Week 5 - Nicholas Suen

In Darrell Y. Hanamoto’s Empire of Death and the Plague of Civic Violence, Hanamoto discusses various examples of the relationship between the militarization of the United States since the Vietnam War, and civic domestic violence. (2003) When I started reading the article, I was definitely confused as to how this reading was in any way related to the class topic of the week, “Imperial University”. However, after reading the article, I found many of the case studies discussed by Hanamoto to be very interesting and surprising. For example, when Patrick Eugene Purdy “invaded” an elementary school while dressed in military fatigues, I assumed this was some veteran who was suffering from some mental issues such as post traumatic stress disorder. I was very surprised to learn that he was actually the son of a military man who served in the Vietnam War, which was the source of his dissent for the South East Asians. This is an interesting example of the traumatic effects of war being passed down on a younger generation that did not directly experience said events. However, the militarization of the United States during the Vietnam War, followed by the continued military presence overseas during the Cold War, created a culture fueled by the idea of constantly being at war. I believe this contributed to Purdy’s belief that his former elementary school “...had become dominated by Southeast Asian American students.” (2003) This also is an example of race acting as a contributing factor in the selection of victims by mass murderers. It is often downplayed how minority groups are more often the target of serial killers and mass murders.

Minority groups are often targeted by radical attacks, with the mass shooting at the Pulse gay nightclub in Orlando as an example. The gunmen targeted the nightclub due to the predominant presence of gay men, whom he “...believed that it was up to God to punish gays.” (2016) It is unfortunate that groups are often selected for violence based on differences in race, sexual orientation, or religion. However, I think it is important to recognize these are triggers for violence, perhaps making people want to think about the origin of this kind of dissenting thought.

Question: Is it possible for the United States to move away from the current militarized culture? Would this result in the reduction of domestic civic violence?

References

1. Hamamoto, Y. Darrell. “Empire of Death and the Plague of Civic Violence.” Masters of War: Militarism and Blowback in the Era of American Empire, by Carl Boggs, Routledge, 2003, pp. 277-292.

2. Lizette Alvarez, Richard Pérez-Peña and Christine Hauser. (2016, June 13). Orlando Gunman Was Cool and Calm After Massacre, Police Say. Retrieved October 22, 2017, from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/us/orlando-shooting.html