1 00:00:15,356 --> 00:00:22,716 Speaker 1: Pushkin from Pushkin Industries. This is Deep Background, the show 2 00:00:22,756 --> 00:00:25,756 Speaker 1: where we explored the stories behind the stories in the news. 3 00:00:26,156 --> 00:00:30,716 Speaker 1: I'm Noah Feldman. The shooting at a synagogue outside San 4 00:00:30,716 --> 00:00:33,116 Speaker 1: Diego on the last day of Passover was just the 5 00:00:33,196 --> 00:00:36,716 Speaker 1: latest deadly attack where the suspect has reported links to 6 00:00:36,756 --> 00:00:40,876 Speaker 1: white supremacy. This incident pushed me to think harder and 7 00:00:40,956 --> 00:00:44,236 Speaker 1: deeper about the roots of white supremacy in the United States. 8 00:00:44,796 --> 00:00:48,276 Speaker 1: Are we really seeing something new here or is this 9 00:00:48,356 --> 00:00:50,916 Speaker 1: the same brand of white supremacy that's been around for 10 00:00:50,916 --> 00:00:52,996 Speaker 1: a very long time, as long ago as the Civil 11 00:00:52,996 --> 00:00:56,956 Speaker 1: War maybe before. To answer these questions and more, we're 12 00:00:56,996 --> 00:01:00,036 Speaker 1: joined by Kathleen Bellou. She's an assistant professor of history 13 00:01:00,036 --> 00:01:03,076 Speaker 1: at the University of Chicago, and her book Bring the 14 00:01:03,076 --> 00:01:07,036 Speaker 1: War Home, The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America is 15 00:01:07,076 --> 00:01:11,156 Speaker 1: the definitive look at the modern history of white power movement. Kathleen, 16 00:01:11,436 --> 00:01:13,996 Speaker 1: Welcome to Deep Background. Thank you for having me, and 17 00:01:14,076 --> 00:01:16,556 Speaker 1: thank you for the kind words about the book. Before 18 00:01:16,596 --> 00:01:20,796 Speaker 1: we dive into the history and prehistory of white power 19 00:01:20,836 --> 00:01:23,356 Speaker 1: and white supremacy, can I ask you just a personal question, 20 00:01:23,596 --> 00:01:25,916 Speaker 1: how did you get interested in this topic? It is 21 00:01:25,956 --> 00:01:28,596 Speaker 1: not the most obvious topic for a starting to work on. 22 00:01:29,516 --> 00:01:32,556 Speaker 1: It isn't, and in fact, when I began the dissertation, 23 00:01:33,236 --> 00:01:34,996 Speaker 1: I was told by more than one person that it 24 00:01:35,036 --> 00:01:38,476 Speaker 1: technically could not count as history, because the usual rule 25 00:01:38,476 --> 00:01:40,236 Speaker 1: of thumb when you're starting a dissertation is that you 26 00:01:40,236 --> 00:01:42,916 Speaker 1: should be studying things twenty five years ago or further 27 00:01:43,396 --> 00:01:45,596 Speaker 1: is the rule. It turns out that it took me 28 00:01:45,636 --> 00:01:47,476 Speaker 1: so long to finish the book that I had cleared 29 00:01:47,516 --> 00:01:50,116 Speaker 1: that mark by the time it was all said and done. 30 00:01:50,476 --> 00:01:53,236 Speaker 1: But I actually think that the study of the recent 31 00:01:53,316 --> 00:01:56,796 Speaker 1: past has become, as you can see with this project, 32 00:01:56,876 --> 00:02:01,476 Speaker 1: urgently important to understanding our political moment and the debates 33 00:02:01,516 --> 00:02:04,596 Speaker 1: and challenges that we now find ourselves embroiled in. I 34 00:02:04,596 --> 00:02:07,836 Speaker 1: wanted to start by asking about the category of white 35 00:02:07,836 --> 00:02:11,156 Speaker 1: power or white supreme see. Certainly in a country like 36 00:02:11,196 --> 00:02:14,876 Speaker 1: the United States, which had slavery from the very beginning 37 00:02:14,876 --> 00:02:16,676 Speaker 1: of the country, and of course there were slavery long 38 00:02:16,716 --> 00:02:20,596 Speaker 1: before there was a United States in North America, the 39 00:02:20,916 --> 00:02:25,036 Speaker 1: idea that white people are superior to the black people, 40 00:02:25,076 --> 00:02:28,516 Speaker 1: that people of African descent is you know, almost baked 41 00:02:28,556 --> 00:02:32,036 Speaker 1: in to the earliest history of the country and the 42 00:02:32,036 --> 00:02:35,596 Speaker 1: prehistory of the country. And I wonder, how do you 43 00:02:35,636 --> 00:02:37,876 Speaker 1: know where to start? You know, when you talk about 44 00:02:37,876 --> 00:02:40,676 Speaker 1: white power or white supremacy. You know, how do you 45 00:02:40,716 --> 00:02:42,036 Speaker 1: know that you don't have to start all the way 46 00:02:42,076 --> 00:02:44,556 Speaker 1: back in the sixteen hundreds when the first African slaves 47 00:02:44,596 --> 00:02:47,316 Speaker 1: were brought to the Americas, or in seventeen eighty seven 48 00:02:47,396 --> 00:02:52,196 Speaker 1: with the US Constitution which enshrines slavery in certain respects. 49 00:02:52,196 --> 00:02:55,676 Speaker 1: The what's your working starting place when you start thinking 50 00:02:55,716 --> 00:02:59,396 Speaker 1: about white power? So when I teach this to my undergraduates, 51 00:02:59,436 --> 00:03:02,476 Speaker 1: we do start with those long histories of racial inequality, 52 00:03:02,596 --> 00:03:06,516 Speaker 1: the ways that white supremacy is not only a matter 53 00:03:06,556 --> 00:03:09,556 Speaker 1: of ideological belief for some people in the United States, 54 00:03:09,596 --> 00:03:12,876 Speaker 1: but has become imbricated in our systems of government, our 55 00:03:12,916 --> 00:03:16,596 Speaker 1: distribution of resources, are policing, and all kinds of other ways. 56 00:03:16,716 --> 00:03:19,836 Speaker 1: It's everywhere everywhere in this country. Race is everywhere. I 57 00:03:19,876 --> 00:03:23,796 Speaker 1: think reasonable people can agree on that. I think that 58 00:03:24,076 --> 00:03:30,196 Speaker 1: the definitions part is critically important, especially now. So what 59 00:03:30,356 --> 00:03:34,516 Speaker 1: white power refers to is a movement that comes out 60 00:03:34,516 --> 00:03:38,356 Speaker 1: of the Vietnam War, brings together a bunch of ideologically 61 00:03:38,436 --> 00:03:41,916 Speaker 1: diverse activists who had not been working together before. Such 62 00:03:41,916 --> 00:03:46,236 Speaker 1: as clansmen, Neo Nazis, skinheads, radical tax resistors, white separatists, 63 00:03:46,236 --> 00:03:50,836 Speaker 1: and others, and kind of amalgamates them into one social movement, 64 00:03:51,036 --> 00:03:53,356 Speaker 1: using the narrative of the war to bind them together, 65 00:03:53,676 --> 00:03:57,516 Speaker 1: and then declares war on the federal government. So that 66 00:03:57,676 --> 00:04:02,676 Speaker 1: begins in nineteen eighty three. Before that, I would characterize 67 00:04:03,236 --> 00:04:07,876 Speaker 1: things like the many iterations of the KKK, the Neo 68 00:04:07,956 --> 00:04:10,836 Speaker 1: Nazi Party in the United States. Those things are more 69 00:04:10,916 --> 00:04:16,036 Speaker 1: like vigilante violence in that the violence is either supporting 70 00:04:16,556 --> 00:04:21,276 Speaker 1: the state or supporting local status quo power. Post nineteen 71 00:04:21,316 --> 00:04:24,916 Speaker 1: eighty three, we're dealing with a completely different thing. After that, 72 00:04:25,036 --> 00:04:27,876 Speaker 1: it is a revolutionary movement that is attempting to overthrow 73 00:04:27,916 --> 00:04:31,716 Speaker 1: the United States, either through a kind of long asymmetrical 74 00:04:31,836 --> 00:04:36,716 Speaker 1: war of sabotage or through a direct revolution. So that's 75 00:04:36,716 --> 00:04:40,756 Speaker 1: the white power movement. The tricky one for a lot 76 00:04:40,796 --> 00:04:44,876 Speaker 1: of people is white nationalism. And actually I think it's 77 00:04:44,876 --> 00:04:47,276 Speaker 1: easier to understand right now because all of these stories 78 00:04:47,276 --> 00:04:51,036 Speaker 1: in the news about Hindu nationalism make this distinction really 79 00:04:51,036 --> 00:04:54,836 Speaker 1: really clear. So Hindu nationalism, for listeners who might not 80 00:04:54,876 --> 00:04:58,956 Speaker 1: be familiar, is a movement in India in which people 81 00:04:59,116 --> 00:05:01,996 Speaker 1: who are a Hindu nationalist, and they call themselves that 82 00:05:02,436 --> 00:05:08,436 Speaker 1: are organizing to make India more oriented around Hinduism in 83 00:05:08,596 --> 00:05:11,996 Speaker 1: culture and in policy. Right, so they're trying to inject 84 00:05:12,076 --> 00:05:16,516 Speaker 1: the nation of India with Hinduism more than a Nardias. 85 00:05:17,156 --> 00:05:19,956 Speaker 1: It's complicated in India by the fact that the name 86 00:05:20,076 --> 00:05:25,116 Speaker 1: for India in the language Hindi is Hindustan. So you know, 87 00:05:25,516 --> 00:05:28,556 Speaker 1: the word itself, Hindu doesn't only mean the religion, it 88 00:05:28,596 --> 00:05:30,676 Speaker 1: also means a culture. It also means a civilization. It's 89 00:05:30,676 --> 00:05:34,916 Speaker 1: a tricky one indeed, But the category is India. In 90 00:05:34,956 --> 00:05:38,836 Speaker 1: white nationalism, the category is not the United States. The 91 00:05:38,956 --> 00:05:42,876 Speaker 1: nation imagined by white nationalism after nineteen eighty three is 92 00:05:42,916 --> 00:05:46,156 Speaker 1: fundamentally opposed to the United States and also to New 93 00:05:46,236 --> 00:05:48,876 Speaker 1: Zealand and Australia and other nations where this takes hold. 94 00:05:49,476 --> 00:05:53,756 Speaker 1: White nationalism is attempting to create a transnational group of 95 00:05:53,796 --> 00:05:58,476 Speaker 1: white people that will take over white homelands, and eventually 96 00:05:58,556 --> 00:06:01,116 Speaker 1: many of them hope to wage war such that they 97 00:06:01,156 --> 00:06:04,276 Speaker 1: can achieve an all white world. That's not the same 98 00:06:04,316 --> 00:06:08,356 Speaker 1: thing as say the clan in the nineteen twenties, where 99 00:06:08,356 --> 00:06:11,396 Speaker 1: people were marching on the National Mall with their robes 100 00:06:11,396 --> 00:06:14,596 Speaker 1: and hoods, but their faces uncovered, which was which is, 101 00:06:14,636 --> 00:06:17,716 Speaker 1: among other things, anti immigrant. It was both about suppressing 102 00:06:17,756 --> 00:06:19,956 Speaker 1: African Americans, but also the clan in the nineteen its 103 00:06:20,036 --> 00:06:23,916 Speaker 1: nineteen twenties iteration was very focused on immigrants, especially from 104 00:06:23,916 --> 00:06:26,836 Speaker 1: Catholic countries. The White Power movement also is anti immigrant. 