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Speaker 1: Next Question with Katie Curic is a production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio and Katie Couric Media. Hi, everyone, welcome to

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Speaker 1: Next Question. I'm Katie Couric. About two and a half

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Speaker 1: years ago, a white nationalist by the name of James

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Speaker 1: Fields Jr. Plowed his car into a crowd protesting the

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Speaker 1: Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. This rally, close

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Speaker 1: to thirty people were injured. Thirty two year old Heather

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Speaker 1: Higher was killed. What did what did you think of

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Speaker 1: what you saw today here in Charlotte's Ville. I've never

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Speaker 1: seen so much hatred in the eyes of my fellow

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Speaker 1: human beings in my life. We are in very deep trouble.

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Speaker 1: This country is in deep trill. I was there that

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Speaker 1: day and since then, at least seventy three murders can

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Speaker 1: be tied to the radical right wing extremist movement James

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Speaker 1: Fields Jr. Embraced That includes, of course, they hate fuel

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Speaker 1: shootings in Pittsburgh, Poway, California, and El Paso, Texas. In

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Speaker 1: many of these cases, the perpetrators adopted the disturbing views

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Speaker 1: of a broad Internet savvy movement made up of different

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Speaker 1: misogynistic and white nationalist groups. In online forums and on

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Speaker 1: social media. The suspect in today's mass shooting at the

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Speaker 1: Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh had an extensive anti Semitic,

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Speaker 1: anti Jewish digital footprint. Law enforcement officials in Texas say

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Speaker 1: they believe he wrote a roughly six hundred word essay

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Speaker 1: on the Internet and posted it an hour or so

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Speaker 1: before the shooting that says the attack was motivated by

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Speaker 1: anti immigrant hatred. Today, that's where hate spreads, not through

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Speaker 1: top secret word of mouth meetings, but out in the open,

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Speaker 1: on places like four chant and Reddit, and even YouTube

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Speaker 1: and Facebook. People who feel lost or left behind, or

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Speaker 1: maybe just looking to rebel are radicalized almost exclusively online,

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Speaker 1: often without ever meeting anyone face to face. The technology

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Speaker 1: itself is a big part of the problem. The algorithms

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Speaker 1: on sites like YouTube encourage users to stick around by

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Speaker 1: serving up ever more extreme examples of whatever topic they're

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Speaker 1: engaged with. To be clear, not everyone who spends time

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Speaker 1: in these virtual spaces will go on to commit horrific acts,

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Speaker 1: but the marching orders for many of these groups are

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Speaker 1: usually pretty explicit. True believers are encouraged to bring people

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Speaker 1: with mainstream views so called norm e s, into the fold.

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Speaker 1: And to ultimately take real world action against the groups

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Speaker 1: they believe are threatening their way of life. That means

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Speaker 1: people of color, women, lgbt Q individuals, and members of

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Speaker 1: other marginalized communities, which brings me to my next question,

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Speaker 1: how can we stop the spread of radical extremism online

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Speaker 1: and keep people from becoming radicalized in the first place.

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Speaker 1: My first guest knows from experience just how easy it

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Speaker 1: can be to get sucked into this world. Three years ago,

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Speaker 1: when he was just thirteen years old, he turned to

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Speaker 1: the Internet as a way to escape a lonely stressful

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Speaker 1: time at school. The community he found there gave him

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Speaker 1: some dangerous ideas about who was actually to blame for

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Speaker 1: his problems. In a jaw dropping anonymous account for Washingtonian Magazine,

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Speaker 1: his mom opened up about forums where her son, who

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Speaker 1: she calls Sam, spent countless hours and the toll his

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Speaker 1: newfound beliefs took on the entire family. Sam, I knew

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Speaker 1: you were having a pretty tough time emotionally when you

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Speaker 1: were thirteen years old. What was going on back then?

