and many other writings also scanned there. https://www.columbine-guide.com/columbine-harris-web-what-i-hate 7/x
You can cherry-pick passages to make a case for Eric being driven by a hundred different motives, and sadly, over the years, I’ve watched advocates for innumerable causes, do so. They’re not looking at the full picture of Eric. 8/x
He was a 17-year-old who shot his mouth off about everything, in the most provocative terms, and if zero in on individual passages, you’re going to completely miss the actual guy. 9/x
You can also look at the testimony of his friends, peers, etc: most were aware of him shooting his mouth off with bits of this stuff, but to the best of my recollection, none perceived him adhering to actual WS views, or acting in that way. 10/x
Nor more than they saw him actually feeling the white (POS) race was inferior: Eric saw EVERYone as inferior. 11/x
That’s the essential truth of Eric that I ask anyone curious about understanding him to consider: Eric’s messianic sense of superiority and contempt for the entire human race is the key to understanding him. 12/x
The idea of Eric making common cause with the entire white race—or to seeing other whites as comparable or on his team or his side--is so ludicrous, and frankly, could only come from someone with little or no understanding of Eric Harris. Eric was an Eric Harris supremacist. 13/x
He makes it clear passage after passage, that his true desire is to kill off the entire human race (except for a handful of people of his choosing—the power to grant life, as well as end it). 14/x
He does this in so many colorful ways: eg, where he crossed out the Denver population in his day-timer and scrawled in 47 once he was through. (Typically, he picks a number under 10, for the whole planet.) 15/x
A central theme which actually pervades virtually every pages of Eric’s writing—not cherry-picked—is the phrase KILL MANKIND, which he wrote in huge block letters, or the opening line of his journal, which sets the tone of the whole thing: “I hate the fucking world.” 16/x
As the brilliant forensic psychologists, psychiatrists and criminologists on the case repeated to me over and over, was how those 2 phrases really capture Eric. While he lists literally hundreds of groups he hates—in all caps: 17/x
“YOU KNOW WHAT I HATE!!!?” over and over and over—is hatred of the whole fucking world. Not any one of these groups in particular. 18/x
Notice, I’ve referred only to Eric so far. That’s because I don’t recall a single instance of his partner Dylan expressing anything that you could even try to build a WS case on. 19/x
The proponents of the WS theory conveniently leave him out, or are perhaps just ignorant of his views, lacking deep knowledge of the case. What is the WS theory on Dylan? (Perhaps, at the very least, limit this theory to “One of the Columbine killers…” 20/x
Now consider the attack. They attempted to blow up an overwhelmingly white high school, then killed randomly. The idea of racial targets falls apart as much at the big myth of targeting jocks. They could have targeted either. They didn’t. 21/x
Twitter’s not an easy medium to address this, but it’s where so many myths are percolating, so that’s my best attempt. I hope I haven’t left too many gaps, or simplified too much. There’s far more nuance, of course. Thanks for reading. 22/x
