And there is no question in my mind that whiteness is a huge part of American gun culture and some of the most notable incidents of gun violence in history, in spite of the occasional non-white mass-murderer.

It’s not an exclusive “White male” thing….It’s more than that.

More like a Male thing than a “White male” thing….Plus it’s not like African Americans are any less likely to murder someone with a gun…Look at Chicago, Baltimore, DC etc….Black on Black violence.

I know what you mean about popularizations in your subject area.

Your children might also be interested in Harriet Jacobs. I found an abridged and illustrated version of her narrative, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, on Amazon by Bob Carruthers. There is also a fictionalized version of her narrative by Mary E. Lyons called Letters from a Slave Girl, for children grades 5-9. Her narrative sheds light on the experience of childhood in slavery both from her experience and that of her own children, whom she sees grow up while she is hiding in an attic, even concealed from them, for something like 7 years. It’s a heartbreaking part of her story, and although aimed to invoke sentimental motherhood of white ladies in the 1850s, it always gets me too, 160 years on.

A word of warning: Jacobs’s narrative implies attempts at sexual coercion and before making her escape, she assents to a liason with a white man (the father of her children). Depending on their sophistication and your personal comfort level, this may be OK for them, or not, but you might want to read ahead if you have concerns about explaining this stuff to them. (I don’t think Truffula will have an issue with this, it’s just a word to the wise.)