When media and political elites frame racist violence as a matter of individual hatred or mental illness, they obscure its systemic nature and global reach. Seeing racism only as hatred is not only deadly. It serves as an excuse that only benefits those in power and allows systemic racism to flourish indefinitely.

The coverage of Robin Westman, the 23-year-old white transgender woman who killed herself on August 27 after committing a mass shooting in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is yet another example of this wrongheaded paradigm. Westman shot through the windows of a church on the grounds of Annunciation Catholic School, wounding 17 people (including 14 children and three elderly parishioners) and killing two children.

It should not be difficult to grasp that one’s gender identity and worldview do not have to align. White transgender women like Westman can be drawn to white supremacy, just as it is often embraced by cisgender white men and women. Yet in a New York Post op-ed, pundit Karol Markowitz responded with transphobic and ableist overtones, writing: “If any other mental condition produced a pattern of murder, we would collectively discuss and decide on strategies to help those ailing. But there’s no discussion allowed about what to do when a child declares themselves transgender.” She provided no evidence of any connection between Westman’s depression, suicidal thoughts, and obsession with mass shootings and her gender identity, all while deadnaming her.

The implications for confronting racist violence are obvious. Too often, media with wide platforms frame racism as an individual defect, an expression of hate or illness, whether in the US or abroad. But the racism-equals-hatred paradigm has no chance of ending systemic racism or the vast, deadly inequalities it produces. What is erased in such coverage is the structural racism that oppresses billions globally.

The news media’s coverage of violent incidents in which an individual of one race attacks individuals of another often defaults to discussions of mental health or a brief conversation about eradicating racist hatred. Westman’s mass shooting and her stream-of-consciousness “manifesto” unfortunately fit this pattern. With........

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