105 00:06:26,836 --> 00:06:30,476 Speaker 1: But the thing that's different is that after nineteen eighty three, 106 00:06:30,596 --> 00:06:34,076 Speaker 1: this is an anti government, anti nation movement. It's not 107 00:06:34,196 --> 00:06:38,756 Speaker 1: an over exertion of patriotism. It's not just too much nationalism. 108 00:06:38,796 --> 00:06:42,796 Speaker 1: You talked about opposition to the United States as opposed 109 00:06:42,836 --> 00:06:46,316 Speaker 1: to vigilante violence. But in its first iteration, when the 110 00:06:46,436 --> 00:06:49,756 Speaker 1: Ku Klux Klan came into existence after the Civil War 111 00:06:50,316 --> 00:06:53,436 Speaker 1: in part to resist the attempts at the creation of 112 00:06:53,516 --> 00:06:56,516 Speaker 1: racial equality that we're being imposed in the South by 113 00:06:56,636 --> 00:07:00,116 Speaker 1: military reconstruction, that is, by an occupation of Union troops, 114 00:07:01,156 --> 00:07:03,636 Speaker 1: wasn't it also in its origins the clan at that 115 00:07:03,716 --> 00:07:07,116 Speaker 1: point in a sense revolutionary. It was opposed to the 116 00:07:07,156 --> 00:07:10,916 Speaker 1: government of the United States and was supporting the already 117 00:07:10,996 --> 00:07:15,596 Speaker 1: defeated ideals of the Confederacy. So in some sense wasn't 118 00:07:15,636 --> 00:07:18,796 Speaker 1: there a revolutionary impulse implicit in the clan from the beginning. 119 00:07:19,716 --> 00:07:22,556 Speaker 1: I think yes, But I think this one is highly debatable, 120 00:07:22,596 --> 00:07:25,756 Speaker 1: and I think it depends on what historians would call periodization, 121 00:07:25,876 --> 00:07:28,236 Speaker 1: meaning when you choose to stop that story. So, the 122 00:07:28,276 --> 00:07:31,036 Speaker 1: first clan was founded in eighteen sixty six in Pulaski, 123 00:07:31,076 --> 00:07:37,756 Speaker 1: Tennessee by frustrated veterans of the Confederacy. It very quickly grew, 124 00:07:37,956 --> 00:07:41,396 Speaker 1: but at the beginning was mostly understood a sort of 125 00:07:41,436 --> 00:07:46,076 Speaker 1: like a burlesque prankster group. And then there is this 126 00:07:46,196 --> 00:07:50,196 Speaker 1: moment when it formalizes and turns violent, and that violence 127 00:07:50,236 --> 00:07:55,516 Speaker 1: is directed at African Americans, school tax collectors, school teachers, 128 00:07:55,676 --> 00:07:58,316 Speaker 1: and people from the North who come in to implement 129 00:07:58,356 --> 00:08:02,596 Speaker 1: reconstruction and people in the South who support reconstruction. In 130 00:08:02,636 --> 00:08:07,516 Speaker 1: other words, it is an attempt either to resist the 131 00:08:07,596 --> 00:08:13,836 Speaker 1: federal government's effort to reconstruct the South or to form 132 00:08:13,876 --> 00:08:17,316 Speaker 1: a new system of power. So right in there is 133 00:08:17,316 --> 00:08:22,596 Speaker 1: the distinction between revolutionary and something else. Historians have sort 134 00:08:22,636 --> 00:08:26,596 Speaker 1: of argued a lot over this, but I think it's 135 00:08:26,636 --> 00:08:29,556 Speaker 1: important to remember that the Jim Crow regime in the 136 00:08:29,596 --> 00:08:32,756 Speaker 1: South is not sort of just a continuation of slavery, 137 00:08:33,316 --> 00:08:36,356 Speaker 1: but something that has to be built and constructed and 138 00:08:36,476 --> 00:08:44,276 Speaker 1: invented after reconstruction, the clan doesn't disappear when reconstruction ends. Instead, 139 00:08:44,436 --> 00:08:49,596 Speaker 1: it largely just relocates into citizen militias, into groups like 140 00:08:49,596 --> 00:08:52,796 Speaker 1: the Red Shirts and the White Shirts, into rifle clubs, 141 00:08:52,836 --> 00:08:56,836 Speaker 1: and into spectacle lynchings, which are these mass public participation 142 00:08:56,916 --> 00:08:59,116 Speaker 1: events that carry out a lot of the same kind 143 00:08:59,116 --> 00:09:01,796 Speaker 1: of violence that the clan was already doing a lot 144 00:09:01,836 --> 00:09:03,116 Speaker 1: of it in public. I mean. One of the things 145 00:09:03,156 --> 00:09:07,196 Speaker 1: that always amazes me about lynching is that there are 146 00:09:07,276 --> 00:09:11,796 Speaker 1: postcards that were spread through the South of people white 147 00:09:11,836 --> 00:09:15,796 Speaker 1: people gathered around a lynched African American with a photograph 148 00:09:15,876 --> 00:09:18,116 Speaker 1: being taken as a kind of commemoration of the event, 149 00:09:18,196 --> 00:09:21,036 Speaker 1: and no one's wearing a mask, no one's hiding his face. 150 00:09:21,756 --> 00:09:23,676 Speaker 1: Not only that, but there are women and children in 151 00:09:23,676 --> 00:09:27,036 Speaker 1: their Sunday best clothes. These events are all very often 152 00:09:27,076 --> 00:09:30,036 Speaker 1: happening on the courthouse or at local sites of power. 153 00:09:30,716 --> 00:09:32,516 Speaker 1: And it's also not just in the South. These are 154 00:09:32,556 --> 00:09:37,036 Speaker 1: happening in Indiana, in the Pacific Northwest, in Texas, and 155 00:09:37,116 --> 00:09:40,356 Speaker 1: in fact, for one stretch in South Texas, the chance 156 00:09:40,436 --> 00:09:43,116 Speaker 1: of being lynched as much higher for Mexican Americans and 157 00:09:43,196 --> 00:09:45,716 Speaker 1: Mexicans than it is for African American men in the South. 158 00:09:47,436 --> 00:09:51,436 Speaker 1: It's it's that move into lynching that makes me reluctant 159 00:09:51,476 --> 00:09:54,116 Speaker 1: to think of it as revolutionary violence, because lynching has 160 00:09:54,196 --> 00:09:58,876 Speaker 1: mostly been understood as scholars as conveying a kind of 161 00:09:59,036 --> 00:10:02,516 Speaker 1: popular sovereignty of the community, in other words, that in 162 00:10:02,556 --> 00:10:04,956 Speaker 1: other words, that when when you lynch somebody, the whole 163 00:10:04,956 --> 00:10:07,156 Speaker 1: community is getting together to do it, it's a kind 164 00:10:07,156 --> 00:10:11,436 Speaker 1: of perverted version of small d democracy, where we're doing 165 00:10:11,436 --> 00:10:15,276 Speaker 1: this as a collective. Yes, it's a claim to that power. 166 00:10:15,316 --> 00:10:17,916 Speaker 1: It's a taking back of sovereign power from the state. 167 00:10:18,396 --> 00:10:22,316 Speaker 1: Let's turn now to that revolutionary movement which, as you 168 00:10:22,436 --> 00:10:27,716 Speaker 1: described in nineteen eighty three, unites itself to some degree 169 00:10:27,796 --> 00:10:31,636 Speaker 1: and declares war on the United States of America. Tell 170 00:10:31,716 --> 00:10:33,756 Speaker 1: us that story, because I don't think that's very well known. 171 00:10:33,876 --> 00:10:38,116 Speaker 1: The nineteen eighty three turn comes after this big infrastructure 172 00:10:38,156 --> 00:10:42,116 Speaker 1: build up, an organization of social movement that happens in 173 00:10:42,156 --> 00:10:46,556 Speaker 1: the years proceeding. The clan builds paramilitary training camps all 174 00:10:46,596 --> 00:10:50,516 Speaker 1: around the country. It trains people in paramilitary warfare. It 175 00:10:50,556 --> 00:10:54,796 Speaker 1: works on amassing weapons and material, getting money, getting people organized, 176 00:10:54,836 --> 00:10:58,036 Speaker 1: getting people in contact with one another, and by nineteen 177 00:10:58,116 --> 00:11:01,836 Speaker 1: eighty three. I think there are two major things that happen. 178 00:11:02,036 --> 00:11:04,956 Speaker 1: One is that that infrastructure is in place. Activists know 179 00:11:05,036 --> 00:11:06,916 Speaker 1: each other, They're all in the same room. They're kind 180 00:11:06,916 --> 00:11:09,476 Speaker 1: of coherent around this common story of the Vietnam War, 181 00:11:09,916 --> 00:11:13,116 Speaker 1: which has allowed some connections possible between different groups that 182 00:11:13,156 --> 00:11:16,116 Speaker 1: weren't possible before. And the other thing that happens is 183 00:11:16,156 --> 00:11:20,836 Speaker 1: they get really frustrated with Reagan. Activists in the movement 184 00:11:21,156 --> 00:11:24,396 Speaker 1: don't make this revolutionary turn in a moment of leftist 185 00:11:24,476 --> 00:11:27,796 Speaker 1: state power, but instead under the second term of the 186 00:11:27,836 --> 00:11:31,276 Speaker 1: Reagan administration. And their argument about this is that the 187 00:11:31,356 --> 00:11:37,036 Speaker 1: distance between Reagan's campaign promises and what they see as 188 00:11:37,156 --> 00:11:40,636 Speaker 1: his moderation proves to them once and for all that 189 00:11:40,716 --> 00:11:43,716 Speaker 1: electoral change will never deliver the kind of world they want, 190 00:11:43,956 --> 00:11:46,596 Speaker 1: and therefore they need to declare war. Now. This is 191 00:11:47,716 --> 00:11:49,676 Speaker 1: this is really relevant to us in the present moment 192 00:11:49,716 --> 00:11:53,476 Speaker 1: because it means that even at moments when the center 193 00:11:53,596 --> 00:11:56,716 Speaker 1: through the left might see kind of a moment of 194 00:11:56,756 --> 00:12:00,796 Speaker 1: conservative orientation and executive power, that doesn't mean that activists 195 00:12:00,836 --> 00:12:02,756 Speaker 1: on the friend right will be assuaged by that, and 196 00:12:02,796 --> 00:12:06,076 Speaker 1: in fact, that's had just the opposite effect. In this case. 197 00:12:06,396 --> 00:12:09,076 Speaker 1: So that's extremely important, as you say, for the question 198 00:12:09,236 --> 00:12:14,076 Speaker 1: of the relationship between recent rounds of white power of 199 00:12:14,156 --> 00:12:17,676 Speaker 1: violence and the Trump administration. There's a tendency on the 200 00:12:17,756 --> 00:12:23,636 Speaker 1: left to say, well, look at Charlottesville, which followed Donald 201 00:12:23,636 --> 00:12:27,676 Speaker 1: Trump's ascending to the presidency, and then look at subsequent 202 00:12:27,716 --> 00:12:30,276 Speaker 1: events the Tree of Life shooting, for example in the 203 00:12:30,356 --> 00:12:33,556 Speaker 1: United States, the Christchurch, New Zealand attacks, and to see 204 00:12:33,596 --> 00:12:36,716 Speaker 1: this all as very much a result of the election 205 00:12:36,876 --> 00:12:40,156 Speaker 1: of Donald Trump. And if I understand you correctly, you're 206 00:12:40,156 --> 00:12:43,836 Speaker 1: telling a slightly different story about the way that white 207 00:12:43,836 --> 00:12:47,076 Speaker 1: power activists reacted, for example, to the election of Ronald Reagan. 