In the wake of the horrific events in New Zealand yesterday, outrage and sadness permeated throughout social media with people struggling to grapple with how a person could enact such cruelty on other human beings. But there’s a segment of people whose first thoughts don’t seem to turn to the victims, but instead turn to themselves and how they can derive some sort of victimhood from the event.
One example was Fox News foreign affairs analyst and former Trump campaign staffer Walid Phares, who decried the New Zealand attacks, but in the very same breath said that the attackers motives were “understandable on a political level.”
There were the bizarre words of GOP Rep. Louie Gohmert, who seemed to suggest that the attacker should have used “courts, dispute resolutions, and legislatures” to “resolve controversies” — insinuating that the attacker’s grievances were justified.
Then there’s this tweet from Trump-supporting Christian pastor Rodney Howard-Browne.
https://twitter.com/rhowardbrowne/status/1106562357512339456
“…a false flag that will be blamed on conservatives…”
Because as we all know, conservatives will be the real victims here.
This kind of logic shouldn’t be surprising come from a guy like Brown. He once declared that he knows global warming is “a total fabrication and garbage” because an eskimo friend of his told him. He also thinks Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg should be executed for “high treason.”
It’d be one thing is this kind of logic stayed relegated to the fringe, but Brown has been invited to mingle in the highest levels of government — even laying his hands in prayer on President Trump in the Oval Office.
The backlash to Brown’s tweet was swift.
You should be forced to watch the video, read the manifesto, and reckon with this statement. You're really arguing that the state orchestrated the horrific slaughter of fifty people? To what end?
— The White Niles Crane (@Prennisaur) March 15, 2019
https://twitter.com/JohnTomVarley/status/1106603103544057859
It's not a false flag. The murderer looks up to Trump and the GOP as allies.
It should be blamed on conservatives.
And you should be ashamed of your words and actions.
— dead (@UnsingingChoirs) March 15, 2019
H/T Right Wing Watch
Featured image via screen grab
