Mimi Groves, Jimmy Galligan, and double standards for White and Black innocence

Follwing the recent New York Times article about Mimi Groves and Jimmy Galligan, we’ve seen many narratives develop along all-too-predictable lines.

I deplore all the angles that try to frame either teenager as being evil, which is especially happening with Jimmy Galligan: Multiple outlets are speaking of him as “vindictive” and “a moral monster,” among other things. And certainly, his approach wasn’t the most nice or nuanced thing to do. But, then, neither was Groves’—and to her credit, she has taken responsibility for that.

People are saying that Groves was “only 15” in the clip that features her uttering the racial slur, and that she didn’t understand the gravity of what she was doing. But somehow, Galligan doesn’t get the same leeway. He’s Black, she’s White. Is this double standard really because he did what he did at 18, while she was 15? I somehow doubt it. Maybe it’s because he hasn’t expressed any regret, while she has? Ok, but it did take her 3 years and getting called out to express that regret. Besides, regret or lack thereof is not by itself a measure of one’s moral standing, particularly given that what each of them did has a very different character. More context is necessary.

The context of Jimmy Galligan’s indignation

Think for a moment about the kind of world Jimmy Galligan and other Black and Brown youngsters are coming of age in for a second. Galligan was 18 in 2020; his whole high school experience has been lived in the shadow of both Donald Trump’s bigotry-filled non-leadership of the country he lives in and broad societal denial of the horrific systemic racial injustices against Black and Brown people.

Remember all the names of Black people killed by police—most with little to no reparative action taken? Remember how Colin Kaepernick took a knee in late 2016—when Galligan was 14—to protest this issue civilly and peacefully, and completely lost his career as a result?

Remember, before May 2020, how whenever folks would say “Black lives matter,” it would so often get framed as being racist, with “all lives matter” as a frequent retort to derail protests against the devaluing of Black life?

Remember when Ahmaud Arbery was lynched in late February 2020, on video, while going for a jog? Remember, a couple of weeks later, when Breonna Taylor was killed asleep in her bed? Remember, in both cases, how local law enforcement did nothing at all for months in response to these atrocities, until public pressure forced them to? How Breonna Taylor’s killers still have not been brought to account, to this day?

Remember how all this was taking place during the presidency of someone who called Mexicans rapists, pursued a blanket ban on any travel by any Muslim to the US, referred to nazis as “very fine people,” had Brown families physically ripped apart at the border, and told the fascist Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” from a public debate stage?

Imagine knowing that one day, you or your family might get attacked or killed because of what your body looks like, and your community and your country might not give a shit. Furthermore, imagine also having a father who is White and himself a police officer who utters the N-word and denies the existence of White privilege, as was the case with Galligan’s father.

All that is a hell of a mindfuck for a young Black kid coming up today, don’t you think? Given this unjust psychological burden on Galligan and other Black and Brown youngsters, which Mimi Groves is not dealing with, I have to ask: If we are going to afford sympathy for her innocence, why would we not do the same for Jimmy Galligan’s? That, to me, points to a troublesome racial double standard.

Youth disenfranchisement amplifies the desire to have an impact

I do not uncritically cheer Jimmy Galligan as a hero for his actions. However, I totally understand both his actions and the praise some people have for what he did—especially given the powerlessness so many youngsters feel in today’s age. Teenagers in the USA in 2020 lived under a regime of supremely incompetent adults, many of whom refused to do even the most basic things [like wearing a mask] to protect their communities from a deadly virus—let alone do sweet fuck all about the climate catastrophe these kids are going to live longest into. Even before 2020, American kids were growing up with school shootings and other public massacres being the norm—and nothing substantive being done about it.

Galligan and others are cited in the New York Times article as having undergone anti-Black racist experiences in their school, with their complaints largely ignored or brushed aside when they went to authorities. When you consider why Jimmy Galligan might want to save that damning clip of Mimi Groves for the moment of greatest effect (which, by the way, he had possession of for 1 year, not 3), think about how powerless he must have felt to change the injustices all around him, from the family level to the school level to the national level. It’s the same sense of frustrating lack of agency that we saw in the youngsters who attacked police vehicles in protest at rampant police violence with no accountability and no by-the-books avenue of redress. In such situations, yes—you want to maximize your effect. Otherwise you are made invisible once again.

Let’s also not impute things onto Jimmy Galligan that he didn’t do. He did not slur or slander her or specifically lead a campaign to deny her entry into a school. The school made that suggestion to Groves’ family after getting angry calls from alumni. This says more about how social media amplification of sensitive issues affects perception of those issues than anything else—and while Galligan is a fairly popular TikToker, his channel is not some well-honed stream of political discourse. I take him at his word that he wanted the clip to have an impact specifically on her, but I don’t buy that he was out to ruin her life.

Keeping perspective

It’s disproportionate that Mimi Groves’ foolish Snapchat message years ago became this huge lightning rod for so much else. I take no pleasure in thinking about what she’s going through—I wish her the best and appreciate that she is taking responsibility for her actions and blaming nobody else for their consequences, as of this writing. But I also know what kind of society she and Galligan are living in; as much as her dreams of today have been deferred, I am fairly sure that in the long term she will get many opportunities through being viewed as a sympathetic and reformed victim of unfortunate circumstances, while Jimmy Galligan is more likely to have his name permanently associated with “ruining” a young girl’s life. This is why I feel called to defend Jimmy Galligan specifically, lest we forget that America’s racism generally doesn’t benefit its Black people, to put it mildly.

Some media personalities are honing in on how insufficient it is to put the burden of America’s problems onto these two youngsters. I agree. This whole episode points to problems way bigger than Mimi Groves and Jimmy Galligan. But if we truly believe that, we must refuse the urge to scapegoat either of these individuals in the process—otherwise, we become that much more immoral ourselves, through our hypocrisy, than those we are scapegoating.