208 00:12:47,116 --> 00:12:50,156 Speaker 1: It's not that they were empowered or emboldened by the 209 00:12:50,196 --> 00:12:53,036 Speaker 1: election of a conservative president. It's rather that they felt 210 00:12:53,036 --> 00:12:55,316 Speaker 1: that it wasn't enough and that therefore they needed to 211 00:12:55,356 --> 00:12:59,996 Speaker 1: take some revolutionary action. Is that in your mind? I mean, 212 00:12:59,996 --> 00:13:02,076 Speaker 1: we're jumping ahead to the president, which will come to 213 00:13:02,316 --> 00:13:04,996 Speaker 1: you in good time as well. But is your view 214 00:13:05,036 --> 00:13:08,836 Speaker 1: that something like that is happening now among white power activists. 215 00:13:08,836 --> 00:13:11,236 Speaker 1: It's not that they're emboldened so much by Trump's election, 216 00:13:11,236 --> 00:13:13,116 Speaker 1: It's that it's not enough, and it gives them reason 217 00:13:13,156 --> 00:13:18,236 Speaker 1: to do more. I suspect that's what we're seeing. This 218 00:13:18,276 --> 00:13:20,756 Speaker 1: is when I have to give the historian caveat that 219 00:13:21,316 --> 00:13:23,276 Speaker 1: the thing that lets me see the story that I 220 00:13:23,316 --> 00:13:27,276 Speaker 1: write about in the book is this archive that spans newspapers, 221 00:13:27,356 --> 00:13:31,956 Speaker 1: primary source materials, FBI and other surveillance documents, court testimony. 222 00:13:32,356 --> 00:13:35,356 Speaker 1: We don't get that kind of source base in real time. 223 00:13:35,476 --> 00:13:37,876 Speaker 1: When you talk about as a starian, talk about the archive, 224 00:13:38,236 --> 00:13:42,036 Speaker 1: you mean some literal archives, in some cases cashes of documents. 225 00:13:42,156 --> 00:13:44,196 Speaker 1: But it's also the word archive is also a metaphor 226 00:13:44,196 --> 00:13:47,516 Speaker 1: that a Starin's used to describe all the materials that 227 00:13:47,676 --> 00:13:49,516 Speaker 1: you guys use to try to make sense of his 228 00:13:49,636 --> 00:13:52,636 Speaker 1: darical events exactly. You can think about it as like 229 00:13:52,676 --> 00:13:54,996 Speaker 1: the receipts for the story I'm going to tell I 230 00:13:55,036 --> 00:13:58,676 Speaker 1: don't have that kind of information about events from about 231 00:13:58,756 --> 00:14:00,956 Speaker 1: nineteen ninety six forward, and there are some reasons for 232 00:14:00,996 --> 00:14:05,396 Speaker 1: why that is in this particular cash of sources. But 233 00:14:05,956 --> 00:14:09,396 Speaker 1: the earlier period does tell us a couple of things 234 00:14:09,436 --> 00:14:12,756 Speaker 1: that make me concerned about the present moment in the 235 00:14:12,796 --> 00:14:14,716 Speaker 1: ways that you've just described. One of them is that 236 00:14:16,156 --> 00:14:21,676 Speaker 1: when there is this moment of perceived sympathetic administration, that 237 00:14:21,756 --> 00:14:24,276 Speaker 1: has not assuaged these activists, and in fact that has 238 00:14:24,316 --> 00:14:26,876 Speaker 1: been seen as a call to arms. The other one 239 00:14:26,956 --> 00:14:30,036 Speaker 1: is that there have always been sort of two spheres 240 00:14:30,076 --> 00:14:34,276 Speaker 1: of activity in this movement. One of them is the 241 00:14:34,356 --> 00:14:43,596 Speaker 1: sort of mass mobilizations like Charlottesville marches, political campaigns, organizing events, recruitment, drives, 242 00:14:44,236 --> 00:14:49,356 Speaker 1: campus campaigns to recruit students, speak of public speaking to ours, 243 00:14:49,436 --> 00:14:53,916 Speaker 1: things like that. The other one is this massive network 244 00:14:54,116 --> 00:15:00,556 Speaker 1: of paramilitary camps, cell style terror, illegal communication in many cases, 245 00:15:00,716 --> 00:15:04,756 Speaker 1: and different kinds of crime ranging from assassination to the 246 00:15:05,516 --> 00:15:10,476 Speaker 1: obtaining of stolen military weapons and material to mass violence attacks. 247 00:15:11,116 --> 00:15:13,556 Speaker 1: In the period that I study, those two spheres of 248 00:15:13,596 --> 00:15:16,716 Speaker 1: activity happened at the same time, um and often there 249 00:15:16,716 --> 00:15:19,036 Speaker 1: were people who crossed the line between those two kinds 250 00:15:19,036 --> 00:15:21,996 Speaker 1: of activism, and we're undertaking both of those things as 251 00:15:22,036 --> 00:15:25,356 Speaker 1: a coordinated kind of kind of campaign. The fact that 252 00:15:25,396 --> 00:15:29,156 Speaker 1: we can't see that underground in real time doesn't mean 253 00:15:29,196 --> 00:15:33,156 Speaker 1: that that's not happening, as as we are noticing more 254 00:15:33,196 --> 00:15:36,276 Speaker 1: of these above board events and in fact, this wave 255 00:15:36,436 --> 00:15:39,476 Speaker 1: of violent attacks that you describe, which I might also 256 00:15:39,516 --> 00:15:45,636 Speaker 1: add Dylan Roofs shooting in Charleston. Absolutely, oh no, yeah, 257 00:15:45,676 --> 00:15:51,356 Speaker 1: wells Bravik in Norway. Yes, putting those all together in 258 00:15:51,396 --> 00:15:53,836 Speaker 1: one story is very very important because then we can 259 00:15:53,876 --> 00:15:56,116 Speaker 1: start to say, oh, wow, this is a wave we're 260 00:15:56,156 --> 00:15:58,596 Speaker 1: talking about. You know, three attempted attacks in the last 261 00:15:58,636 --> 00:16:01,676 Speaker 1: six months. Um. A lot of these are mass attacks, 262 00:16:01,716 --> 00:16:03,756 Speaker 1: A lot of these are people who are using the 263 00:16:03,756 --> 00:16:07,596 Speaker 1: same coordinated messaging. UM. That indicates to me that we 264 00:16:07,676 --> 00:16:10,916 Speaker 1: do have this two spheres model of activism going again, 265 00:16:11,036 --> 00:16:13,796 Speaker 1: even if I can't see the sources in real time 266 00:16:13,836 --> 00:16:17,196 Speaker 1: to be able to describe it in detail. One element 267 00:16:17,316 --> 00:16:19,636 Speaker 1: that I think we need to also add to your 268 00:16:19,876 --> 00:16:26,636 Speaker 1: depiction of people's common narrative of the Vietnam War having 269 00:16:26,676 --> 00:16:29,716 Speaker 1: been lost because of betrayal by the American government and 270 00:16:30,276 --> 00:16:33,716 Speaker 1: anti communism and they're bringing together of clan members and 271 00:16:33,836 --> 00:16:37,796 Speaker 1: neo Nazis and others, is the religious component. Would you 272 00:16:37,836 --> 00:16:45,316 Speaker 1: say something about the apocalyptic religious elements of the combined 273 00:16:45,996 --> 00:16:49,316 Speaker 1: viewpoints that are coming together around nineteen eighty three in 274 00:16:49,356 --> 00:16:53,436 Speaker 1: this revolutionary movement. Sure, there are kind of two major 275 00:16:53,676 --> 00:16:57,956 Speaker 1: theological innovations of this movement. One of them is Norse paganism, 276 00:16:58,076 --> 00:17:03,396 Speaker 1: so Odinism and other kind of neopagan ideologies that put 277 00:17:03,396 --> 00:17:06,196 Speaker 1: forward the greatness of white cultures in different ways. So 278 00:17:06,276 --> 00:17:10,396 Speaker 1: the idea is to take Nordic mythology, of which Odin 279 00:17:10,516 --> 00:17:13,956 Speaker 1: is a central figure, and to say, ah, Nordic mythology 280 00:17:14,396 --> 00:17:18,156 Speaker 1: equals white people's mythology something like that exactly. So there's 281 00:17:18,356 --> 00:17:20,996 Speaker 1: and it comes with a whole cultural apparatus of things 282 00:17:20,996 --> 00:17:24,076 Speaker 1: like writing in ruins and using the Viking imagery and 283 00:17:24,116 --> 00:17:27,596 Speaker 1: things like that. The other one is Christian identity, and 284 00:17:27,636 --> 00:17:31,676 Speaker 1: I think this one is more impactful for a couple 285 00:17:31,676 --> 00:17:34,076 Speaker 1: of different reasons. One is that it has a very 286 00:17:34,156 --> 00:17:37,076 Speaker 1: clear role for women, who turn out to be enormously 287 00:17:37,116 --> 00:17:41,716 Speaker 1: important to motivating this movement and holding it together. The 288 00:17:41,796 --> 00:17:45,676 Speaker 1: other is for its depiction of the end of the world. 