It's no surprise that Norway's mass murderer was white

Having spent much time this past year reading the books of the great Henning Mankell and Stieg Larsson, not to mention Eva Gabrielsson's fine memoir of her 32 years with Larsson, it was hardly a shock to hear that the perpetrator of Norway's killing spree was a home-grown terrorist.  The Neo-Nazi's and right-wing xenophobes are sufficiently powerful and violent that Gabrielsson and Larson lived in constant fear for many years before his untimely death.  And did we not just read last week that Germany has been forced to obliterate all remains of Rudolf Hess and his grave, since the site had become a perverse locus of pilgrimage for neo-nazis?  On our last trip to Germany I was surprised by the popularity of New Balance sneakers, only to be shocked by the widespread symiotics of their trademark letter "N".

I don't know what the answer is, but I do know that we need to support courageous journalists like Larsson and Gabrielsson who risk their lives to expose the truth of these hate groups.  We could start by refusing to call these terrorists Christians.  Hate, violence and intolerance are not what the New Testament teaches.  We should also support organized efforts such as those by the Southern Poverty Law Center, who, among many other good works maintain a nation-wide list of hate crimes and groups.  But perhaps most importantly we should remember that we are all immigrants (unless your family has lived forever in the African rift valley).  I suspect the only countries without racial tension are those that are racially homogeneous.

If you want to find out about particular group, such as the  California Coalition for Immigration Reform or the American Family Association, look them up here. It's really appalling how many of these groups exist in the US and the extent of their vile emanations.