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Speaker 1: I had a kind of traumatic experience in eighth grade,

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Speaker 1: and uh, my parents didn't really like how the school

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Speaker 1: handled it, so they ended up pulling me out of

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Speaker 1: the school, um, which just led to a lot of

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Speaker 1: like confusion on my part, and it just made me upset.

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Speaker 1: You know, I had to find new friends. I had

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Speaker 1: to you know, kind of remake my mark on my

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Speaker 1: new school. What happened exactly that made you feel this way?

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Speaker 1: My friend and I were joking around and some people

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Speaker 1: took it out of context and went to the school,

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Speaker 1: and the school handled it really poorly, said you were

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Speaker 1: sexually harassing. Yeah. They said I was sexually harassing these

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Speaker 1: two girls, which wasn't the case, and the girls didn't

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Speaker 1: even think it was the case. Um, and the school

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Speaker 1: kind of they just had their sexual harassment training, so

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Speaker 1: they were really on edge about that kind of stuff,

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Speaker 1: and they handled it pretty poorly. They said that I

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Speaker 1: was bullying the girls. And then eventually it just got

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Speaker 1: to a point where I said, okay, like it's time

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Speaker 1: to go. And so you changed schools and you were

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Speaker 1: feeling pretty isolated, lonely, I guess a little angry. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I was upset with the school. I was upset that

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Speaker 1: I had to leave. I was, you know, angry that

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Speaker 1: you know, my old friends weren't you know, in I

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Speaker 1: wasn't in as much contact with my old friends as

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Speaker 1: I like as I'd like to be. So you turn

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Speaker 1: to the internet. What was the process that opened this

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Speaker 1: door to the people you got involved with at least online.

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Speaker 1: One of my friends at my at my new school

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Speaker 1: UM decided to show me Reddit, which I had never known,

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Speaker 1: so he was showing me some subredits, like there's one

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Speaker 1: called r slash dank Memes that he was showing me,

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Speaker 1: which was just a subredit for like internet jokes and memes.

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Speaker 1: Um harmless enough, yeah, harmless enough. Seemingly the memes on there,

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Speaker 1: I didn't really understand a lot of them. A lot

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Speaker 1: of them were talking about right wing politics or um,

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Speaker 1: you know, race issues or gender issues, you know, about

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Speaker 1: women lying about rape, or about just in general, like

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Speaker 1: like gender politics, about gay people, and you know, at first,

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Speaker 1: I had come from a friend group that was pretty liberal,

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Speaker 1: so I didn't really understand the memes or get them.

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Speaker 1: But I started to look them up. And the more

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Speaker 1: and more that I started to see the memes and

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Speaker 1: I started to relate to them, the more I wanted

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Speaker 1: to be part of that community since I didn't have

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Speaker 1: friends to fall back on. So did you get involved

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Speaker 1: in these chat rooms. I guess that's a very unequated

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Speaker 1: way of describing it. Well, um, I decided to apply

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Speaker 1: for a moderator position on our slashdanc memes, and a

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Speaker 1: moderator is just someone who controls content that goes on

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Speaker 1: the subredituh, deletes posts, you know, flags them. So I

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Speaker 1: started getting in with the moderator community and a lot

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Speaker 1: of the moderators that were there, there's like a group

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Speaker 1: chat basically something called discord where you can talk to

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Speaker 1: them about everything, talk to them about posts, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of them were, you know, members of the alt

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Speaker 1: right or at least believed in the philosophy. So you know,

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Speaker 1: these people were basically my friends for a little bit,

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Speaker 1: or at least they convinced me that friends. So what

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Speaker 1: kinds of things would they say and what kinds of

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Speaker 1: things would you say? They would say like on our

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Speaker 1: group chat they would say like these liberal snowflakes can't

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Speaker 1: handle the fact that science says they're only two genders

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Speaker 1: and just stuff like that. Or they'd say like, you know,

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Speaker 1: gay people, you know, aren't they aren't like genetically okay,

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Speaker 1: Like it's not okay to be gay, It's not right

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Speaker 1: with the Bible. They'd say, you know, immigrants are fighting

