“Jews Will Not Replace Us”

One of many racist/anti-Semitic loud and oft-repeated chants from the largest assemblage of white supremacists in over a decade (per CBS News) in Charlottesville, Virginia. Along with “They will not replace us.” Referencing black Americans… and “Blood and soil,” a Nazi-era slogan (German: Blut und Boden and the words on the Nazi Ministry of Food and Agriculture logo) referring to pure Aryan blood and native German land belonging only to these “pure Christian Germans.”

Many of this alt-right Charlottesville group – understanding that “alt-right” is defined as those American right wing adherents where white Christian (almost always Protestant) supremacy is a core belief – carried rifles, pistols and assault weapons… using defensive shields with racist markings, carrying torches specifically as homage to the traditional KKK practice of carrying torches that would be used to ignite their burning crosses.

They are well-represented in the White House by players like Stephen Bannon, Sebastian Gorka and Stephen Miller, where some of these individuals have been instrumental in creating catch-phrases that sound patriotic – such as “America First” and “Make America Great Again” – that are in fact alt-right dog whistles for white supremacy.

My June 5^th “America First” – A Phrase with a Very Dark Past blog traces the clear historical path of that phrase into a rather unambiguous racist, white supremacist connotation, and it is pretty universally acknowledged that “Make America Great Again” is a call to return the United States to the ethos, economy, power and influence of the 1950s… which the alt-right also includes as a time when blacks and Jews “knew their place.” The alt-right has seized on the Confederacy for symbolism and history, coopting the flag, symbols and historical icons, arguing that they are doing nothing more than preserving history… a posture rapidly and openly adopted by the President himself. But who are these followers of the alt-right philosophy, what do there really believe and what motivates them?

The August 15^th Vox.com explores a recent formal psychological study – A Psychological Profile of the Alt-Right: “Recently, psychologists Patrick Forscher and Nour Kteily recruited members of the alt-right (a.k.a. the ‘alternative right,’ the catchall political identity of white nationalists) to participate in a study to build the first psychological profile of their movement. The results, which were released on August 9, are just in working paper form, and have yet to be peer-reviewed or published in an academic journal…

“A lot of the findings align with what we intuit about the alt-right: This group is supportive of social hierarchies that favor whites at the top. It’s distrustful of mainstream media and strongly opposed to Black Lives Matter. Respondents were highly supportive of statements like, ‘There are good reasons to have organization that look out for the interests of white people.’ And when they look at other groups — like black Americans, Muslims, feminists, and journalists — they’re willing to admit they see these people as ‘less evolved.’”

The study itself noted why Forscher and Kteily mounted the research in the first place: “[Donald] Trump’s election coincided with the rise of a political movement, the ‘alternative right’ or ‘alt right,’ that took an active role in cheerleading his candidacy and several of his controversial policy positions. Although the movement embraced Trump enthusiastically, the precise nature of its membership and goals remain unclear. Nevertheless, associates of the alt-right appear to wield considerable influence within Trump’s administration, dramatically increasing the movement’s reach and political power. Moreover, some alt-right associates have shown a willingness to use aggressive behavior in pursuing their aims, including violence at political rallies and doxxing of political opponents (i.e., publicly releasing sensitive personal information on the internet). Beyond the significance of the alt-right’s rise for theories of intergroup relations, the movement’s growing political influence and the seeming willingness of some of its adherents to use extremist tactics towards their objectives highlight the practical need to better understand the psychological roots of alt-right support.

“Some of the opaqueness of the alt-right’s motivations follows from the movement’s largely decentralized structure; whatever formal organization it has exists primarily online.” (Citations omitted). While there are clearly-defined local groups, from assemblages of KKK followers to regional alt-right militias/neo-Nazi organizations – supported by online periodicals like Breitbart News – they are heavily dispersed across the country. However, their common thread is the reestablishment of white Christian traditionalists to all material positions of power in the American political scene and the relegation of everyone else to a rather clear second class (or worse) status, regardless of citizenship. Reversing the results of the long-past Civil War.

The study’s authors compared answers to series of questions and visual analyses between clear alt-right supporters and a more average grouping. For example, using the image above with online sliders to measure intensity along with additional polling efforts, they generated the following “evolved status” result from the alt-right test-takers:

“[It’s] the degree to which the alt-righters differed from the comparison sample that’s most striking — especially when it came to measures of dehumanization, support for collective white action, and admitting to harassing others online. That surprised even Forscher, the lead author and a professor at the University of Arkansas, who typically doesn’t find such large group difference in his work…

“Among the measures where the alt-right and comparison groups don’t look much different in the survey results is closeness and relationships with other people. The alt-righters reported having about equal levels of close friends, which means these aren’t necessarily isolated, lonely people. They’re members of a community.

“Also important: Alt-righters in the sample aren’t all that concerned about the economy. The survey used a common set of Pew question that asks about the current state of the economy, and about whether participants feel like things are going to improve for them. Here, both groups reported about the same levels of confidence in the economy… It goes to show: The alt-right is motivated by racial issues, not economic anxiety.

“But it goes deeper than that. The survey revealed that the alt-righters were much more concerned that their groups were at a disadvantage compared with the control sample. The alt-right (and white nationalists) is afraid of being displaced by increasing numbers of immigrants and outsiders in this country. And, yes, they see themselves as potential victims.” Vox.com.

The most troubling undercurrent to these findings, evidenced by the alt-right’s violent Charlottesville protest followed by alt-rallies around the country, is their increasing willingness to take action against those they see as the inferior beings that threaten their power and control over “their” society.

Online attacks and the dissemination of fake news through social media are bad enough, but the notion that alt-right followers are no different from any other group (there is no “alt-left,” by the way, no matter what Donald Trump may say)… no more or less violent… and are thus categorized and legitimized by the President of the United States as part of his official U.S. policy, has effectively empowered these groups to escalate their well-armed efforts to the next level. Social media is now replete with statements from alt-right hate groups citing the President’s statements as clear support for their views.

If the rise of legitimize alt-rights expressions of hatred and concomitant belief that violence against their perceived “inferiors” is now legitimized by those they have voted to put in office is not severely stopped, we may well generate that race war that mass murderer Charles Manson (a rather clear alt-right neo-Nazi pictured above right with his obvious facial tattoo) tried to foment in back in 1969. “In the months leading up to the Tate/LaBianca murders in August 1969, Charles Manson often spoke to the members of his ‘Family’ about Helter Skelter, an apocalyptic war arising from racial tensions between blacks and whites.” Wikipedia.

But back then we did not have a president who counted that extreme neo-Nazi movement as just one more protest group. One more thing: Odd, I thought that the over 30 thousand U.S. soldiers, sailors and airmen who died or were wounded in World War II were deeply committed to purging Nazi from the face of this earth. I wonder how those fighting men and women would feel to watch the President of the United States legitimize neo-Nazis as just one more political force in the American body politic?

If you have the slightest doubt what side the Trump administration is on, here’s a little stunning development reported in the August 16^th BBC.com: “The Department of Justice (DoJ) wants all visitors' IP addresses - some 1.3 million - to a website that helped organise a protest on the day of President Trump's inauguration… DreamHost is currently refusing to comply with the request and is due in court later this month.” The Donald does not do well with anyone who criticizes him or his policies. But if you voted for and support him... no matter how extreme you may be... expect his unyielding support. I wonder how well our enemies will use these racist vectors in their anti-American propaganda.

I’m Peter Dekom, and if you aren’t already angry at our President, perhaps it’s time to leap over mere anger into being furious and letting your elected representatives know that.