White Feelings Can Jeopardize Black Lives
By: Heather M. Edwards
Tags: Racism, Race, Politics, BlackLivesMatter, Culture

White Feelings Can Jeopardize Black Lives

A conversation in which I debate with a fellow writer

All rights © Robert Eklund. Brompton Cemetery. London, Storbritannien

Following is an online ping-pong of ideas about racism, intention and redemption between me and a fellow Medium writer whose thoughtful writing and deep introspection I admire, though largely disagree with on this one particular piece. This is a long one, folks. You might want a glass of wine.

A year and a half ago I was stunned to hear one of my favorite actors casually discussing premeditated murder in an interview about his upcoming movie. Liam Neeson incurred predictable backlash and immediately apologized. But he apologized for conflating vengeance with justice — not for conflating all Black men with rapists and hoping to kill one of them in retaliation for the rape a close friend survived.

He did not apologize for “racializing crime” as The Guardian Journalist Afua Hirsch definitively analyzed despite being repeatedly interrupted by white people on The Pledge.

It is in this context that I “excoriated” Liam Neeson last year for reflecting on the time he indulged a race-based revenge plot, for an entire week, and society as a whole for maintaining a legally safe climate for him to have done that in the first place and a relatively socially safe climate for him to publicly reflect on it 40 years later.

David Wade Chambers — I think we are circling each other in half-agreement. The nuances of our disagreement are exactly where I see hidden daggers in the Liam Neeson debacle that pervade society still.

It seems not a week goes by without a white phone call to the police about a minority who has made them feel threatened or even merely uncomfortable. And given the heart-shattering prevalence of police brutality, the despicable frequency of which ends the lives of innocent Black people, white feelings can be dangerous. And as Amy Cooper chillingly showcased, white feelings can be weaponized.

David — your comments are italicized, my responses within and after. Readers — the specific celebrity is not as relevant here as is this deep and abiding template for uniformly subjugating and criminalizing people of color in the name of white comfort, denial or rage. And that is precisely what we need to root out of ourselves and our systems.

Sigh, Liam Neeson has been one of my favorite actors for many years, and reading your essay deeply saddens me — for a number of reasons. I agree with some, possibly even most, of the substantive points that you make in your essay about racism. Without doubt, the feelings he freely and regretfully acknowledges in the interview were racist and a low point in a life that we have many reasons to admire.

He was one of my favorites too but celebrities don’t get morality exceptions. And this celebrity did not express regret for the right thing — that he had homogenized all Black men, any Black man, while simultaneously criminalizing them. Black people are not interchangeable and none of them are punching bags. He failed to say “I deeply regret indulging and perpetuating this dangerous stereotype and discussing it so casually.” He failed to say “Black men have historically been murdered for even perceived transgressions against white women.” And this presumed inherent criminality of Black men is exactly what makes white people shoot first and ask questions (or plant drugs and weapons) later.

I suggest that you go back to the interview; listen to it a little more carefully.

Why? Why do I need to patiently sit with the skeletons in this man’s closet? His moral arc is not more important than the safety of our fellow human beings. I suggest you read about the extensive history of innocent Black men being murdered because angry white men thought they looked at a white woman, harassed a white woman or killed white girls. That is the relevant context, not his regret for thinking that violence would make him feel better.

The strongly felt fantasy, that he describes, of wanting to take violent revenge for the wrong done to a friend builds to a climax which you choose to ignore: he says “It was horrible, horrible, when I think back, that I did that.” His tone when he tells the story is grave, pondering, and full of regret.

But it wasn’t just a fantasy. He described his activities — taking a weapon and choosing “Black” areas which he then physically staked out — every night for a week. That is premeditation and recon. He didn’t say he felt horrible for that crime or how Black people are treated worse on their best behavior than white people are on their worst behavior.



I do believe people can change. I wouldn’t write the kinds of articles I do if I didn’t believe that with all my heart. But perhaps you can listen a little more carefully to what he’s not saying. He regrets conflating vengeance with justice — not conflating all Black men with rapists. That’s his own moral crisis. And I think many people who’ve experienced violation go through this same process all the time without getting angry at an entire race. The “horrible thing” in his mind was indulging vigilantism — not that he wanted to kill “any Black man”. He still needs to make that distinction and express tragic regret for that racism.

