UPenn Professor Ripped for Suggesting Police Allowed Texas Schoolchildren to Die Because They Were ‘Brown’
A University of Pennsylvania professor drew ridicule online for suggesting that first responders waited too long to engage the shooter in Uvalde, Texas last week because “police didn’t give a damn” about “brown kids.”
In a since-deleted tweet from Friday, UPenn Religious Studies and Africana Studies Professor Anthea Butler — who is also an MSNBC contributor — suggested that racism was responsible for the police failure to stop a gunman at a Texas elementary school in an attack that left 19 children and two adults dead.
“So since no one else will ask, I will. Did those children die because most of them were Mexican American and the police didn’t give a damn about a school w predominately brown kids? I mean, because it’s Texas.. and if you think everyone who isn’t white is illegal..”
Anthea Butler - in a now deleted tweet from a newly locked down profile...
— 🇺🇸 Patriots Rise 🇺🇸 (@suenesbitt75) May 29, 2022
Disgusting
She teaches at @Penn and works with MSNBC. Big surprise. pic.twitter.com/gjhnxYglTe
Butler — whose 2021 book “White Evangelical Racism” charges that racism is at the core of conservative evangelical activism and power — seemed to disregard the fact that the attacker in the Hispanic-majority City of Uvalde was himself of Latino descent, as were the city’s police chief, Daniel Rodríguez, the school’s police chief, Pedro Arredondo, and several other officers at the scene.
A few of the officers are reported to have had children trapped in the school at the time, some of whom died in the attack.
Butler later made her profile private following the critical responses to her tweet. However, the associate professor was not alone in her unfounded claims.
Left-wing columnist Wajahat Ali
expressed agreement with Butler’s sentiments when he tweeted, “I’m glad
I’m not the only one thinking this.”
I'm glad I'm not the only one thinking this. https://t.co/f0TaPXu1EQ
— Wajahat Ali (@WajahatAli) May 27, 2022
Erika Wilson, a professor of law at the University of North Carolina, concurred.
“It would be naive to believe race didn’t in some way color the response,” she wrote. “You are not wrong for asking the question.”
It would be naive to believe race didn’t in some way color the response. You are not wrong for asking the question.
— Erika K Wilson (@Erika_K_Wilson) May 27, 2022
In a lengthy thread, activist Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman — who co-founded the Sadie Collective, a group dedicated to fighting alleged racism experienced by black women in the economics field — expressed her conviction that racism undoubtedly contributed to the Uvalde deaths.
“I’ve heard from a couple of Black and Brown people that the slow response to a bunch of Latino children’s lives being endangered was intentional,” she wrote. “Honestly, racism will do that.”
“IT WAS RACISM ALL ALONG,” she charged in another tweet. “The gun violence? Racism. The slow PD response? Racism. Abbott getting his check after hearing the reports? Racism.”
“It’s racism steeped in apathy. It is
the intentional disregard for Black and Brown lives,” she added. “It
has BEEN reality so wake up.”
Beto asked Abbott to do something and got kicked out. Now the scum of the earth is shifting blame everywhere BUT guns and racism. And that's what this has always been about: control, power, and money.
— Anna Gifty (@itsafronomics) May 27, 2022
Half of these thoughts and prayers are brought to you by the NRA. FOH. #Uvalde pic.twitter.com/oZq6zduONE
Opoku-Agyeman claimed that “these attacks are targeting communities of color IN OUR COMMUNITIES.” She continued, “the same people who arrested the parents fighting for their CHILDREN’S LIVES would have cosigned every protest against Black and Brown children integrating white schools probably.”
“And that’s why this boils down to racism,” she added.
In response to Butler’s tweet, many called out the professor’s remarks.
“They love their racism narrative so much they are willing to stand on the bodies of dead children to promote it,” wrote conservative commentator Jeff Charles.
They love their racism narrative so much they are willing to stand on the bodies of dead children to promote it. https://t.co/hcK9PCpfV4
— Jeff Charles (@JeffOnTheRight) May 28, 2022
Source: Breitbart