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Speaker 1: or fighting to get Donald Trump out of office, and

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Speaker 1: that you know, immigrants are killing people and immigrants are

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Speaker 1: raping people. They would say that black people commit crimes

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Speaker 1: at a higher rate than white people. Do. They bring

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Speaker 1: up black crime statistics, which are obviously skewed and you know, biased,

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Speaker 1: but uh, you know, you want to agree with them,

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Speaker 1: because if someone's your friend, or at least if someone

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Speaker 1: says that they're your friend, you want to be like

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Speaker 1: them and you want to have that friend. You want

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Speaker 1: to keep that friend. You don't want to be isolated.

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Speaker 1: What about women? How did misogyny play into their overall conversation.

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Speaker 1: A lot of the stuff they would say about women

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Speaker 1: was about how women would lie about rape and about

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Speaker 1: how women would lie about sexual harassment, which spoke to

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Speaker 1: me on a personal point because of the thing that

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Speaker 1: happened at my old school in eighth grade. So that

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Speaker 1: was kind of your I don't want to say sweet spot,

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Speaker 1: but their way into you. Yeah, definitely, it was the

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Speaker 1: topic that I had, you know, had to change my

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Speaker 1: whole life because of and because of that, I was

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Speaker 1: kind of like a claim mold. I could easily be manipulated.

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Speaker 1: And did you ever challenge initially some of the things

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Speaker 1: that were being set there, And did you ever say,

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Speaker 1: wait a second, that's not true, or that's racist or

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Speaker 1: anything like that. I would never audibly fight back because

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Speaker 1: I didn't want to lose my position as a moderator

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Speaker 1: and I didn't want to alienate myself from the rest

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Speaker 1: of them. So if they said something, I disagreed, and

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Speaker 1: I just wouldn't say anything back. You have been raised

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Speaker 1: in a progressive Jewish Yeah, so you must have thought,

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Speaker 1: g these views do not swear with the values that

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Speaker 1: have been taught by my parents. I mean, how did

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Speaker 1: you kind of wrap your head around that? For me,

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Speaker 1: I think a lot of it was just resentment from

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Speaker 1: my parents, and resentment that made me leave my old

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Speaker 1: school and they made me leave my friends, and you know,

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Speaker 1: I couldn't see that they were, you know, right in

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Speaker 1: the long run. You know, it was just I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: be different than you guys. I'm gonna be the black

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Speaker 1: sheep of the family, you know that kind of the thing.

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Speaker 1: So you're sort of proud that you were being a

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Speaker 1: nonconformist in a way. Yeah, it became like a part

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Speaker 1: of my identity, that I was different than the rest

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Speaker 1: of my family. Did your parents challenge you when you

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Speaker 1: started sharing these newfound beliefs with them? Definitely, Yeah, there

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Speaker 1: was a lot of um. I'd say it became pretty

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Speaker 1: tense in our household because I would keep learning new

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Speaker 1: stuff and then something on the news would come on

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Speaker 1: that would say it would be Trump saying they were

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Speaker 1: fine people on both sides of the charts to about

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Speaker 1: and he was said, I would say, you know, he's right,

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Speaker 1: you know, not everyone was bad, not everyone was violent,

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Speaker 1: and you know, it was basically defending neo Nazis, or

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Speaker 1: I would say Jews basically run the world, which my

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Speaker 1: parents were horrified by because I was Jewish and I

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Speaker 1: was propagating anti Semitism as a teenager and as a Jew.

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Speaker 1: But to hear this blatant anti semitism as someone who's

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Speaker 1: Jewish himself, was there a disconnect there? I mean at

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Speaker 1: first there was, but then you bought into it, bought

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Speaker 1: into it somehow. Yeah. I became so receptive that kind

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Speaker 1: of talk that I would basically believe anything that they

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Speaker 1: told me. And that was the case with the anti Semitism.