I know he’s a good actor, but why not believe him? I do believe him. But, as I said, he didn’t apologize for conflating all Black men, any Black man with rapists. If his motives were merely to promote his film, as you suggest, then he could have done a much better job of it. Probably? And he would have appealed to a lot more people. Definitely agree. I found his account largely believable, especially for a man who grew up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.

Listen, by way of contrast, to your own tone in this Medium piece: angry, self righteous, unforgiving and unrelenting. When you tell Neeson “Every time you open your racist mouth more ignorance spews forth” you lose my support. Your comment is nasty and vindictive hyperbole. Nothing more and nothing less.

I’ve asked myself this too on other pieces. I don’t want to alienate readers from the content because of my tone. And I can hear my mother’s quiet voice, “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.” My current work-in-progress solution is proportionality. I think we have to weigh our tone against the facts. And in this case, I think the egregiousness of what he did warrants anger. But as I said, perhaps I should skip the name-calling and make factual statements like: It is terrifying that a white man can muse about homicidal impulses against an entire race and only apologize for his primal instincts for revenge violence — not for endangering the lives of however many Black men he encountered during his weeklong stakeout.

But can’t I have justifiable anger too? Or does just Liam Neeson get to be angry about the injustices of the world? Why aren’t you angry that he threatened innocent people? Why did you write a whole piece defending him against my tone instead of defending Black men against white people who jeopardize their safety in the name of their own feelings? That merits a whole article, right?

Calling him an ‘asshole’ is simply abusive name-calling. Nothing more and nothing less. Like ‘black bastard’? Did you write a whole piece about how that’s no more or less than abusive name-calling? Or is it just abusive when someone calls a white man names? This feels sexist though I’m sure that’s not your intention. But I hope that you hold men to the same standard — that they’re name-calling is “simply abusive” too.

Other commenters have pointed out my name-calling as well. I don’t disagree with you. I am indulging my anger. But is it the most pressing issue here amongst all this rubble?

Forty years from now I doubt I will look back on this and regret calling a racist an asshole. Forty years from now I hope I will be able to look back in consternation and remember, holy shit, back then a white man could just sit around in an interview ruefully recounting that time he premeditated revenge murder. I hope I will be shocked that journalism allowed for a nice Irish man to casually muse about “feeling horrible” for attempted first-degree murder.

Saying that at the time of the rape attack Neeson blamed all Blacks for a crime apparently committed by one Black is clearly correct, but why do you think Neeson would not now agree with you? He did not claim his motivation at the time was rational. Yes, I certainly hope he would agree with me now. I hope he would see that being irrational is one thing. But choosing a weapon and carrying it to targeted areas is pre-meditative. And murdering any Black man because of what one Black man did in another country is catastrophically life-threateningly different.

I find it pretty hard to forgive the sexism in your joking remark that since his “friend was raped by a man. That means any human with a penis would have been a sufficient target for [his] vigilantism.” What the ‘limp dick’ that you than mention might I have to do with this discussion I leave it to you to explain.

I don’t need your forgiveness. I stand by this point. By his monolith logic anyone with a penis could be a rapist, right? So where is your defense of his primal anger now? His friend got raped! Remember? So why didn’t he just beat up the first dude who provoked him? Because in his racist mind any Black man can be a proxy for any other Black man. He needed Black skin to take his anger out on. And that is *exactly* the problem — not the anger itself, but that the anger could be satisfied by taking it out on any faceless unindividuated dehumanized Blackness. His rage is totally understandable — but when I suggest that he not limit his self-described “irrational” rage to Black men suddenly it’s sexist?

The limp-dick dig is straightforward. He seems to have felt emasculated by both his inability to protect her or have prevented it as well as his inability to avenge it or undo it. And just like his apology, that still makes it about him. All of this is about him. His anger, his regret. None of it is about her or all of the Black men who were in danger for that week while he indulged himself. And I am indulging my anger by mocking him. Perhaps it is counterproductive in this context if I want to change minds.

And for God’s sake, the sentiments he describes feeling forty years before, he never actually acted upon, any more than you actually hit Neeson “over the snout” with a folded up newspaper, which is in some ways the perfect woman’s equivalent of a man’s cosh (whatever that is) in the back pocket.

So he can physically carry a weapon and go hunting but when I do it two-dimensionally it’s exasperating? You seem more upset about my article than his racism. I assume that’s not true or you wouldn’t have entered into a dialogue about it. That indicates curiosity and open-mindedness so I will continue.