289 00:17:46,236 --> 00:17:49,636 Speaker 1: So the nineteen eighties in general are a time of 290 00:17:49,916 --> 00:17:53,116 Speaker 1: deep fixation on the end of the world. There's deep, 291 00:17:53,196 --> 00:17:58,196 Speaker 1: deep apocalyptic belief kind of across American culture, including in 292 00:17:58,316 --> 00:18:02,396 Speaker 1: evangelical churches, which are recruiting much larger congregations and much 293 00:18:02,396 --> 00:18:07,196 Speaker 1: more politicized congregations in the nineteen eighties. Now in evangelical Christianity, 294 00:18:07,276 --> 00:18:09,876 Speaker 1: that comes with a belief in a day all the rapture, 295 00:18:10,236 --> 00:18:12,596 Speaker 1: which is a moment when all of the faithful are 296 00:18:12,636 --> 00:18:16,556 Speaker 1: supposed to be peacefully transported to Heaven before this big, 297 00:18:16,636 --> 00:18:20,636 Speaker 1: bloody last battle that will come right before the return 298 00:18:20,676 --> 00:18:25,396 Speaker 1: of Christ. So Christian identity has no rapture, but it 299 00:18:25,436 --> 00:18:28,916 Speaker 1: does have the battle. So what Christian identity does is 300 00:18:29,436 --> 00:18:33,196 Speaker 1: turn its believers into either survivalists. You either have to 301 00:18:33,236 --> 00:18:37,036 Speaker 1: survive this end times before Jesus returns, or you have 302 00:18:37,116 --> 00:18:39,556 Speaker 1: to become a soldier of God to clear the world 303 00:18:39,596 --> 00:18:43,596 Speaker 1: of non white populations before you know, before Christ can 304 00:18:43,636 --> 00:18:46,636 Speaker 1: return to the world. So what it does is transfigure 305 00:18:46,716 --> 00:18:50,556 Speaker 1: this whole host of social issues that are important to 306 00:18:50,596 --> 00:18:54,716 Speaker 1: the white power movement into a holy war. And one 307 00:18:54,716 --> 00:18:56,716 Speaker 1: way to think about this is that it comes with 308 00:18:56,756 --> 00:19:00,396 Speaker 1: this intense sense of emergency about something that people talk 309 00:19:00,436 --> 00:19:05,236 Speaker 1: about very casually in American culture, which is this kind 310 00:19:05,236 --> 00:19:09,356 Speaker 1: of imagined moment of demographic change when the country will 311 00:19:09,396 --> 00:19:12,676 Speaker 1: switch over from a majority white population to something else. 312 00:19:13,956 --> 00:19:16,676 Speaker 1: And as different communities begin to make that transition in 313 00:19:16,716 --> 00:19:18,836 Speaker 1: the eighties and the nineties, these activists get more and 314 00:19:18,876 --> 00:19:24,276 Speaker 1: more preoccupied with this. For people in the white power movement, 315 00:19:25,596 --> 00:19:29,996 Speaker 1: the issues that might be conservative or understandable to us 316 00:19:29,996 --> 00:19:38,716 Speaker 1: as conservative, like opposing immigration, opposing abortion, LGBT rights, opposing feminism, 317 00:19:38,756 --> 00:19:41,716 Speaker 1: being in favor of racial segregation or freedom of association. 318 00:19:42,356 --> 00:19:45,916 Speaker 1: All of that stuff, for white power activists is attached 319 00:19:46,156 --> 00:19:50,316 Speaker 1: to this deep preoccupation with the future of the race 320 00:19:50,916 --> 00:19:54,876 Speaker 1: through the production of white babies. So it's not for 321 00:19:54,956 --> 00:19:59,196 Speaker 1: white power activists just they oppose abortion because it's a 322 00:19:59,236 --> 00:20:02,676 Speaker 1: conservative issue or because they have concerns about unborn life. 323 00:20:03,076 --> 00:20:06,556 Speaker 1: It's that they oppose abortion because abortion is one thing 324 00:20:06,636 --> 00:20:11,396 Speaker 1: that is threatening the white birthrate, along with immigration integration, 325 00:20:11,396 --> 00:20:13,076 Speaker 1: which they think will result in the birth of non 326 00:20:13,076 --> 00:20:15,236 Speaker 1: white children or mixed race children who they see as 327 00:20:15,276 --> 00:20:20,636 Speaker 1: non human. LGBT rights they think will take white women 328 00:20:21,236 --> 00:20:24,476 Speaker 1: out of the work of birthing children. They're worried about 329 00:20:24,516 --> 00:20:27,156 Speaker 1: feminism because they think women should be at home raising children. 330 00:20:27,556 --> 00:20:30,116 Speaker 1: This whole production of white children thing is like the 331 00:20:30,156 --> 00:20:32,796 Speaker 1: glue that holds together this whole belief system. And in 332 00:20:32,876 --> 00:20:34,516 Speaker 1: order for it to make sense, you really have to 333 00:20:34,516 --> 00:20:38,716 Speaker 1: think about how vivid and immediate this sense of emergency 334 00:20:39,116 --> 00:20:43,196 Speaker 1: is to these activists. They feel this as an apocalyptic threat, 335 00:20:43,316 --> 00:20:46,236 Speaker 1: so not as kind of like a soft demographic change 336 00:20:46,276 --> 00:20:48,756 Speaker 1: that's going to come at some point. Okay, so you 337 00:20:48,836 --> 00:20:55,516 Speaker 1: get this attempt to unify these disparate, potentially disparate social 338 00:20:55,756 --> 00:20:59,236 Speaker 1: groups around a common vision and a kind of a 339 00:20:59,236 --> 00:21:03,396 Speaker 1: common ideology. It's happening in the middle of the nineteen eighties, 340 00:21:04,116 --> 00:21:10,996 Speaker 1: and it then leads to some rather extraordinary consequences, most 341 00:21:11,156 --> 00:21:13,316 Speaker 1: saliently in your book. And this is the kind of 342 00:21:13,356 --> 00:21:18,436 Speaker 1: climactic point in your book, the nineteen ninety five bombing 343 00:21:18,676 --> 00:21:23,076 Speaker 1: of the Oklahoma City Federal Building by Timothy McVay and 344 00:21:23,236 --> 00:21:26,156 Speaker 1: a group of others, And will say more about that group. 345 00:21:26,516 --> 00:21:30,436 Speaker 1: How did that spectacular bombing spectacular in the sense that 346 00:21:30,476 --> 00:21:34,116 Speaker 1: it was a spectacle. It created a spectacle in which 347 00:21:34,196 --> 00:21:37,836 Speaker 1: nearly one hundred and seventy people were killed grow out 348 00:21:37,916 --> 00:21:40,356 Speaker 1: of this movement? How did the movement go from, as 349 00:21:40,356 --> 00:21:44,476 Speaker 1: it were, a group of possibly crazy looking peripheral people 350 00:21:44,996 --> 00:21:48,396 Speaker 1: to a cohesive movement that could produce an attack like this. 351 00:21:50,196 --> 00:21:52,356 Speaker 1: That's a great question, and the short answer is through 352 00:21:52,436 --> 00:21:57,116 Speaker 1: women during the nineteen eighties. What unfolds is not sort 353 00:21:57,156 --> 00:22:04,476 Speaker 1: of a popularly understood collection of shrieking and ignorant activists 354 00:22:04,516 --> 00:22:09,716 Speaker 1: in backwoods something, you know, doing their own and fighting 355 00:22:09,756 --> 00:22:12,636 Speaker 1: with each other, etcetera. What we see is actually a 356 00:22:12,836 --> 00:22:17,396 Speaker 1: broad ranging social movement. It includes men, women, and children. 357 00:22:17,596 --> 00:22:22,196 Speaker 1: It includes people in all regions of the country, including rural, suburban, 358 00:22:22,236 --> 00:22:25,036 Speaker 1: and urban spaces, and includes people of a lot of 359 00:22:25,036 --> 00:22:28,796 Speaker 1: different age groups, people with education ranging from high school 360 00:22:28,876 --> 00:22:34,756 Speaker 1: dropout and to homeschool to I mean rocket launch engineer 361 00:22:34,876 --> 00:22:40,156 Speaker 1: kind of people. Um. Religious leaders and felons and civilians, 362 00:22:40,236 --> 00:22:45,116 Speaker 1: veterans and active duty troops. So it's really a disprint 363 00:22:45,156 --> 00:22:50,676 Speaker 1: group of people group the word poor everybody. Yeah, well done. No, no, 364 00:22:50,716 --> 00:22:52,716 Speaker 1: not at all. It's a very diverse group of people 365 00:22:52,756 --> 00:22:56,796 Speaker 1: except racially, yes, um. And it even has multiple faiths 366 00:22:56,836 --> 00:22:59,676 Speaker 1: in it, as we talked about. So that UM, that 367 00:22:59,836 --> 00:23:03,796 Speaker 1: structure UM, together with this turn against the state, leads 368 00:23:03,796 --> 00:23:06,796 Speaker 1: them to adopt a strategy called leaderless resistance in nineteen 369 00:23:06,836 --> 00:23:09,036 Speaker 1: eighty three. So talk to us about leaderless resistance because 370 00:23:09,036 --> 00:23:12,276 Speaker 1: that hugely important for the present moment as well. It 371 00:23:12,436 --> 00:23:16,876 Speaker 1: is leaderless resistance is easy to understand now as just 372 00:23:17,116 --> 00:23:20,196 Speaker 1: cell style terrorism. The idea is that you're going to 373 00:23:21,316 --> 00:23:27,716 Speaker 1: indoctrinate and shape activists and maybe small cohorts of cells, 374 00:23:27,956 --> 00:23:30,756 Speaker 1: like one to six people, maybe the occasional larger cell 375 00:23:30,796 --> 00:23:33,756 Speaker 1: of twelve people, maybe just one to two activists you're 376 00:23:33,796 --> 00:23:37,436 Speaker 1: going to get them all aligned towards the same targets, 377 00:23:37,796 --> 00:23:41,116 Speaker 1: and then they're going to act independently, without communication with 378 00:23:41,196 --> 00:23:44,836 Speaker 1: leadership and without communication with each other. Now, there's actually 379 00:23:44,876 --> 00:23:47,916 Speaker 1: a historical reason for why they adopt this strategy, which 380 00:23:47,956 --> 00:23:51,356 Speaker 1: is that in the earlier clan, in the fifties and 381 00:23:51,356 --> 00:23:53,516 Speaker 1: the sixties, the Third Era clan, which is the one 382 00:23:53,516 --> 00:23:57,356 Speaker 1: that opposes the Civil rights movement, the federal government had 383 00:23:57,396 --> 00:24:02,116 Speaker 1: sent in a ton of informants under the FBI's Counterintelligence 384 00:24:02,156 --> 00:24:06,316 Speaker 1: Project and other initiatives, and clansmen got really really frustrated 385 00:24:06,396 --> 00:24:08,276 Speaker 1: with how many of these people were getting into their 386 00:24:08,276 --> 00:24:10,756 Speaker 1: meetings and messing their stuff and getting people arrested and 387 00:24:10,796 --> 00:24:12,676 Speaker 1: turning over mailing lists and all kinds of things like that. 388 00:24:13,116 --> 00:24:17,116 Speaker 1: So leaderless resistance is actually implemented in large part to 389 00:24:17,196 --> 00:24:21,916 Speaker 1: foil surveillance, and it has the other kind of immediate 390 00:24:22,716 --> 00:24:26,996 Speaker 1: benefit of foiling court prosecution. But the lasting impact of 391 00:24:27,036 --> 00:24:30,476 Speaker 1: it has actually been to foil public understanding. Because what 392 00:24:30,516 --> 00:24:33,996 Speaker 1: happens is leaders resistance plays right into this sort of 393 00:24:34,076 --> 00:24:39,036 Speaker 1: media narrative about lone wolf violence or crazy people or 394 00:24:39,076 --> 00:24:42,276 Speaker 1: a few bad apples or mad gunmen, right where we 395 00:24:42,356 --> 00:24:45,956 Speaker 1: get a lot of different stories about one person committing 396 00:24:45,996 --> 00:24:48,316 Speaker 1: an act of violence and don't get the apparatus to 397 00:24:48,316 --> 00:24:52,636 Speaker 1: put those things together into the same history. So leaderless 398 00:24:52,636 --> 00:24:54,676 Speaker 1: resistance is one of the ways that we get from 399 00:24:54,756 --> 00:24:57,956 Speaker 1: the formation of the