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Speaker 1: Who were these people? Did they reveal, say what they

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Speaker 1: did for a living. A lot of the people were

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Speaker 1: minimum wage workers, people who worked in restaurants, people who

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Speaker 1: worked in you know, hotels, and some people made money

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Speaker 1: off of Reddit. The only time people would talk about

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Speaker 1: their actual jobs is saying like, oh, work, it was

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Speaker 1: so hard today. You know. I think they're upset because

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Speaker 1: they don't have a great job, they don't have a

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Speaker 1: great life in general, and they need to blame it

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Speaker 1: on other people for their downfalls. So these were a

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Speaker 1: lot of aggrieved people. Yeah, definitely. I'd say no one

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Speaker 1: was truly happy within the alright community. I think these

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Speaker 1: people are disgruntled, upset, you know, men who really feel

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Speaker 1: like they have the worst. You know, they feel like

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Speaker 1: they have it the worst. They got the raw end

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Speaker 1: of the stay they got, the yeah they got, the

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Speaker 1: short they got, they pulled a short straw. And then,

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Speaker 1: on top of their preexisting anger, all the new things

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Speaker 1: that they're reading on the internet about immigration, about ethnic people.

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Speaker 1: You know, all of that translates into real anger and

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Speaker 1: they internalize it and you know, their wires get crossed

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Speaker 1: and they're kind of like a powder keg. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: they're already primed and the alright, hatred is what light suffuse.

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Speaker 1: That's scary, It's terrifying. How much time would you spend online?

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Speaker 1: It depended on the day. I mean I would normally

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Speaker 1: get home from school and then spend about three or

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Speaker 1: four hours online. So you really did get sort of

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Speaker 1: sucked into a vortex. That's a lot of time. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean it adds up to you know, after a

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Speaker 1: couple of weeks, you've spent days online on those subredit's already,

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Speaker 1: and that amount of time is already detrimental. How did

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Speaker 1: what you heard sam impact your your relationships or how

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Speaker 1: you acted with friends or at school? It alienated me

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Speaker 1: amongst friend groups because again, you know, my school was

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Speaker 1: fairly liberal, you know, my new school at least, and

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Speaker 1: then all my friends shared those viewpoints. So me saying,

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Speaker 1: you know, like immigration is out of control, that would

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Speaker 1: alienate me amongst my friends, amongst my teachers. Even so,

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Speaker 1: it would just drive me deeper and deeper and deeper

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Speaker 1: into isolation, which in turn led to more Internet time

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Speaker 1: because I wanted to talk to people because you you

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Speaker 1: were lonely, yeah, I mean, above everything else, lonely. Did

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Speaker 1: you feel you were targeted in some ways that once

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Speaker 1: you showed up in this place that people were enticing

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Speaker 1: you to kind of get deeper and deeper into it.

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Speaker 1: Do you feel like your groom. Yeah, a little bit, honestly.

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Speaker 1: I mean the people there were really, really, really insist

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Speaker 1: on their strict set of beliefs, which is immigration is bad,

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Speaker 1: women lie about rape. Uh, you know, black people commit

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Speaker 1: more crimes, black people are violent, that kind of stuff. There.

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Speaker 1: They were so insistent on those beliefs that it felt

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Speaker 1: like I was being brainwashed. And I liked it because

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Speaker 1: it meant that people, you know, I was able to talk.

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Speaker 1: I was able to tell them my beliefs and tell

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Speaker 1: them my take on these issues. I would say like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: you know, women do lie about rape because this happened

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Speaker 1: to me, and I'm proof that this is the truth.

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Speaker 1: And then they would, you know, they would eat that

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Speaker 1: shipped up completely. They would love it, you know, just

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Speaker 1: to hear that. And so they felt like they had

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Speaker 1: a receptive audience. And you definitely they thought that I

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Speaker 1: was an adult for a while, which I loved. I

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Speaker 1: loved feeling like an adult and feeling like my voice mattered.