Yes, it was 40 years ago. But Black men were in even more danger 40 years ago, with less legal recourse and even fewer convictions against white perpetrators. I would be more inclined to believe Neeson’s remorse if it included context along these lines: “It is still a dangerous society for Black men. But it was so much more dangerous back then and because of systemic racism I probably would’ve gotten away with it had I acted out on my ‘primal instincts’. As a society we have to change that.” All of this centers around him and his feelings when the conversation and the apology both need to center around rape victims and wrongfully targeted Black men.

I completely agree with him that revenge is indeed a primal instinct that civilized men (and women!) must learn to overcome. When a wallaby ate my roses I wanted to hit him over the snout, and I did chase him away from the garden. In truth I love having wallabies in the garden as much as roses.

So glad you didn’t! Wallabies in a rose garden sound like the most precious thing I’ve heard in a long time!

People are complicated. But apparently you are, or at least have become, one of those people, so commonly found on the right, and on the left, who think that one is either a good guy or a bad guy. Nothing in between and no allowance for any possibility of change over 40 years!

I apologize if my tone sounds binary. That’s actually completely contrary to the spectrum I believe to be true. Good people have always done bad things — on accident and on purpose. “Bad” people do good things all the time — probably with ulterior motives but sometimes just because they have genuine goodness in them too. Another Irish actor does a fabulous job of showcasing this human complexity — Jamie Dornan in The Fall.

But the abiding problem here is that a famous white man was safe to muse about how he’s evolved over 40 years from pre-meditating murder to understanding that vigilantism is wrong. Denzel Washington or Samuel L. Jackson — today — cannot sit around and muse about the time they staked out predominantly white areas because their justifiable anger triggered their primal instincts and they brought weapons — for a week — hoping a white man, any white man would antagonize them so they could kill him.

Let’s take a disproportionately “white” place like a yacht club or Wall Street. Imagine a Black actor staked out this area for a week with a weapon of his choice, lurking around late at a night hoping some white guy, any white guy, would provoke him so he could murder him. I don’t think any Black actor would casually reflect back on that time in any public way.

I wonder if you have any idea of how transparently inconsistent, how capricious and self-contradictory, is your advice to Neeson. On the one hand you tell him “spare us your personal journey,” then you say “first-person narratives only.”

Ah. Good point. I could’ve made that more clear. Spare us your personal journey through someone else’s trauma and use your own first-person narratives from The Troubles.

You accuse Neeson of “publicly telling the story of someone else’s ‘brutal’ rape”, then, you excoriate him without mercy for failing to give “any mention whatsoever” of the rape survivor’s story.

I wish he would’ve left her story out of the interview altogether. But since he did he could’ve put it in the broader context of rape culture that still exists 40 years later or the ongoing impact that had on her after the crime itself.

I think I know why you did not provide a link to the original interview. You did not want your readers to see the context of his confession, which was an interview with him precisely about a movie in which he plays a vigilante. Because contextualizing white men’s feelings and experiences and perspectives is not only irrelevant it is exactly the problem that persists today and gets Black people killed. It is exactly what keeps white murderers from being convicted and imprisoned for their crimes.

You’re implying that there is some context in which it is ok to premeditate the murder of Black men. There is not. I implore you to consider this. “Contextualizing” white feelings instead of Black safety is exactly what got Trayvon Martin and Philando Castile and Ahmaud Arbery and Botham Jean shot and killed. White feelings can literally jeopardize Black lives. One of the ways many actors get inside their characters, is to look deeply within themselves for a relevant incident that reflects their own experience. No. No movie role justifies premeditating murder. I know you don’t believe that. But when you include this as relevant context it weakens your argument. Neeson did this by recalling his own reaction to a friend’s rape. So …? Artistic process justifies indulging his internalized racism?

Nothing in the interview called for a detailed discussion of his friend’s rape. Yet you insist that he should be providing this. For example,

“this week that you spent wandering the streets with *your* world turned upside down? Who was taking care of your friend? Who took her to the hospital? Who sat with her during the police interview? Who stayed over at her house so she could sleep without fear?”

The answer provided in his interview: he was not in the country and did not learn of the rape till he got home.

I should’ve researched that detail. But when he got back did he check in on her every day? Instead of wandering the streets, couldn’t he have been standing guard at her place so she could feel safe and fall asleep?

