Thread by @monaeltahawy

I see that Ashli Babbitt is trending because of her racist fuck of a mother. So let me remind you who Ashli Babbitt was.

https://twitter.com/monaeltahawy/status/1551569880134172672

Ashli Babbitt never imagined she would survive fighting for regime change “over there” only to die fighting for regime change “over here.” feministgiant.com/p/white-women-…

The 14-year Air Force veteran who fought in both Iraq and Afghanistan was the only person shot by Capitol Police while trying to storm the Congress of her own country.

So eager of a footsoldier of white supremacist patriarchy was Babbitt that she was the first to scramble through a window in a door separating the insurrectionists from an area where members of Congress were sheltering from the mob.

She never imagined the Capitol Police would shoot her because the police in the U.S. rarely shoot white women, unless it’s a cop who shoots his wife at home. feministgiant.com/p/white-women-…

Ashli Babbitt supported QAnon, a far-right conspiracy movement that formed around a baseless belief, born on the internet, that Trump has been secretly fighting deep state enemies and a cabal of Satan-worshipping cannibals operating a child sex-trafficking ring.

It is the latest polite mask for white supremacy and was instrumental in driving the insurrection.

Although media were full of male QAnon supporters who stormed the Capitol, QAnon--which FBI labelled a domestic terror threat in 2019--was driven largely by suburban white women.

Particularly mothers.

It elected two representatives to Congress, both white women. feministgiant.com/p/a-white-supr…

Babbitt was described as “never afraid to speak her mind” and her sedition: “in a way, this was her way of speaking her mind.” We are told that the woman who survived a war of regime change in other countries only to be killed attempting regime change in her own country 👇🏽

Babbitt family insisted they “really don’t know why she decided to do this.” The innocence afforded white womanhood, even when they join an insurrection, white women are still remembered for the best versions of themselves.

Women who joined ISIS were never afforded such an audacious innocence.

But those comparisons must be made. As I read that the bereaved relatives of Babbitt said they'd argued with her not to go.

Or that QAnon had created a wedge within families, it reminds me of the backstories of armed Islamists I reported when I was a Reuters correspondent in Cairo and later of the women who became suicide bombers for movements such al-Qaeda.

Babbitt & other vets who stormed Capitol on #Jan6 remind me of men who joined mujahideen to fight vs Soviet Union in Afghanistan only to return home to Egypt or Algeria and turn their guns on governments there. Is the U.S. ready to make those connections? feministgiant.com/p/white-women-…

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