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Speaker 1: Was there a turning point did you say these people

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Speaker 1: are assholes. Yeah, I mean it was gradual French Sam, Oh,

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Speaker 1: don't worry about it. You've heard it before, I'm sure,

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Speaker 1: especially on the internet. It was gradual, like I got

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Speaker 1: in gradually and kind of got out gradually as well.

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Speaker 1: In September two thousand seventeen, a little over a month

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Speaker 1: after Charlottesville, Sam convinced his mom to take him to

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Speaker 1: the so called Mother of All rallies in d C,

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Speaker 1: a gathering of right wing groups ranging from arden Trump

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Speaker 1: supporters to far right fascists. You'd think that finally meeting

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Speaker 1: his heroes offline would only reinforce Sam's views, but ironically

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Speaker 1: it was those face to face interactions that made him

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Speaker 1: have second thoughts. So he went and I was like

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Speaker 1: talking to some of the all right people, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of them were insane, like they were crazy people,

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Speaker 1: Like one guy had an iron cross on his lapel

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Speaker 1: and then had a like an anarchist cookbook and was

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Speaker 1: talking about how he was an anarchist but he supported Trump,

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Speaker 1: which it doesn't make sense. It's ridiculous, But he kept

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Speaker 1: trying to justify it with his own you know, with

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Speaker 1: his own reasoning that he made up. And it made

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Speaker 1: no sense. That was the first time I finally saw

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Speaker 1: that the people of the alt right had no idea

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Speaker 1: what the hell they were talking about. And then from

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Speaker 1: there on that kind of planted the seed in my

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Speaker 1: brain that grew, you know, to think like, hey, maybe

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Speaker 1: I should, you know, stop doing this. Maybe I should

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Speaker 1: focus more on school. Maybe I shouldn't try to isolate

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Speaker 1: myself among my friends, you know, maybe I should try

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Speaker 1: to make a name for myself. So I eventually got

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Speaker 1: out just through time. You just stopped going there. I

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Speaker 1: just gradually stopped going on the internet, you know. I

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Speaker 1: went on less and less and less every day until

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Speaker 1: it I was not on the hateful sub credits at

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Speaker 1: all anymore. I wanted to get Sam's mom's take on

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Speaker 1: what it was like watching her son go from a

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Speaker 1: carefree kid to an angering member of the growing far right,

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Speaker 1: so I asked her to join us for the second

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Speaker 1: part of our conversation. When you first realized that saying

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Speaker 1: Am was doing this, what was your reaction, I mean,

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Speaker 1: how did you process it? It was a really scary time.

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Speaker 1: Sam is someone who we had raised from day one

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Speaker 1: to be a very empathetic kid, and everyone had always

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Speaker 1: commented on how he seemed like an old soul. Hey,

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Speaker 1: even his kindergarten teacher couldn't believe how well he related

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Speaker 1: to other people and saw other perspectives. He was the

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Speaker 1: kid that every other kid went to in class when

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Speaker 1: they were hurt or when they needed a friend. He

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Speaker 1: was that person. And so to watch this transformation, I mean,

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Speaker 1: it was as if he had a total personality transplant.

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Speaker 1: How did you realize that this was going on. We

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Speaker 1: have dinner together every night as a family, and do

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Speaker 1: you just have one child. We have a daughter as well,

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Speaker 1: who's younger than Sam, And and that actually is part

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Speaker 1: of the story, because we we had dinner every night

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Speaker 1: as a family, and we always talked through the day

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Speaker 1: and you know, little little things and big things. And

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Speaker 1: I noticed that Sam started to talk about really odd issues,

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Speaker 1: such as there is no wage gap between men and women.

