The sense of shock and shame that has engulfed the Korean American community in the wake of the murderous Virginia Tech rampage may seem overdone to some, but its roots are familiar to many minorities.
"My first thought when I heard initial reports [of the shootings] was 'Oh my God, I hope it's not a black person,' " African American commentator Earl Ofari Hutchinson said. "It's a visceral reaction, a reflection of this country's long history of typecasting all minorities."
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Saturday April 28, 2007 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 1 inches; 37 words Type of Material: Correction
Virginia Tech: An article in the A Section on April 19 about the reaction of ethnic communities to the Virginia Tech massacre said the Oklahoma City bombing occurred in April 1993. The bombing occurred April 19, 1995.
When the spotlight settled on Seung-hui Cho on Tuesday, Korean Americans in Los Angeles wasted no time denouncing the crime, holding a candlelight vigil and prayer service -- extending, in effect, a collective olive branch to a society they worried might judge them harshly.
"It is during these times that we need to remind each other how far we have come as a multicultural nation and continue to help each other heal past wounds," said Grace Yoo of the Korean American Federation of Los Angeles.
That kind of response prompted confusion, even derision, in some quarters. "It's a lack of intelligence to think that one lunatic shoots up a university and we're going to go after all the Koreans," John Kobylt of "The John & Ken Show" on KFI-AM (640) told his audience Tuesday afternoon. He poked fun at Korean Americans' self-blame, accusing them of "playing the race card.... Now look who's stereotyping."
But the sensitivity of Korean Americans -- and that of other minorities -- is rooted in culture and history, and reflects the reality that distinctive events, with distinctive players, tend to leave a unique mark on our collective psyche, bolstering innate tendencies toward bias and stereotyping.
"People will never forget that it was a Korean that committed the crime," said social psychologist Joel D. Lieberman, chairman of the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
"When you've got a white guy going crazy, [his ethnicity] doesn't stand out because most mass killings are done by whites. But when you have two rare things occurring like this, people tend to overestimate the frequency of the occurrence" and make a connection between group membership and behavior that doesn't exist.
Lieberman said he couldn't can't imagine people holding the Korean American community accountable.
But the impulse toward a public display of contrition is also rooted in psychology, he said. "People's sense of identity rests not just on your own accomplishments, but the failures and accomplishments of your group. If you're a Mets fan and the Mets are doing well, you feel good about yourself. When a person from your group does something that reflects negatively, you feel bad about yourself. You have a desire to distance yourself from the person."
The feeling may be especially pronounced among minorities who feel more vulnerable to being judged by society. Each group nurses its own concerns that are specific to its history and place in society.
Blacks might fear that events like this would bolster stereotypes that they are prone to violence. Jews' fears might reflect a history of being scapegoats for society's ills. The focus on immigration causes many Latinos unease. And hate crimes against Muslims in America have risen since the World Trade Center attacks cast them as terrorists.
Salam Al-Marayati, executive director of the national Muslim Public Affairs Council, said he waited with dread Tuesday to find out whether the Virginia Tech killer might be Muslim or Middle Eastern. When the gunman was identified as a South Korean national, Al-Marayati said, he felt overwhelming relief, quickly replaced by guilt, and then by sadness that another immigrant community would be in the spotlight.
"It's a sad commentary that we have to be relieved when the story is not going to be one about our religion or ethnicity or race," he said, noting that no group should be held responsible for the problematic behavior of an individual.
Al-Marayati expressed similar sentiments immediately after the Oklahoma City bombing in April 1993, when little was known about the perpetrators but suspicions were rampant that they might be Middle Eastern men. At the time he said, "The first trauma is in witnessing with everyone else the suffering inflicted on innocent ... people," he said. The second, he added, is when Muslims are unfairly targeted.
Former Huntington Park Mayor Ric Loya said he experienced a sense of relief when he learned the gunman was not a Latino. "It's horrible, but I found myself thinking, 'I'm glad it wasn't us. We're in the spotlight enough.' It's weird; I don't know why I'd think that. You look back at all these mass shootings and it's never a Latino."
For Korean Americans, the sense of shame may be particularly acute because of their cultural commitment to interdependence. "Here in America, we think of ourselves as much more separate and autonomous," said Stanford University professor Hazel Rose Markus, an expert in cultural psychology.