movement to Oklahoma City. The other 400 00:24:57,996 --> 00:25:03,636 Speaker 1: one is the implementation of computer social networking. In nineteen 401 00:25:03,716 --> 00:25:07,916 Speaker 1: eighty three eighty four, they implement a series of code 402 00:25:07,916 --> 00:25:12,036 Speaker 1: word accessed message board is called liberty net UM. This 403 00:25:12,116 --> 00:25:14,716 Speaker 1: is before the Internet, so technically this is not the Internet, 404 00:25:14,756 --> 00:25:16,516 Speaker 1: but we can we can understand this is like the 405 00:25:16,556 --> 00:25:19,556 Speaker 1: proto Internet. It's it's networked computers that can speak to 406 00:25:19,596 --> 00:25:22,116 Speaker 1: one another. Um. And also, by the way, it takes 407 00:25:22,156 --> 00:25:24,196 Speaker 1: the FBI like two years to crack the code and 408 00:25:24,196 --> 00:25:27,196 Speaker 1: see what they're posting, kind of amazing that White Power 409 00:25:27,276 --> 00:25:30,436 Speaker 1: might be might be the very first social movement to 410 00:25:30,596 --> 00:25:35,756 Speaker 1: have actively exploited computer technology in that way. Yeah, not 411 00:25:35,796 --> 00:25:38,636 Speaker 1: only that, but the way that they do this is 412 00:25:38,916 --> 00:25:42,756 Speaker 1: very much like Facebook, long before Facebook was invented. Um. 413 00:25:42,956 --> 00:25:45,716 Speaker 1: What they post to these message boards includes a lot 414 00:25:45,716 --> 00:25:50,316 Speaker 1: of you know, practical content like assassination lists and um, 415 00:25:50,556 --> 00:25:53,316 Speaker 1: you know, propaganda messaging and things like that, but it 416 00:25:53,356 --> 00:25:56,876 Speaker 1: also includes things like personal ads, So what these these 417 00:25:56,916 --> 00:25:59,476 Speaker 1: boards are meant to do is to connect activists together 418 00:25:59,556 --> 00:26:03,876 Speaker 1: in a movement in order to motivate this cell style activism. 419 00:26:03,716 --> 00:26:05,476 Speaker 1: M So it's in a way, if you're going to 420 00:26:05,556 --> 00:26:08,076 Speaker 1: have leader list resistance, you need cells and they need 421 00:26:08,116 --> 00:26:10,876 Speaker 1: to communicate with each other somehow, even if not in coordination, 422 00:26:11,476 --> 00:26:13,876 Speaker 1: and then the message sports become the mechanism in your 423 00:26:13,916 --> 00:26:16,876 Speaker 1: story for how that happens. Yeah, well you also need 424 00:26:16,916 --> 00:26:19,956 Speaker 1: a big you need the social movement to share resources 425 00:26:19,996 --> 00:26:22,876 Speaker 1: and also to connect everybody in common culture as such 426 00:26:22,916 --> 00:26:25,156 Speaker 1: that they can understand what the targets are supposed to be. 427 00:26:25,676 --> 00:26:28,036 Speaker 1: It's interesting that Timothy McVeigh, I think you show in 428 00:26:28,076 --> 00:26:31,156 Speaker 1: your book also engage in one of these models of 429 00:26:31,276 --> 00:26:33,476 Speaker 1: get some resources by robbing somebody. Right, He and a 430 00:26:33,516 --> 00:26:36,956 Speaker 1: couple of the associates robbed a gun dealer to get 431 00:26:36,996 --> 00:26:40,396 Speaker 1: the money to have the resources to buy to buy 432 00:26:40,396 --> 00:26:44,916 Speaker 1: the material to blow up the Federal building. Yes, and 433 00:26:44,996 --> 00:26:47,636 Speaker 1: that's a strategy from the order and also from a 434 00:26:47,676 --> 00:26:51,516 Speaker 1: novel called The Turner Diaries, which kind of becomes a 435 00:26:52,316 --> 00:26:55,396 Speaker 1: I mean, it's important as a cultural text, but it's 436 00:26:55,996 --> 00:26:58,276 Speaker 1: and as a manual of operations. But it's also kind 437 00:26:58,276 --> 00:27:01,276 Speaker 1: of a cultural loadstar from the movement in the sense 438 00:27:01,276 --> 00:27:04,436 Speaker 1: that it does that work of explaining to everybody what 439 00:27:04,476 --> 00:27:06,316 Speaker 1: they're trying to do and how they're going to do it. 440 00:27:06,556 --> 00:27:09,836 Speaker 1: I was fascinated reading your book about the centrality of 441 00:27:10,196 --> 00:27:13,156 Speaker 1: this novel, the Turner Diaries, which seem to include in 442 00:27:13,196 --> 00:27:17,276 Speaker 1: your account actually a blueprint even for blowing up a 443 00:27:17,356 --> 00:27:20,396 Speaker 1: federal building with a truck bomb. I mean, very very detailed, 444 00:27:20,876 --> 00:27:24,396 Speaker 1: sort of sort of envisioning process. Yeah, tell us a 445 00:27:24,436 --> 00:27:26,476 Speaker 1: little bit about that about that novel, because again, it 446 00:27:26,516 --> 00:27:27,956 Speaker 1: was a novel that I had not heard of before 447 00:27:27,996 --> 00:27:31,596 Speaker 1: reading your book. Oh okay, So it's a novel that's 448 00:27:31,596 --> 00:27:34,036 Speaker 1: published in Cereal in the late nineteen seventies and then 449 00:27:34,076 --> 00:27:38,036 Speaker 1: comes out in paperback, And it is very difficult to 450 00:27:40,396 --> 00:27:44,276 Speaker 1: overstate how important this novel is to the movement. The 451 00:27:44,356 --> 00:27:47,956 Speaker 1: Turner Diaries shows up everywhere, so McVay sells it for 452 00:27:47,996 --> 00:27:51,516 Speaker 1: a while on the gun show circuit. The Order that 453 00:27:51,556 --> 00:27:53,476 Speaker 1: I talked about a moment ago keeps a stack of 454 00:27:53,516 --> 00:27:56,276 Speaker 1: them in the bunk house. Other white power groups distribute 455 00:27:56,316 --> 00:28:00,116 Speaker 1: them at paramilitary training. It shows up in bookstores and 456 00:28:00,316 --> 00:28:03,436 Speaker 1: other places where the movement is trying to recruit far 457 00:28:03,436 --> 00:28:07,236 Speaker 1: aways South Africa, and it's it's mentioned in advertisements and 458 00:28:07,276 --> 00:28:10,716 Speaker 1: all kinds of different white power publications. And I think 459 00:28:10,796 --> 00:28:12,836 Speaker 1: one of the reasons it's so important is it sets 460 00:28:12,836 --> 00:28:18,516 Speaker 1: out to answer a question that is sort of baffling 461 00:28:18,596 --> 00:28:20,436 Speaker 1: on its face and that actually has stood in the 462 00:28:20,436 --> 00:28:23,556 Speaker 1: way of prosecution more than once, which is, how could 463 00:28:23,716 --> 00:28:27,996 Speaker 1: this fringe movement, right, it's a very small movement possibly 464 00:28:28,036 --> 00:28:31,436 Speaker 1: hope to do what it's setting out to do, which 465 00:28:31,476 --> 00:28:35,476 Speaker 1: is to overthrow the United States, the most militarized superstate 466 00:28:35,516 --> 00:28:39,556 Speaker 1: in world history. This is a kind of baffling problem 467 00:28:39,756 --> 00:28:42,036 Speaker 1: for these activists, and in the novel, I think he 468 00:28:42,076 --> 00:28:44,916 Speaker 1: describes it as a nat trying to assassinate an elephant. 469 00:28:46,076 --> 00:28:48,956 Speaker 1: So the imaginative work that the Turner Diaries does in 470 00:28:49,236 --> 00:28:52,396 Speaker 1: laying out how such a thing could be possible is 471 00:28:52,436 --> 00:28:55,476 Speaker 1: really important for this movement in terms of being able 472 00:28:55,556 --> 00:28:59,196 Speaker 1: to have an imaginary in which this could happen. And 473 00:28:59,276 --> 00:29:02,316 Speaker 1: it tells us something very very important and alarming about 474 00:29:02,316 --> 00:29:04,396 Speaker 1: the kind of violence we're seeing today, which is that 475 00:29:04,996 --> 00:29:08,956 Speaker 1: acts like Christchurch or the Pittsburgh shooting or the Oklahoma 476 00:29:09,276 --> 00:29:13,916 Speaker 1: bombing are not imagined to be the endpoint of this activism. 477 00:29:13,716 --> 00:29:17,116 Speaker 1: The endpoint is not the act of violence. These are 478 00:29:17,116 --> 00:29:20,316 Speaker 1: supposed to be political acts of violence that white power 479 00:29:20,356 --> 00:29:24,396 Speaker 1: activists hope will awaken other white people to what they 480 00:29:24,436 --> 00:29:27,396 Speaker 1: see as the self evident state of emergency facing the 481 00:29:27,396 --> 00:29:30,796 Speaker 1: white race, and they think that that will eventually lead 482 00:29:30,876 --> 00:29:35,276 Speaker 1: to an armed uprising that will create an all white world. 483 00:29:35,676 --> 00:29:39,716 Speaker 1: And the turnidiaries imagines this very violently and very vividly, 484 00:29:40,356 --> 00:29:43,996 Speaker 1: and it includes things like like many nuclear weapon blasts, 485 00:29:44,516 --> 00:29:47,676 Speaker 1: the forced march of people of color out of the 486 00:29:47,756 --> 00:29:51,836 Speaker 1: United States, and the eventual genocide of all populations except 487 00:29:51,836 --> 00:29:55,636 Speaker 1: for white people in the world. And so then Oklahoma 488 00:29:55,676 --> 00:30:00,036 Speaker 1: City does happen and the bombing does occur. And then 489 00:30:00,316 --> 00:30:05,156 Speaker 1: from the standpoint of public perception, instead of the world 490 00:30:05,196 --> 00:30:11,396 Speaker 1: sitting up and taking notice and ordinary concerned Americans saying 491 00:30:11,636 --> 00:30:16,236 Speaker 1: there's this powerful, dangerous social movement that's seeking revolution and 492 00:30:16,516 --> 00:30:19,236 Speaker 1: is using terrorist techniques and it's just blown up a 493 00:30:19,276 --> 00:30:22,796 Speaker 1: building and killed a lot of people, we get basically 494 00:30:22,956 --> 00:30:26,596 Speaker 1: the opposite. We get a narrative of this was a 495 00:30:26,636 --> 00:30:30,076 Speaker 1: few people. I remember a narrative that you know, Timothy 496 00:30:30,116 --> 00:30:33,316 Speaker 1: fi McVeigh was so radical that even the militias wouldn't 497 00:30:33,316 --> 00:30:35,956 Speaker 1: have him as a member, thereby implying that maybe these 498 00:30:35,956 --> 00:30:40,356 Speaker 1: militias actually aren't so bad after all. McVeigh doesn't put 499 00:30:40,436 --> 00:30:42,476 Speaker 1: up much of a defensive trial. And then he allows 500 00:30:42,556 --> 00:30:46,996 Speaker 1: himself to be executed by not challenging the death sentence, 501 00:30:47,396 --> 00:30:50,516 Speaker 1: and he's executed in record