Follow up to Charmayne Brown: Earnest Apology?

I did my research project on the recent hate crime involving Charmayne Brown who was attacked by Billie Jean (B.J.) Taylor and her family. Recently, B.J. issued an apology via CNN as seen here. I personally don’t feel B.J. represents herself or her community very well. She gives no real explanation for any of the racial slurs that were spat at news reporter Charmayne Brown, nor the reason for the violence, punching, beating, and pulling on the hair that she received. B.J. claims it was basically a crime of passion, that she and her family couldn’t control themselves and that if she could, she really would take all of it back. I feel that this experience isn’t going to teach this family anything other than to be more careful next time. They basically got off scot-free owing to the lack of hate crime legislation in South Carolina. B.J. stumbles through questions asked by the reporter and only seems to make a bigger fool out of herself, saying that she never threw out a racial slur, when it seems in the video she was equally violent and livid as the other three attackers. She says the reason they didn’t attack the white news reporters was because, when told that the family did not want to talk, the other news crew “just said okay and walked off” while Charmayne Brown and Ti Barnes (her cameraman) resisted, “throwing back comments at us, that they didn’t have to leave.” Well, heaven forbid that they be told by news reporters that they were on public property and had every right to be there. The nerve of Charmayne Brown, doing her job like she did! How dare a news caster attempt to report the news. B.J. denies it being race related, but the slurs that were yelled cannot be denied, even if she says she did not partake in the name calling. Even if she wasn’t throwing out the “N word,” she sure as hell wasn’t trying to stop her family members from saying it. She is a reflection of her family, her family is a reflection of her. It’s bad enough that B.J.’s relative killed her father. Was the attack worth more disgrace to the family name?

-Scrappy