The Binghamton Shooting: Could It Happen in Boston?

Today another mass murder was carried out against innocent people in a public setting - this time in a immigration center in Binghamton, NY. And while the identity of the shooter has not been officially announced yet, the web is abuzz with unconfirmed reports that his name was Jiverly Voong (a.k.a. Linh Phat Voong), a Vietnamese immigrant who had just lost his job at IBM in a recent wave of layoffs at the company. Voong was apparently known to the staff of the American Civic Center where the shooting took place. According to the Associated Press his family said he had been in this country 28 years and had citizenship. As this drama plays out, and assuming Voong is confirmed as the gunman, this brings up an issue that should be of great concern to immigrant advocates here in Boston. That is, if it turns out that Voong was willing to kill fellow immigrants in response to his layoff from IBM - a layoff that was part of a move by IBM to offshore production to countries with cheaper labor costs like India - then this kind of violence could be merely the first of many such incidents to come.

These are difficult times for working families in the U.S. - with official federal unemployment numbers shooting up to 8.3 percent in March, as employers cut 663,000 jobs. And Boston is hardly immune to the global financial meltdown, as we've documented in these pages over and over again. Immigrants, most of whom have already left their countries-of-origin as economic refugees looking for jobs, are among the most vulnerable groups as unemployment figures rise. Add the steady drumbeat of anti-immigrant hysteria - fed to a huge public by ostensibly respectable news outlets like CNN nightly on shows like Lou Dobbs Tonight - to growing economic hardship suffered by the once-solid American middle class, and we've got the makings of a potential disaster for immigrants and organizations that support immigrants.

Ironically, at the same time, the election of Pres. Barrack Obama has provided some real openings for improvements in a heretofore irrational U.S. immigration policy. So we do not mean to suggest that immigrants - whose human rights Open Media Boston staunchly defends, as we staunchly defend the rights of all working families - should hide their heads in the sand at this critical moment because some unkind person decided to commit a ... shall we say ... externalized suicide.

We are, however, sounding a note of caution that Boston is hardly immune to this kind of violence. And we're not just talking about ongoing gang shootings either, which already take more than their fair share of innocent lives every year. We're thinking more about the abortion clinic shootings in Brookline over a decade ago. Another event that combined a victimized constituency, earnest advocates, a serious lack of security, and the crazed U.S. gun culture into a horrid outcome like the one we saw today.

Open Media Boston is concerned that this latest outrage energize five responses from people of good conscience.

First, people should do everything they can to help fight for a progressive immigration policy that stops criminalizing huge groups of people merely because they want to live and work in the U.S.

Second, as part of the first response, it would be really helpful if everyone took some time - at least once a week - to do battle with the nativist lobby in media and elsewhere in society. Write angry emails about unfair unbalanced anti-immigrant programming on networks like CNN, challenge nativists when they appear in your community, work with immigrant advocates to hold public forums and rallies, and lobby your politicians in support of immigrant rights.

Third, support the labor movement wherever you can. Help rebuild a nation that respects and defends labor rights as human rights in the U.S. and around the world - as one of the best possible solutions to corporate globalization and the economic war of all against all that it has caused. Join a union if possible, and help start one if there's not one at your workplace.

Fourth, fully fund community mental health programs that have been limping along since privatization and deinstitutionalization of the mental health sector began in the 1980s. This reform alone would do a hell of a lot to stop people from thinking it might be a good idea to get some guns and go blow away a lot of random folks before committing the suicide that was the ultimate aim of their penultimate brutal gesture.

Fifth, and finally, let's get some European-style strong gun control laws enacted on a federal level. People just don't need to be walking around with firearms on a day-to-day basis. And it should be really hard to get them at all times. If we can do that, we're going to limit the ability of angry individuals to kill lots of other people with easily available handguns and rifles.

If lots of people, especially local viewers, commit to this kind of activism in the public interest then we can ensure - as far as it's humanly possible - that the kind of tragedy that struck Binghamton today, never happens here. Or anywhere else in the U.S. ever again.

Our hearts go out to the families of the victims, and if we get word of any funds in their support - since many of those killed were recent immigrants with little financial means - we'll certainly append the information to this editorial.

This editorial was filed at 10:30 p.m. EST on 4/3/09
 

Update - 10:30 p.m. EST, 4/4/09

Many interesting articles now online on the background of the Binghamton shooter. His name was Jiverly Antares Wong (a last name that he sometimes gave as Voong). He was 41 years old, and came to the U.S. 18 years ago from Vietnam. His father was respected for his immigrant aid work with the now-defunct World Relief Organization. He had bounced between the Binghamton area where his family lived, and California - where he was married and divorced. Wong had recently moved back to Binghamton and held various jobs - the most solid of which was a per diem job at the local Shop-Vac plant (not IBM as many outlets were reporting last night). When he was laid off from that job and started receiving small unemployment checks, he stated to a former co-worker that "America sucks." But he was particularly angry at the American Civic Association where he took English classes until last month. He apparently felt that people there were making fun of his limited English. He was well known at a local outdoors shop where he often bought and traded guns. Former co-workers at Shop-Vac said that he once showed up at work in body armor - which was probably the same body armor he is now said to have been wearing during yesterday's shootings.

How to donate to the victim's families

Catholic Charities of Broome County (NY) has set up a special fund to receive monetary donations to help the victims’ families.

Click on the following link to donate online (Internet Explorer and Safari browsers only):http://www.catholiccharitiesbc.org/NewSite/donatepage.exe

You also can call (607) 729-9166 to donate by phone, or mail donations to Catholic Charities, Attn.: Marsha Maroney, 232 Main St., Binghamton, NY 13905. Write “Civic Association” on the memo line.

Jason Pramas is the Editor/Publisher of Open Media Boston.