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Speaker 1: So he was thirteen years old. We're at the dinner

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Speaker 1: table talking about our day, and he's talking about how

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Speaker 1: the wage gap is a fallacy his words. And our daughter,

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Speaker 1: who's younger but it is already a very ardent feminist,

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Speaker 1: would argue with him about that. And we'd had such

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Speaker 1: a happy, peaceful family and the two of them are

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Speaker 1: were in our best friends, and so it would they

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Speaker 1: would fight about it, and we were just left scratching

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Speaker 1: our heads thinking where did this issue of the wage

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Speaker 1: gap fallacy even come from? It was never anything we

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Speaker 1: had talked about. So did you ask him where are

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Speaker 1: you getting these ideas? Well? Yeah, and he said, well

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Speaker 1: I read about it online and he wanted to talk

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Speaker 1: about it, and he felt like he was educating us.

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Speaker 1: He was really excited to be discovering all this new information,

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Speaker 1: and I think because we had always been the people

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Speaker 1: to tell him things, he was thrilled now to have

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Speaker 1: new in for nation that we didn't have and to

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Speaker 1: be able to tell it to us. So, I mean,

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Speaker 1: it was the wage gap, it was stuff about the

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Speaker 1: Second Amendment. It was a ton of stuff about you know,

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Speaker 1: women lying about rape, and it was very jarring because

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Speaker 1: it was nothing we had ever been led to expect

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Speaker 1: that our kid would um parent. Do you think that

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Speaker 1: the people online saw an opening in because of Sam's

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Speaker 1: personal experience at his other school. Well, what what I

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Speaker 1: read about when I started finally looking into it and

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00:18:35,440 --> 00:18:38,760
Speaker 1: seeing what a problem we really had is that, you know,

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Speaker 1: the people in these white supremacist communities prey on depressed, vulnerable,

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Speaker 1: isolated kids, and they knew what to look for um,

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Speaker 1: and they saw that in him. And we saw he

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Speaker 1: was lonely. He didn't say he was lonely, but we

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Speaker 1: saw he had no friends. We just figured it's going

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Speaker 1: to take time, you know. And when he complained about

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Speaker 1: the kids at his new school, we said, it's going

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Speaker 1: to take time, like over and over, because that's what

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Speaker 1: you say as a parent. It's going to be okay.

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Speaker 1: But that's not what the people online were telling him.

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Speaker 1: What were they say They were reacting in a much

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Speaker 1: more immediate way, saying, the people in your new school

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Speaker 1: don't have your back for whatever reason. That was what

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00:19:17,960 --> 00:19:21,400
Speaker 1: they were implying. And they were also implying, we are

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Speaker 1: the ones who have your back, and we're your real friends.

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Speaker 1: And and that resonated with him. And they knew that

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Speaker 1: three or four hours a day he was online. It

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Speaker 1: was actually I heard him say that too. It was

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Speaker 1: more than that. It was more than that because he

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Speaker 1: came home. You were online when you came home, and

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Speaker 1: then you went back online after dinner anything. That's what

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Speaker 1: I remember, because it was do you have an exact

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Speaker 1: time frame? I don't have an exact time frame, but

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Speaker 1: I do remember that when you became a moderator, you

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Speaker 1: had a quota that you had to fill, and that

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Speaker 1: was one of the things that actually added to your

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Speaker 1: stress at that time. Becau as as a moderator, you

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Speaker 1: have to spend a certain amount of time online. It's

365
00:20:04,760 --> 00:20:06,960
Speaker 1: not about time. It's more like you have a certain

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Speaker 1: amount of posts you have to approve a day. Um

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Speaker 1: so it would be I would have to approve like

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Speaker 1: a hundred posts a day or remove. So there's moderator actions,

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Speaker 1: and an action is removing or approving a post. You

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Speaker 1: sound like you're an amazing mom. So could you not

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Speaker 1: have said, I'm sorry, you can't be online like this,

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Speaker 1: you can't be talking to these people. I mean, I

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Speaker 1: didn't understand at the time what was going on. I

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Speaker 1: mean when when he told me he was a moderator,

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Speaker 1: he was so excited and proud and proud, and things

376
00:20:42,359 --> 00:20:45,800
Speaker 1: had been so rocky for such a long time that

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00:20:45,920 --> 00:20:49,879
Speaker 1: seeing him happy again made me happy. And I didn't

