Summary

Elinor Langer, author of A Hundred Little Hitlers

In her remarks, Elinor Langer said that A Hundred Little Hitlers essentially is divided into two parts: history and law. In the history section, she traces the evolution of the Portland skinhead movement in the 1980s, in particular its spread within the youth punk-rock culture. She also examines the involvement and influence of Tom Metzger, a white supremacist from California with ties to groups such as East Side White Pride, the Portland neo-Nazi group linked to the killing.

In the law section, Langer said that her first priority is to draw attention to Oregon's unique racial history: the state's leaders sought to avoid all racial issues by excluding both slaves and, later, black people from Oregon from statehood (1859) until the de facto policy was rescinded in 1926. This highly unusual "compromise" had the effect of creating an insular, relatively homogenous community that persists to this day, she argued, even though the state's racial diversity has increased substantially. This community prefers to deal with racially tinged violence such as the Seraw murder by painting such incidents as unambiguous anomalies within the social fabric—in this case, that white skinheads with bats were "out to get" a black man. All evidence, meanwhile, indicates that the Ethiopian's murder was a much more random act that was indicative of entrenched social realities among some Oregon subcultures.

Langer argued that the 1990 trial of the Seraw defendants raised "both constitutional and ethical questions." She said her decision to write the book was prompted by her "discomfort" with the trial itself, in particular the lack of effective representation for the local skinheads and the aggressive prosecution of Metzger, who was more than 1,000 miles away when the murder was committed. (Metzger was found guilty of inciting the murder through a skinhead ally in Portland, Dave Mazzella, and fined $12.5 million.) Langer contended that the community's effort to deny any related culpability for the crime prevented a clear-eyed, objective investigation of the murder and blocked a much-needed discussion of a social stratum whose views were not only distasteful but potentially deadly.

Langer concluded her presentation by reading an excerpt from A Hundred Little Hitlers focusing on Kenneth Mieske, one of the convicted murderers. Mieske's life in the 1980s serves as a chilling example of the "Nazification" of many Portland youths during that decade, an ominous social development that was mirrored elsewhere in the United States and around the world. Langer portrays Mieske (known in Portland punk-music circles as "Ken Death") and his girlfriend as unapologetic Nazi worshipers who openly expressed hatred of Jews, blacks, gays, and other minority groups while partying hard with other skinhead gang members in the city. Yet the author said that she sought to "humanize" Mieske and his girlfriend by also noting their love for each other and ability to behave decently in other parts of their lives. Full portraits such as these are the only way that such crimes and larger social developments can be adequately understood and addressed, she said.

Todd Gitlin, writer and professor

Gitlin concurred with Langer's measured approach, in particular what he called the book's "hard" aspects. The "bad guys" are portrayed as human, he noted approvingly, as are the "good guys"—who are "sometimes not so good." Gitlin hailed A Hundred Little Hitlers as not only a "tremendous feat of truth-telling" about skinheads and racism during that period, but also as a "classic" of journalism.

He said the book reminded him of Homage to Catalonia, George Orwell's account of his military and political engagement in the Spanish Civil War. The fascist enemies are often described as "young, terrified, and clueless," Gitlin said, thus helping convey the ultimate tragedy of the situation no matter what side one was fighting for. Orwell also exposes the "moral and intellectual flaws" of his putative Communist allies, Gitlin argued, thus proving that the author was not going to "close in brackets" inconvenient facts.

Gitlin also drew favorable parallels between A Hundred Little Hitlers and Jeffrey Cowan's 1993 book The People v. Clarence Darrow: The Bribery Trial of America's Greatest Lawyer. Although Cowan clearly venerates Darrow, a liberal icon, his research proves that Darrow was in fact guilty of jury tampering in a 1912 trial even though he denied the charge and was eventually acquitted. Gitlin said that the mark of valued journalists such as Cowan and Langer is that they refuse to allow their prejudices to overwhelm the story and hinder their search for the truth. It is, he added, extremely difficult to write a book where everyone is human and where "saints have lost their haloes."

Aryeh Neier, OSI president

Aryeh Neier echoed Gitlin's praise of Langer's ability to consider seemingly black-and-white events such as the Seraw murder in all their complexity. Neier said A Hundred Little Hitlers "stands out" for its honesty, writing quality, and solid defense of civil liberties that run contrary to popular opinion. He said he was particularly impressed with Langer's portrayal of nationally known civil rights leaders such as Morris Dees, the head of the Southern Poverty Law Center, who led the highly publicized and ultimately successful effort to implicate Tom Metzger in Seraw's murder. Dees and his supporters, argued Neier, "acted in ways that seemed to fulfill whatever institutional imperatives were most important to them" and thus only "carried out [their] assigned roles" in uncompromising lockstep. Dees' heavy-handed tactics during Metzger's trial were part of the trial's sweeping tragedy, Neier said.

Neier mentioned that Langer's book reminded him not so much of Orwell but of Norman Mailer's The Executioner's Song, which focused on the crimes of Gary Gilmore and his eventual execution by the state of Utah in 1977. Like Langer, Neier said, Mailer "looked at losers" and "dealt with them as human beings, [which] helped us see them as complex people." This sort of treatment enables the reader to "understand them much better," Neier argued, thus putting horrible deeds and related tragedies into more realistic contexts—and providing greater opportunities for the development of pragmatic strategies to address the causes and effects of these tragedies.