time, and it's as though 502 00:30:50,636 --> 00:30:54,396 Speaker 1: the story disappears. Why did this happen? I mean to 503 00:30:54,436 --> 00:30:59,076 Speaker 1: take a comparison. After September eleventh, whatever skepticism there might 504 00:30:59,116 --> 00:31:03,036 Speaker 1: have been about the capacities of terrorists operating the name 505 00:31:03,076 --> 00:31:06,636 Speaker 1: of Islam to change global affairs was eliminated, and a 506 00:31:06,756 --> 00:31:10,676 Speaker 1: generation of experts or pseudo experts in some cases, but nevertheless, 507 00:31:10,676 --> 00:31:13,356 Speaker 1: a generation of concerned people who cared about this was 508 00:31:13,436 --> 00:31:17,436 Speaker 1: born in a moment and created an industry that hasn't 509 00:31:17,436 --> 00:31:21,276 Speaker 1: gone away since. In contrast, in radical contrast and the 510 00:31:21,316 --> 00:31:24,916 Speaker 1: aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing, things sort of don't 511 00:31:24,916 --> 00:31:27,436 Speaker 1: happen in that way. Talk about why, because I think 512 00:31:27,436 --> 00:31:32,276 Speaker 1: it's so important. The Oklahoma City bombing represents the largest 513 00:31:32,316 --> 00:31:36,116 Speaker 1: deliberate mass casualty in the United States between Pearl Harbor 514 00:31:36,236 --> 00:31:39,076 Speaker 1: and nine to eleven, and the fact that we don't 515 00:31:39,116 --> 00:31:40,916 Speaker 1: have a narrative about it in the ways that you've 516 00:31:40,956 --> 00:31:46,116 Speaker 1: outlined is both alarming and surprising given how thoroughly these 517 00:31:46,316 --> 00:31:48,876 Speaker 1: these events that I cover in the book were talked 518 00:31:48,876 --> 00:31:51,676 Speaker 1: about at the time. So if you think about something 519 00:31:51,676 --> 00:31:55,516 Speaker 1: like the shooting at Greensboro, people knew about that. That 520 00:31:55,596 --> 00:31:59,916 Speaker 1: was front page news. Yeah, that made the front pages 521 00:31:59,956 --> 00:32:03,756 Speaker 1: of many, many, many newspapers, and eventually also became a 522 00:32:03,756 --> 00:32:06,116 Speaker 1: Saturday Net Life sketch like that was in the zeitgeist. 523 00:32:06,516 --> 00:32:10,436 Speaker 1: But somehow we haven't connected that event with Oklahoma City. 524 00:32:10,476 --> 00:32:13,036 Speaker 1: We haven't connected either of them with a narrative about 525 00:32:13,076 --> 00:32:15,716 Speaker 1: a social movement. We don't have really a durable way 526 00:32:15,796 --> 00:32:18,156 Speaker 1: at all of thinking about how to narrate these events. 527 00:32:18,716 --> 00:32:21,196 Speaker 1: So with Oklahoma City, one of the things that happens 528 00:32:21,396 --> 00:32:24,556 Speaker 1: is that the federal government tries to do a big 529 00:32:24,596 --> 00:32:27,916 Speaker 1: prosecution of these activists in nineteen eighty seven eighty eight 530 00:32:28,756 --> 00:32:32,116 Speaker 1: in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and so it's a federal trial 531 00:32:32,356 --> 00:32:37,836 Speaker 1: on charges including seditious conspiracy. Seditious conspiracy in this case 532 00:32:37,996 --> 00:32:42,196 Speaker 1: was wholly evident. The jury heard testimony about white power 533 00:32:42,196 --> 00:32:45,756 Speaker 1: activists plotting to poison the water supply of a major 534 00:32:45,796 --> 00:32:50,196 Speaker 1: city with cyanide. They seized thirty gallons of cyanide. The 535 00:32:50,436 --> 00:32:55,196 Speaker 1: jurors saw laundry hampers full of illegal weapons and material 536 00:32:55,356 --> 00:32:57,716 Speaker 1: pushed through the courtroom, and we're talking about things like 537 00:32:57,796 --> 00:33:00,916 Speaker 1: anti tank weapons and claim war minds. They saw the 538 00:33:00,956 --> 00:33:03,356 Speaker 1: writings of these activists where they had said that they 539 00:33:03,356 --> 00:33:05,756 Speaker 1: were involved in seditious conspiracy. It goes on and on 540 00:33:05,836 --> 00:33:11,076 Speaker 1: like this. That trial got no convictions. So you get 541 00:33:11,076 --> 00:33:14,356 Speaker 1: these acquittals in these cases of trying people for trying 542 00:33:14,356 --> 00:33:17,076 Speaker 1: to overthrow the government. I get that that's a part 543 00:33:17,156 --> 00:33:21,036 Speaker 1: of the disappearance of a story that there's a coherent 544 00:33:21,436 --> 00:33:24,876 Speaker 1: movement say more about how yeah, go ahead. More than that, 545 00:33:25,076 --> 00:33:27,676 Speaker 1: what emerges from it is that it is a disaster 546 00:33:28,076 --> 00:33:34,036 Speaker 1: for the prosecuting agencies, the atf dog, FBI. Everyone is 547 00:33:34,076 --> 00:33:38,636 Speaker 1: embarrassed by this entire thing. And afterward, there's a policy 548 00:33:38,676 --> 00:33:41,876 Speaker 1: institutionalized at the FBI that says they will make no 549 00:33:41,916 --> 00:33:47,116 Speaker 1: attempt to tie white power violence to a movement. They 550 00:33:47,156 --> 00:33:51,636 Speaker 1: will prosecute only individual crimes. They will not attempt to 551 00:33:51,676 --> 00:33:54,516 Speaker 1: prosecute as part of a movement. So you have a 552 00:33:54,516 --> 00:33:57,236 Speaker 1: piece of paper written at the end of this sedition 553 00:33:57,316 --> 00:34:00,476 Speaker 1: trial that when the Timothy mcveay case comes up, says 554 00:34:00,716 --> 00:34:02,996 Speaker 1: they will not try to prosecute as part of a movement. 555 00:34:04,316 --> 00:34:07,116 Speaker 1: And why do they say in this document that they 556 00:34:07,116 --> 00:34:09,716 Speaker 1: won't do that, because because it's a no win proposition 557 00:34:09,756 --> 00:34:11,916 Speaker 1: that they thought that was why they lost those prosecutions. 558 00:34:11,956 --> 00:34:15,156 Speaker 1: It's a kind of tactical judgment. It's a tactical judgment 559 00:34:15,156 --> 00:34:18,316 Speaker 1: and a recognition that there's not a sufficient public will 560 00:34:18,636 --> 00:34:21,316 Speaker 1: to prosecute white power violence as the work of a movement. 561 00:34:21,316 --> 00:34:23,396 Speaker 1: And I mean, if anything, that's only deepened by the 562 00:34:23,436 --> 00:34:26,436 Speaker 1: events of the early nineteen nineties Ridge and Ridge and 563 00:34:26,516 --> 00:34:30,396 Speaker 1: Waco and the sieges, where where the state very clearly 564 00:34:31,276 --> 00:34:36,316 Speaker 1: oversteps in and uses militarized violence against against white power 565 00:34:36,356 --> 00:34:40,196 Speaker 1: activists in one case and followers of the branch Davidian 566 00:34:40,716 --> 00:34:43,636 Speaker 1: compounded the other case. So the FBI is a part 567 00:34:43,676 --> 00:34:45,316 Speaker 1: of the story and the deal Department of Justice. They 568 00:34:45,636 --> 00:34:50,636 Speaker 1: decline to treat white white power or white supremacy movements 569 00:34:50,676 --> 00:34:55,276 Speaker 1: as a coordinated and coherent said of terrorist groups, even 570 00:34:55,356 --> 00:34:57,876 Speaker 1: after Oklahoma City. Why does the rest of the world 571 00:34:57,916 --> 00:35:01,396 Speaker 1: go along with that? Why does the media accept that 572 00:35:01,956 --> 00:35:05,956 Speaker 1: instead of pushing against the government's failure to construct a narrative. 573 00:35:06,156 --> 00:35:09,676 Speaker 1: I think that there is a very durable narrative form 574 00:35:09,716 --> 00:35:12,836 Speaker 1: about the lone wolf gunmen. And when there is a 575 00:35:12,876 --> 00:35:17,676 Speaker 1: mass violent event that is carried out by a white perpetrator, 576 00:35:17,876 --> 00:35:20,436 Speaker 1: we almost always see the same story about it. It 577 00:35:20,476 --> 00:35:24,796 Speaker 1: almost always goes to lone wolf mental health and sort 578 00:35:24,836 --> 00:35:30,636 Speaker 1: of like a psychological profile, rather than going to connections 579 00:35:30,676 --> 00:35:35,636 Speaker 1: and ideology and politics, even when there is clear clear 580 00:35:35,756 --> 00:35:39,036 Speaker 1: evidence that these are white power gunmen. So it's a 581 00:35:39,116 --> 00:35:42,156 Speaker 1: kind of denial, and it may be an individual psychological denial, 582 00:35:42,236 --> 00:35:45,756 Speaker 1: or it may be a white people wide social denial. 583 00:35:46,196 --> 00:35:49,636 Speaker 1: I mean, my assumption is that you know that many 584 00:35:49,676 --> 00:35:52,956 Speaker 1: African Americans would not instinctively think, oh, it must be 585 00:35:52,996 --> 00:35:55,956 Speaker 1: a lone wolf, but might think they are organized people 586 00:35:55,956 --> 00:35:58,436 Speaker 1: who are who are out to get us. Well, not 587 00:35:58,476 --> 00:36:02,276 Speaker 1: only that, but the term lone wolf comes from this movement, 588 00:36:02,436 --> 00:36:05,916 Speaker 1: So we are allowing this movement to disappear every time 589 00:36:05,956 --> 00:36:08,236 Speaker 1: we say that phrase. One question that I hear a 590 00:36:08,236 --> 00:36:12,756 Speaker 1: lot about this story is who failed to stop this movement? 