I'm actually kind of surprised it's taken so long for one of these kids to set off a bomb.” And there are even more of Tsarnaev’s friends, who are still stunned. But it's the usual thing: Is this the land of opportunity or isn't it? When I look at what they've been through, and how they are screwed by federal policies from the moment they turn around, I don't understand why all of them aren't angrier. He says, “All of these kids are grateful to be in the United States. There is also testimony, by way of Wick Sloane, a community college professor who has taught many young immigrants like Tsarnaev. The empathy does not end with the reportage. Reitman later notes that, “Though it seems as if Jahar had found a mission, his embrace of Islam also may have been driven by something more basic: a need to belong.” The article seems ultimately to be asking, how can we not have some measure of empathy for a young man with so simple a desire to belong? Family friend Anna Nikeava discussed the Tsarnaev family’s problems and concluded, “Poor Jahar was the silent survivor of all that dysfunction.” Poor, poor Jahar. When danger has an unexpected face, we demand answers. Not only does Reitman meticulously reveal how Tsarnaev went from boy next door to terrorist, she seems desperate to understand why. Reitman’s article is breathless in its empathy for Tsarnaev. He smoked “a copious amount of weed.” He may have committed a monstrous act, but he retains his normalcy. He is described as “ a beautiful, tousle-haired boy with a gentle demeanor, soulful brown eyes.” He enjoyed what most teenagers seem to enjoy-popular television shows, sports, music, girls. Time and again, the word “normal” comes up. They were shocked because we have a portrait, in our minds, of what danger and terror look like and it’s not this golden boy on the cover of Rolling Stone. The article also reveals how shocked Tsarnaev’s friends and neighbors to learn he and his brother were responsible for such a crime. Tsarnaev is described by those who knew him in near reverential terms as “sweet” and “superchill” and “smooth as fuck” and “a golden person, really just a genuine good guy.” While Tsarnaev’s community acknowledges the terrible things the young man has done, and mourn the tragedy of the bombings, they are unwilling to turn their backs on him. Most striking in Reitman’s extensive and well-reported article is how the people who knew Tsarnaev are still willing to see the man behind the monster. Zimmerman was acquitted for the very same reason. George Zimmerman killed Martin because Martin fit our cultural idea of what danger looks like. The tone of Janet Reitman’s reportage and the ongoing conversation about Tsarnaev as a “normal American teenager,” are an interesting and troubling contrast to the way we talk about, say, Trayvon Martin, who was also a “normal American teenager” and not a criminal or terrorist.
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These notions are reinforced, amply, by the article accompanying the cover, something few people seem to be talking about. It is also a reminder that we have certain cultural notions about who looks dangerous and who does not. It is a stark reminder that we can never truly know where danger lurks. But protests aside, the cover is provocative and pointed. The magazine has been accused of exploiting tragedy, glorifying terrorism, and trying to make a martyr or a rock star out of Tsarnaev.
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This notoriety, I imagine, explains why Tsarnaev is featured on the cover of the August issue of Rolling Stone. Three people were killed and nearly 300 others injured. We were reminded of this in early 2013 when we learned that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who looks like the “boy next door,” was identified as one of the two young men suspected in the terrorist bombings near the finish line of the Boston Marathon. Dangerous people rarely look the way we expect. There is no way to truly know whom we need to protect ourselves from.