Why did he not tell more of her story? I don’t think he should’ve brought it up at all. But since he brought it up in the context he did he could’ve talked about how few rapes make it to trial, and how even fewer result in convictions. And too many rapists get probation and community service instead of serving their full sentence. He could’ve talked about the justice system in general without divulging any private details about her. Here is another example from Ireland. I should’ve prescribed those suggestions more clearly.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, to coin a phrase, it wasn’t relevant to the interview and he was trying to protect her identity.

I hope so. Another commenter pointed out that she was already deceased by the time of this interview so I am relieved about that. And side note — it’s not coining a phrase, per se. It’s a familiar Catholic refrain. And I am frustrated with my fellow Catholic here.

Wikipedia presents a summary of his life’s political actions and social commitments that some readers may not have known about. Like you, I’ve hated the vigilantism and revenge motifs that dominate the second half of his acting career. And I suspect that by that time he was rich enough and talented enough to have chosen other roles instead. He’s no hero.

You perhaps give me too much credit here. I have to admit I enjoyed the first Taken before I learned how detrimental it is to anti-sex-trafficking advocacy. And there was no shortage of revenge in Rob Roy. And I loved him for it. He killed the man who raped his wife, the repugnant antagonist who smirked, “your wife was sweeter forced than many are willing.” I don’t believe in murder or vengeance. But at least in that fictional story, he directed his rage *at the actual rapist* — not just somebody, anybody with the same skin color.

But surely, he is also not the total ogre you make him out to be.

His soul is not for me to judge. But I will absolutely evaluate the impact of his public statements on the society and culture we all share. I will absolutely point out problematic implications that perpetuate the legacy of racism — and normalize it, even neutralize it by luxuriating in “context” that “justifies” the rage.

I may be wrong about him. I doubt if I know as much about him as you seem to think you know.

All I know is what the man said in the original interview and then in the subsequent damage-control responses.

In many ways, the most important part of your essay is your summary of five conclusions at the very end.

Here is my recap:

Points 1 and 2, I agree with and, more importantly, I suggest, so would Neeson. I hope so. But I still wish he would’ve been less preoccupied with his personal struggle and just used it as an introductory paragraph and then emphasized that jeopardizing Black safety in an unjust society where murdering Black people goes unpunished was grotesque of him. And I further suggest that these two points constitute a major reason why he told his story in the first place.

Your point 3 was “Your friend’s rape is not your ‘learning curve’ ”. I would argue the exact opposite: we, all of us, should, rather must, learn from tragedy, from error in deed and in belief, from one’s own lives and from other people’s.

Agreed.

Agreed. Points 4 and 5, I agree with D. Andre’s comment in your responses. “He wasn’t advocating for vigilante violence, he was actually attempting to illustrate how he’d learned from it and how it was a pointless time in his life. Whether he succeeded is up for debate, but using his platform to discuss issues that affect society is certainly not wrong.”

If he had said, “I was enraged. I wanted to find the guy who did it. I wanted to kill him,” I would absolutely humanly understand that primal rage to attack that specific person. But he didn’t. So in this weird way it became about exorcising his rage, not avenging her rape. She told him she didn’t know the attacker and the only other question he asked was, What color was he? So, yes, I think that is grotesque racism and all of this moral prevaricating in the gray area about justice v. revenge is both self-indulgent and a red herring.

If he had said, “I was enraged. I wanted to find the guy who did it. I wanted to kill him,” I would absolutely humanly understand that primal rage to attack that specific person. But he didn’t. So in this weird way it became about exorcising his rage, not avenging her rape. She told him she didn’t know the attacker and the only other question he asked was, What color was he? So, yes, I think that is grotesque racism and all of this moral prevaricating in the gray area about justice v. revenge is both self-indulgent and a red herring. Below is a link to the interview in question. I invite readers to judge the matter for themselves.

If you don’t have time to check out this link to the interview, I leave you with these word of Neesum: [sic]

“I understand that need for revenge, but it just leads to more revenge, to more killing and more killing, and Northern Ireland’s proof of that. All this stuff that’s happening in the world, the violence, is proof of that, you know. But that primal need, I understand.”

I agree that readers should read the whole interview. I didn’t deliberately leave that out of my original article, I directly quoted from it and linked to it.

But I hope that readers will agree that the primal need to survive, to be free from racial profiling, is far more important than anyone’s anger.