591 00:36:12,796 --> 00:36:15,196 Speaker 1: Because in the entirety of my book, there's never a 592 00:36:15,236 --> 00:36:18,396 Speaker 1: moment where when there's like a decisive court case that 593 00:36:18,596 --> 00:36:22,396 Speaker 1: renders the movement unable to organize even for a short time. Yeah, 594 00:36:22,436 --> 00:36:24,156 Speaker 1: you don't have an Elliot's in your book. You don't 595 00:36:24,156 --> 00:36:25,876 Speaker 1: have a you know, it will be hard to make 596 00:36:25,876 --> 00:36:27,316 Speaker 1: a movie out of it because you don't have the 597 00:36:27,436 --> 00:36:30,796 Speaker 1: heroic cop or you know, an FBI agent who stands 598 00:36:30,876 --> 00:36:33,436 Speaker 1: up and says enough, I'm going I'm going to change 599 00:36:33,436 --> 00:36:36,876 Speaker 1: this around. There's one actually who quits and frustration after 600 00:36:36,876 --> 00:36:39,916 Speaker 1: this edition. Trial policy is instituted about not tying the 601 00:36:40,116 --> 00:36:42,276 Speaker 1: individual crimes of the broad movement. And there are some 602 00:36:42,356 --> 00:36:45,236 Speaker 1: heroic local reporters who have like one piece of this 603 00:36:45,276 --> 00:36:47,596 Speaker 1: story in real time, which is amazing. I mean, there 604 00:36:47,596 --> 00:36:51,076 Speaker 1: are people who are trying right, but the failure is 605 00:36:52,396 --> 00:36:56,676 Speaker 1: exists at a I have to use one historical jargon term, 606 00:36:56,716 --> 00:37:02,076 Speaker 1: which is transscalar, meaning that the failure of response to 607 00:37:02,116 --> 00:37:06,436 Speaker 1: this movement lives both at the level of like personal 608 00:37:06,476 --> 00:37:09,596 Speaker 1: prejudice of people in various positions of power allow it 609 00:37:09,636 --> 00:37:14,396 Speaker 1: to go unchecked right all the way up through failures 610 00:37:14,396 --> 00:37:18,956 Speaker 1: of media reporting, failures of juror education, failures of prosecutorial 611 00:37:19,116 --> 00:37:23,116 Speaker 1: policy and the law, failures of military policy to stop 612 00:37:23,156 --> 00:37:27,076 Speaker 1: this kind of organizing, and active duty troops failures in 613 00:37:28,196 --> 00:37:32,716 Speaker 1: all kinds of different allocation of surveillance resources all the 614 00:37:32,756 --> 00:37:36,236 Speaker 1: way up right, so transcalar, meaning it goes every level 615 00:37:36,396 --> 00:37:40,396 Speaker 1: of all the way up to every level of systemic 616 00:37:40,396 --> 00:37:43,796 Speaker 1: power you can think of, and it's all so imbricated 617 00:37:43,836 --> 00:37:47,356 Speaker 1: that I think to really change it would require a 618 00:37:47,556 --> 00:37:50,516 Speaker 1: massive shift in public discourse such that people start to 619 00:37:50,596 --> 00:37:52,956 Speaker 1: think about it as a movement all the way up 620 00:37:52,996 --> 00:37:55,996 Speaker 1: to reforming those policies and laws that allow these things 621 00:37:56,036 --> 00:38:00,956 Speaker 1: to continue. Well, one change that might potentially becoming is 622 00:38:01,156 --> 00:38:08,396 Speaker 1: ironically driven by a rapidly growing number of wildly successful 623 00:38:08,596 --> 00:38:14,236 Speaker 1: and heavily publicized terrorist attacks, which is what we've seen 624 00:38:14,516 --> 00:38:18,196 Speaker 1: in the last few years. You know, I'm oversimplifying a bit, 625 00:38:18,276 --> 00:38:22,276 Speaker 1: but I would say since Charlottesville, American public consciousness, US 626 00:38:22,356 --> 00:38:26,476 Speaker 1: public consciousness has really been profoundly raised around these issues, 627 00:38:26,476 --> 00:38:29,196 Speaker 1: such that even events that take place abroad like the 628 00:38:29,276 --> 00:38:35,196 Speaker 1: christ Church, New Zealand attacks, are incorporated into our understanding 629 00:38:35,276 --> 00:38:36,676 Speaker 1: or our wake up call, which I think was not 630 00:38:36,756 --> 00:38:41,596 Speaker 1: so much true for the unders Bravick attacks, which although 631 00:38:41,636 --> 00:38:43,356 Speaker 1: there was interested in the United States, and there was 632 00:38:43,396 --> 00:38:45,036 Speaker 1: a movie and there was a long New York or article, 633 00:38:45,196 --> 00:38:46,996 Speaker 1: there was still some tendency to see this as though 634 00:38:46,996 --> 00:38:50,836 Speaker 1: it were a Northern European problem. You know, something not 635 00:38:51,436 --> 00:38:53,036 Speaker 1: a problem of the US. On top of that, there 636 00:38:53,076 --> 00:38:55,236 Speaker 1: was the fact that Bravick, you know, was a white 637 00:38:55,236 --> 00:38:57,196 Speaker 1: guy who killed a lot of white people, I mean, 638 00:38:57,516 --> 00:39:00,356 Speaker 1: and so it was it seemed possible not to construct 639 00:39:00,356 --> 00:39:03,356 Speaker 1: this narrative. But the recent events don't look that way. 640 00:39:03,396 --> 00:39:07,396 Speaker 1: They look like a coordinated set of events around the world. 641 00:39:07,436 --> 00:39:11,196 Speaker 1: And what's more, we also now have a powerful comparison 642 00:39:11,316 --> 00:39:15,796 Speaker 1: to make, which is the comparison to self radicalized terrorists 643 00:39:15,796 --> 00:39:19,196 Speaker 1: who are acting in the name of Islam, who also 644 00:39:19,436 --> 00:39:22,876 Speaker 1: have practiced a kind of leaderless resistance. But that's not 645 00:39:22,956 --> 00:39:24,756 Speaker 1: how a lot of the most effective attacks of the 646 00:39:24,756 --> 00:39:28,396 Speaker 1: Islamic state operate. They operate on a leaderless resistance principle. 647 00:39:28,476 --> 00:39:30,716 Speaker 1: So we now have a salient example in our minds 648 00:39:30,756 --> 00:39:33,436 Speaker 1: and lots and lots of attacks. Do you have a 649 00:39:33,516 --> 00:39:37,796 Speaker 1: sense that these attacks are actually speeding up or is 650 00:39:37,796 --> 00:39:40,236 Speaker 1: that an artifact of our starting to notice them more? 651 00:39:40,476 --> 00:39:43,436 Speaker 1: It feels to me like a wave of attacks that 652 00:39:43,476 --> 00:39:48,596 Speaker 1: we're in. And something that I have been trying to 653 00:39:48,916 --> 00:39:52,996 Speaker 1: talk about since Charlottesville is that the body count is 654 00:39:53,276 --> 00:39:58,036 Speaker 1: very very low still given the kind of public facing 655 00:39:58,036 --> 00:40:01,156 Speaker 1: activism that we can observe. So the body count is 656 00:40:01,156 --> 00:40:04,436 Speaker 1: low relative to what it could be. Well, so if 657 00:40:04,436 --> 00:40:08,596 Speaker 1: we compare the earlier moment with this moment and compare 658 00:40:08,676 --> 00:40:13,996 Speaker 1: something similar amounts of public sphere activity with where we 659 00:40:14,036 --> 00:40:17,716 Speaker 1: are right now, the comparative body count is very low, UM, 660 00:40:18,156 --> 00:40:21,236 Speaker 1: meaning that I would expect there to be more death. 661 00:40:21,476 --> 00:40:23,076 Speaker 1: But does that mean, just to clarify, does that mean 662 00:40:23,076 --> 00:40:25,916 Speaker 1: you expect more death is coming or that you're surprised 663 00:40:25,916 --> 00:40:28,156 Speaker 1: that it hasn't come yet. No, no, no no, no, I 664 00:40:28,676 --> 00:40:33,156 Speaker 1: would expect more mass attacks to becoming. Yes, and we 665 00:40:33,676 --> 00:40:36,116 Speaker 1: should pause on that for a moment. You're saying, in 666 00:40:36,236 --> 00:40:39,676 Speaker 1: light of the historical examples and evidence, you would predict 667 00:40:39,716 --> 00:40:43,996 Speaker 1: that there are more very violent public attacks coming. Yeah, 668 00:40:45,196 --> 00:40:48,156 Speaker 1: that would be my hunch. I mean, historians always are 669 00:40:48,236 --> 00:40:53,036 Speaker 1: reluctant to make prognosis about the future, and understandably I am, 670 00:40:53,196 --> 00:40:55,156 Speaker 1: like I said, I don't have an archive. But my 671 00:40:55,276 --> 00:40:59,396 Speaker 1: hunch is that, given how much public facing activity we've 672 00:40:59,396 --> 00:41:03,916 Speaker 1: seen in the last say, five years, I am staggered 673 00:41:04,036 --> 00:41:06,836 Speaker 1: that the body count is not already higher. So I 674 00:41:06,836 --> 00:41:10,996 Speaker 1: would be very surprised if it did not amplify. UM. 675 00:41:11,356 --> 00:41:13,676 Speaker 1: And that's also true because we have this other X 676 00:41:13,716 --> 00:41:17,716 Speaker 1: factor about UM. So if you look at rises in 677 00:41:17,756 --> 00:41:21,716 Speaker 1: the clan throughout its life, so from eighteen sixty six 678 00:41:21,756 --> 00:41:24,036 Speaker 1: to the present, we have these clearly defined ebbs and 679 00:41:24,076 --> 00:41:29,596 Speaker 1: flows of the clan. Um. The the high points always 680 00:41:29,636 --> 00:41:33,236 Speaker 1: align with the aftermath of warfare in American society, and 681 00:41:33,236 --> 00:41:35,436 Speaker 1: they do that more consistently than they align with things 682 00:41:35,436 --> 00:41:39,556 Speaker 1: like economic hardship or poverty, or even anti immigration sentiment 683 00:41:39,716 --> 00:41:46,716 Speaker 1: or um segregation law changes, UM. And the fact that 684 00:41:46,756 --> 00:41:50,556 Speaker 1: we are now in a prolonged aftermath of war period 685 00:41:50,756 --> 00:41:53,516 Speaker 1: that is stretched out coming out of Iraq and eventually 686 00:41:53,516 --> 00:41:56,036 Speaker 1: out of I mean we're in. We're in kind of 687 00:41:56,076 --> 00:42:02,356 Speaker 1: like a forever aftermath right now, forever wars aftermath exactly. 688 00:42:02,396 --> 00:42:03,916 Speaker 1: And I mean this is a this is a kind 689 00:42:03,916 --> 00:42:06,396 Speaker 1: of aftermath that we have never seen before. If you 690 00:42:06,436 --> 00:42:09,636 Speaker 1: think about kind of the cycles of combat and aftermath 691 00:42:09,996 --> 00:42:12,436 Speaker 1: in that it is mostly focused on one sector of 692 00:42:12,476 --> 00:42:15,756 Speaker 1: society that interacts less and less with other sectors of society. Right, 693 00:42:15,796 --> 00:42:19,916 Speaker 1: we see increasing segregation of military families into communities apart 694 00:42:19,996 --> 00:42:24,036 Speaker 1: from other families. We see increasing use of things like 695 00:42:24,116 --> 00:42:27,436 Speaker 1: stop loss in multiple tours to put people back in 696 00:42:27,476 --> 00:42:30,156 Speaker 1: combat over and over rather than drafting new people. I 697 00:42:30,196 --> 00:42:34,156 Speaker 1: teach at a university which is as wonderful students, but 698 00:42:35,156 --> 00:42:40,076 Speaker 1: I hardly ever have students who have themselves served, or 699 00:42:40,116 --> 00:42:43,156 Speaker 1: have even have family members who've served. So there's a 700 00:42:43,236 --> 00:42:46,636 Speaker 1: profound social segregation around who is doing this work of violence, 701 00:42:46,996 --> 00:42:50,916 Speaker 1: and a stretching out of the combat aftermath period. I 702 00:42:50,916 --> 00:42:53,596 Speaker 1: don't know what that will do in those earlier periods. 