White nationalism

"Racist isn’t a descriptive word. It’s a pejorative word. It is the equivalent of saying, ‘I don’t like you.’ ‘Racist’ is just a slur word,” he said. “I think race is real, and I think race is important. And those two principles do not mean I want to harm someone or hate someone. But the notion that these people can be equal is not a scientific way of looking at it.”"

"According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, an advocacy group that tracks hate and bigotry toward marginalized communities, there were at least 950 active hate groups in the United States in 2017, up from 917 the previous year. Experts say the term “hate group” is increasingly difficult to define, as extremist groups grow in number, diversify in ideology and use codewords to spread their messages. “I think they’re scared they’re going to lose everything they’ve worked for, their standing in society and everything that’s dear to them,” said A.J. Marsden, assistant professor of psychology at Beacon College in Leesburg, Florida. “In our culture, it has been traditionally easier for white people to get good jobs, for them to go to school, to get a good education, et cetera, and I think they start to see their opportunities narrow”..."

"White populists complain they are losing ground to minorities in terms of status and power. At the same time, they assert with increasing belligerence that their country is the greatest in the world. On its face, this pair of claims is puzzling: Why would your allegiance grow to a society you feel is treating your people poorly? According to a new study, it makes perfect sense from a psychological perspective. Researchers... [at] the University of Oxford and... the University of Auckland argue that the negative feelings arising from perceived group decline can be counteracted by the conviction that your country is strong and powerful. In other words, if one group you identify with (whites) no longer provides the same comforting sense that you are a part of a powerful "we," you can latch onto the strength of a different group you identify with... The new findings "provide an explanation for the rise of nationalism," the researchers write in the journal Political Psychology. "Endorsing beliefs about national superiority is one way a nations dominant ethnic group can cope with the negative psychological consequences of perceiving that their group is deprived."

"Those who study human behavior attribute hate speech more to deep personality issues than a diagnosable mental illness. But theyre also intrigued by how the white supremacy movement is rebranding itself for the 21st century. The well-known racist symbols of white robes and hoods or shaved heads and torches have given way to a clean-cut subtlety for the millennial generation... Young people with a troubled past are especially vulnerable, said psychologist Ervin Staub, of Holyoke, Massachusetts, a professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst who studies social processes that lead to violence... A 2015 report from the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism found that former members of violent white supremacist groups showed almost half (45 percent) reporting being the victim of childhood physical abuse and about 20 percent reporting being the victim of childhood sexual abuse... humans are complex. In the deep South, it was once common for otherwise upstanding citizens – mayors, sheriffs and judges, among others – to also be members of the KKK."

"Arno Michaelis, a former racist who’s now an anti-extremism activist, was a member... in the late 1980s and early ’90s... Hammerskin Nation, whose website states, “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White Children.” Michaelis said recruiters for extremist groups target white people — often working class and ex-military — who believe they’ve been victimized and short-changed by society. “So that’s what we would do,” he said, “is look for ways that people were suffering, look for whatever is wrong in their life, and then we would try to spin that problem into our narrative and invite them in as a means to addressing that problem.” This fear of becoming a minority is one commonly shared among far-right extremists, regardless of otherwise differing ideologies. Michaelis said the reinforcement of this fear is key to the radicalization process. “All white-power ideology stems from the idea that white people are oppressed,” he said. “And therefore anything goes in order to fight this oppression, the same way that anyone else who felt oppressed would justify fighting against what they see as their oppressors.” He said it was the people who treated him with undeserved kindness that ultimately motivated him to reject racism."