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Speaker 1: realize what this sub bread it was about. I hadn't

379
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Speaker 1: gone on it myself. Um, I thought it was just

380
00:20:56,119 --> 00:21:00,720
Speaker 1: about funny memes. In retrospect, there was so much that

381
00:21:00,800 --> 00:21:04,480
Speaker 1: I did that was wrong. When did you discover the

382
00:21:04,600 --> 00:21:09,040
Speaker 1: kind of hateful, horrible things that were being discussed. So

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Speaker 1: it started with the whole wage gap as a fallacy business,

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Speaker 1: and then it moved on to the Second Amendment. And

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Speaker 1: then when he started talking about women lying about rape,

386
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Speaker 1: obviously that was incredibly alarming. When he started parenting Jews

387
00:21:23,600 --> 00:21:28,280
Speaker 1: run all the financial networks in the world, that really

388
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Speaker 1: helped us see how far gone he was. I mean,

389
00:21:31,400 --> 00:21:34,520
Speaker 1: it's it's one thing to set out on his own

390
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Speaker 1: like political journey. And we did for a while think, well,

391
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Speaker 1: maybe he's just maybe he just has a conservative mindset,

392
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Speaker 1: like that's not a crime. He's not like us. But

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Speaker 1: that's okay. You know, there's merit to both sides. Maybe

394
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Speaker 1: he's sort of like an Alex P. Keaton conservative. That

395
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Speaker 1: was like my frame of reference, the Alex P. Keaton

396
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Speaker 1: of our family. Um. And but when he started, you know,

397
00:22:00,359 --> 00:22:03,240
Speaker 1: parroting anti Semitic statements, I realized it was it was

398
00:22:03,280 --> 00:22:05,760
Speaker 1: way more than that. And so that was when we

399
00:22:05,800 --> 00:22:09,800
Speaker 1: started taking things a lot more seriously and engaging on

400
00:22:09,840 --> 00:22:14,800
Speaker 1: a more serious level. I can't believe you went to

401
00:22:14,880 --> 00:22:18,600
Speaker 1: this mother of all rallies. It took a lot of convincing.

402
00:22:18,840 --> 00:22:22,720
Speaker 1: I mean, what did you think when you I got

403
00:22:22,800 --> 00:22:28,520
Speaker 1: there and you saw these people, these very fine people.

404
00:22:29,680 --> 00:22:32,280
Speaker 1: I was there for one reason and one reason alone,

405
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Speaker 1: and that was to try to show Sam, by actually

406
00:22:36,440 --> 00:22:39,760
Speaker 1: being there, that I I would be his partner in

407
00:22:39,840 --> 00:22:44,080
Speaker 1: this um not in in believing these beliefs, but in

408
00:22:44,440 --> 00:22:48,440
Speaker 1: having these discussions. And he saw for himself. I mean,

409
00:22:48,480 --> 00:22:51,520
Speaker 1: that was what was so amazing about this whole experience

410
00:22:51,640 --> 00:22:55,359
Speaker 1: is that he did see, by being there himself, that

411
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Speaker 1: that these people don't have a leg to stand on.

412
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Speaker 1: I always tried to get through to him that if

413
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Speaker 1: you're going to have an opinion, you need to meet

414
00:23:03,480 --> 00:23:05,320
Speaker 1: the people, You need to talk to the people, you

415
00:23:05,359 --> 00:23:07,920
Speaker 1: need to see things with your own eyes. And that's

416
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Speaker 1: what this was. He saw it with his own eyes,

417
00:23:10,800 --> 00:23:14,679
Speaker 1: and his mind was changed. You're lucky because I imagine

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Speaker 1: that there are a lot of young people who do

419
00:23:18,280 --> 00:23:26,000
Speaker 1: not have the wherewithal to reject this philosophy and to

420
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Speaker 1: basically see that it's wrong. I mean, do you ever

421
00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:35,879
Speaker 1: think about what would have happened if if Sam hadn't

