On Saturday, as an 18-year-old white gunman opened fire at a supermarket in Buffalo, NY — in what authorities are calling a racially-motivated …
On Saturday, as an 18-year-old white gunman opened fire at a supermarket in Buffalo, NY — in what authorities are calling a racially-motivated attack targeting Black people — viewers on Amazon-owned
Twitch were able to watch it live. Before the shooting, in which 10 people were killed, the suspect is said to have discussed intimate details about his plan in a private server on the popular chat service
Discord. And even earlier, according to a 180-page manifesto seen by Insider and purportedly written by the shooter, the anonymous chat forum 4chan helped radicalize him.
“There I learned through infographics, shitposts, and memes that the White race is dying out, that blacks are disproportionately killing Whites, that the average black takes $700,000 from tax-payers in their lifetime, and that the Jews and the elite were behind this”, he wrote, much of which is a reference to the racist “Great Replacement” theory. The horrific event over the weekend in Buffalo follows an eerily similar pattern to other shootings in recent history sparked by racial or religious hatred: White-nationalist radicalization fueled largely by social media, followed by a violent act committed before a live audience.