703 00:42:53,596 --> 00:42:57,556 Speaker 1: It's really interesting because at one point I wondered if 704 00:42:57,556 --> 00:43:00,196 Speaker 1: we might be seeing like a Rambo effect right where 705 00:43:00,316 --> 00:43:02,716 Speaker 1: veterans come back and just can't stop doing the violence 706 00:43:02,756 --> 00:43:06,196 Speaker 1: of warfare. But it turns out that violence increases for 707 00:43:06,316 --> 00:43:11,476 Speaker 1: everybody in American society after warfare, people who definitely didn't serve, 708 00:43:11,556 --> 00:43:15,636 Speaker 1: like older people and women and children, across all of 709 00:43:15,676 --> 00:43:19,116 Speaker 1: those groups. There's just more violence in the aftermath of 710 00:43:19,116 --> 00:43:22,756 Speaker 1: warfare in American society. So in this long aftermath period, 711 00:43:23,116 --> 00:43:27,716 Speaker 1: I think we should be concerned about this effect where 712 00:43:27,796 --> 00:43:30,316 Speaker 1: vigilante or excuse me, revolutionary groups in this case are 713 00:43:30,356 --> 00:43:35,676 Speaker 1: able to either mobilize that violent sentiment or I don't know, 714 00:43:35,716 --> 00:43:38,636 Speaker 1: contribute to infan and in some way. I want to 715 00:43:38,676 --> 00:43:42,516 Speaker 1: close by asking you about a phenomenon that is obviously 716 00:43:42,596 --> 00:43:48,116 Speaker 1: very significant for the post nineteen ninety five of white supremacy. 717 00:43:48,156 --> 00:43:50,396 Speaker 1: The era that we're in now, and that is the Internet, 718 00:43:50,476 --> 00:43:54,476 Speaker 1: not in its proto message board form, but in the 719 00:43:54,916 --> 00:43:58,316 Speaker 1: contemporary form that we know, which includes not only Internet 720 00:43:58,316 --> 00:44:01,396 Speaker 1: one point oh, but also social media, and in which, 721 00:44:01,436 --> 00:44:04,476 Speaker 1: among other things, it's much easier to spread information to 722 00:44:04,556 --> 00:44:08,396 Speaker 1: people who never have to have individual human contact with 723 00:44:08,396 --> 00:44:10,636 Speaker 1: each other. They might, but they don't need to have done. 724 00:44:11,196 --> 00:44:13,796 Speaker 1: It strikes me that, on the one hand, the phenomenon 725 00:44:13,796 --> 00:44:16,316 Speaker 1: of self radicalization, the Dylan roof whom, as you say 726 00:44:16,516 --> 00:44:19,596 Speaker 1: and the close of your book, never actually had to 727 00:44:19,636 --> 00:44:22,836 Speaker 1: meet any people who shared his views to develop them. 728 00:44:22,836 --> 00:44:24,476 Speaker 1: So in that sense, you could sort of imagine that 729 00:44:24,476 --> 00:44:28,316 Speaker 1: the Internet is a social media are are vehicles to 730 00:44:28,436 --> 00:44:31,636 Speaker 1: spread ideology and to spread violence. But on the other hand, 731 00:44:31,636 --> 00:44:34,796 Speaker 1: we did have Charlottesville, which was less we forget, began 732 00:44:34,836 --> 00:44:37,396 Speaker 1: with a march that was called Unite the Right, which 733 00:44:37,476 --> 00:44:41,996 Speaker 1: was trying precisely to translate Internet connections to the real 734 00:44:42,036 --> 00:44:46,556 Speaker 1: life sphere. Talk about, if you would, the Internet and 735 00:44:46,556 --> 00:44:50,236 Speaker 1: how it's going to affect or is affecting white power 736 00:44:50,356 --> 00:44:53,996 Speaker 1: in our present moment. The actual violence of even public 737 00:44:54,036 --> 00:44:57,396 Speaker 1: facing events like Charlottesville that led to the death of 738 00:44:57,436 --> 00:45:01,236 Speaker 1: Heather Higher and the beating of other demonstrators is important 739 00:45:01,316 --> 00:45:04,396 Speaker 1: to queue up as we have that conversation. The internet 740 00:45:04,916 --> 00:45:11,036 Speaker 1: is both concerning and immensely hopeful. The use of viral 741 00:45:11,636 --> 00:45:15,116 Speaker 1: videos and live streaming of the attacks is new and 742 00:45:15,316 --> 00:45:17,716 Speaker 1: strikes me as very much of a piece with our 743 00:45:17,796 --> 00:45:21,596 Speaker 1: present moment. And I'm thinking of the christ Church shooter 744 00:45:21,836 --> 00:45:24,636 Speaker 1: live streaming the attack, and also the militias on the 745 00:45:24,716 --> 00:45:29,556 Speaker 1: border detaining undocumented immigrants and live streaming, you know, their 746 00:45:29,596 --> 00:45:33,396 Speaker 1: agony as they were held by a non government group 747 00:45:33,676 --> 00:45:36,276 Speaker 1: in order to turn them over to the border patrol. 748 00:45:36,836 --> 00:45:39,796 Speaker 1: On the other hand, I do want to say that 749 00:45:39,876 --> 00:45:43,316 Speaker 1: like there is, there is a way that the internet 750 00:45:43,676 --> 00:45:47,556 Speaker 1: could also be an agent of change and could offer 751 00:45:47,676 --> 00:45:50,756 Speaker 1: us a seed of hope. The idea that we talked 752 00:45:50,796 --> 00:45:53,956 Speaker 1: about with connecting these stories together as a form of 753 00:45:54,036 --> 00:45:56,836 Speaker 1: understanding the history, such that we can talk about christ 754 00:45:56,916 --> 00:46:00,196 Speaker 1: Church and the Tree of Life shooting and Charlottesville and 755 00:46:00,356 --> 00:46:03,876 Speaker 1: Dylan Roofs shooting and Charleston all as the act of 756 00:46:03,916 --> 00:46:07,556 Speaker 1: the white power movement. One potential there is to connect 757 00:46:07,676 --> 00:46:11,556 Speaker 1: the impacted communities with one another and to create a 758 00:46:11,636 --> 00:46:15,636 Speaker 1: kind of coalition politics that could resist this kind of violence, 759 00:46:16,836 --> 00:46:19,916 Speaker 1: and so you know, the Internet gives and takes away, 760 00:46:19,956 --> 00:46:23,076 Speaker 1: I suppose, but there is a way that it might 761 00:46:23,116 --> 00:46:27,196 Speaker 1: also provide an instrument for public understanding that wasn't available 762 00:46:27,236 --> 00:46:31,076 Speaker 1: to us in that earlier period. Kathleen, thank you very 763 00:46:31,196 --> 00:46:33,556 Speaker 1: very much, not just for talking with us, but for 764 00:46:33,636 --> 00:46:38,036 Speaker 1: your extraordinarily important work to help us come to terms 765 00:46:38,036 --> 00:46:43,716 Speaker 1: with by recognizing a genuine, organized, unified set of ideologies 766 00:46:43,716 --> 00:46:47,156 Speaker 1: that are in fact a social movement with real violent tendencies. 767 00:46:47,316 --> 00:46:49,956 Speaker 1: Unless we recognize that, we're not going to be anywhere. 768 00:46:50,116 --> 00:46:52,396 Speaker 1: And when we do recognize that, and I have some 769 00:46:52,436 --> 00:46:55,676 Speaker 1: confidence that we will, it will be thanks to your 770 00:46:55,716 --> 00:46:57,716 Speaker 1: work and to the work of other other people like you. 771 00:46:57,836 --> 00:47:00,156 Speaker 1: Thank you very very much for being with us. Well, 772 00:47:00,156 --> 00:47:09,756 Speaker 1: thank you for having me. Before talking to Kathleen and 773 00:47:09,876 --> 00:47:12,236 Speaker 1: reading her book. I'm afraid I was one of those 774 00:47:12,276 --> 00:47:16,636 Speaker 1: people who believe the message that attacks by white supremacists 775 00:47:16,836 --> 00:47:22,316 Speaker 1: are isolated, disconnected, lone wolf actions. I didn't take on 776 00:47:22,356 --> 00:47:25,036 Speaker 1: board the extent to which the Oklahoma City bombing and 777 00:47:25,196 --> 00:47:30,276 Speaker 1: the white supremacist attacks, including the Charlottesville events and attacks 778 00:47:30,316 --> 00:47:33,756 Speaker 1: on mosques and synagogues, were actually part of an organized 779 00:47:33,796 --> 00:47:37,836 Speaker 1: social movement, A lot like the international jihadi movement. What's 780 00:47:37,876 --> 00:47:42,156 Speaker 1: scary about that diagnosis? You heard directly from Kathleen, She 781 00:47:42,276 --> 00:47:46,236 Speaker 1: said she expects the body count to rise. Now, historical 782 00:47:46,276 --> 00:47:48,836 Speaker 1: precedent isn't always a perfect predictor of what's going to 783 00:47:48,916 --> 00:47:51,556 Speaker 1: happen in the future, but when it comes to terrorism 784 00:47:51,836 --> 00:47:55,396 Speaker 1: or other complex phenomena, it's often the best predictor that 785 00:47:55,396 --> 00:47:58,276 Speaker 1: we're going to get. So I was a little bit scared, 786 00:47:58,356 --> 00:48:01,356 Speaker 1: I will admit. My takeaway, though, is more about what 787 00:48:01,396 --> 00:48:05,036 Speaker 1: we can do going forward than just the feeling that, boy, 788 00:48:05,196 --> 00:48:08,236 Speaker 1: is this scary. The only way to solve and address 789 00:48:08,436 --> 00:48:13,196 Speaker 1: a phenomena like white power terrorism is actually to recognize 790 00:48:13,196 --> 00:48:15,836 Speaker 1: it for what it is. Once we understand that people 791 00:48:15,876 --> 00:48:18,236 Speaker 1: can be radicalized, we can try to track the people 792 00:48:18,236 --> 00:48:21,316 Speaker 1: who are in the process of becoming radicalized. Once we 793 00:48:21,356 --> 00:48:23,876 Speaker 1: know there are targets, we can harden those targets and 794 00:48:23,916 --> 00:48:26,516 Speaker 1: try to prevent attacks, much in the way that we've 795 00:48:26,516 --> 00:48:29,636 Speaker 1: tried with some success in some instances, although not on others, 796 00:48:29,916 --> 00:48:33,276 Speaker 1: to protect ourselves against the threat of international jihadi terrorism. So, 797 00:48:33,316 --> 00:48:35,516 Speaker 1: in a sense, I think there are things we can 798 00:48:35,556 --> 00:48:39,796 Speaker 1: do provided we diagnose the threat for what it actually is. 799 00:48:44,556 --> 00:48:47,476 Speaker 1: Deep background is brought to you by Pushkin Industries. Our 800 00:48:47,516 --> 00:48:50,596 Speaker 1: producer is Lydia gene Coott, with engineering by Jason Gambrel 801 00:48:50,796 --> 00:48:54,516 Speaker 1: and Jason Roskowski. Our showrunner is Sophie mckibbon. Our theme 802 00:48:54,596 --> 00:48:57,396 Speaker 1: music is composed by Luis GERA special thanks to the 803 00:48:57,396 --> 00:49:01,516 Speaker 1: Pushkin Brass, Malcolm Gladwell, Jacob Weisberg and Mia Lobel. I'm 804 00:49:01,596 --> 00:49:04,836 Speaker 1: Noah Feldman. You can follow me on Twitter at Noah R. Feldman. 805 00:49:05,236 --> 00:49:06,596 Speaker 1: This is Deep Background