422
00:23:35,960 --> 00:23:38,600
Speaker 1: had this epiphany. A lot of people wrote in both

423
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Speaker 1: to the WASHINGTONY and also on Twitter, and a lot

424
00:23:41,680 --> 00:23:46,040
Speaker 1: of the conversations were from parents whose kids had gone

425
00:23:46,720 --> 00:23:49,800
Speaker 1: all the way in terms of the white supremacy movement

426
00:23:49,920 --> 00:23:54,800
Speaker 1: and didn't come back and they were estranged and and

427
00:23:55,200 --> 00:23:57,960
Speaker 1: I saw that over and over again after my article

428
00:23:58,040 --> 00:24:00,760
Speaker 1: was published, and I just felt again how lucky we

429
00:24:00,760 --> 00:24:03,080
Speaker 1: were that it worked out the way it did. And

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Speaker 1: I think some of that has to do with the

431
00:24:04,800 --> 00:24:08,040
Speaker 1: fact that um Sam was so young when it all happened.

432
00:24:08,080 --> 00:24:10,480
Speaker 1: He didn't, for example, he couldn't like go out and

433
00:24:10,480 --> 00:24:13,480
Speaker 1: get his own apartment, you know, he was under our roof,

434
00:24:13,720 --> 00:24:16,439
Speaker 1: and I think that helped bring him back into the fold.

435
00:24:16,800 --> 00:24:20,200
Speaker 1: I think that I couldn't go to events myself also right,

436
00:24:20,640 --> 00:24:25,280
Speaker 1: And also you had a mom who was learning but

437
00:24:25,440 --> 00:24:28,720
Speaker 1: also presenting a counterpoint. Definitely. I think a lot of

438
00:24:28,720 --> 00:24:31,359
Speaker 1: the parents that have kids like that, you know, immediately

439
00:24:31,400 --> 00:24:33,800
Speaker 1: go the your insane route like you did at first,

440
00:24:33,840 --> 00:24:37,560
Speaker 1: and never change that route. But they don't realize that

441
00:24:37,600 --> 00:24:39,480
Speaker 1: if you tell a kid no, they're just gonna want

442
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:42,240
Speaker 1: something more, I mean, more than anything else. I think

443
00:24:42,280 --> 00:24:43,960
Speaker 1: that's the case with a lot of things. What do

444
00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:46,679
Speaker 1: you think should be done about this? If I already

445
00:24:46,680 --> 00:24:48,600
Speaker 1: given advice to a kid that was going through something

446
00:24:48,640 --> 00:24:51,240
Speaker 1: like this, I would say that no one ever tells

447
00:24:51,280 --> 00:24:53,560
Speaker 1: you something to be your friend, and that they only

448
00:24:54,040 --> 00:24:55,760
Speaker 1: or at least a lot of the times it's not

449
00:24:55,840 --> 00:24:58,560
Speaker 1: the case, and that when you read something in the news,

450
00:24:58,800 --> 00:25:03,040
Speaker 1: there's a definitive yes, and you need to source your information.

451
00:25:03,600 --> 00:25:05,399
Speaker 1: You need to find out where it's coming from. The

452
00:25:05,440 --> 00:25:07,879
Speaker 1: thing that I do now is I'll read something from

453
00:25:07,880 --> 00:25:10,640
Speaker 1: a conservative news site, and I'll read something from a

454
00:25:10,760 --> 00:25:13,280
Speaker 1: very liberal news site, and I'll compare facts and I'll

455
00:25:13,320 --> 00:25:15,720
Speaker 1: compile the information that has shared in both of those

456
00:25:15,760 --> 00:25:17,679
Speaker 1: and to me, that is the full story. That's a

457
00:25:17,720 --> 00:25:19,960
Speaker 1: lot of work, isn't it. I feel like it's worth

458
00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:22,560
Speaker 1: it in the long run. I mean, even if it

459
00:25:22,600 --> 00:25:24,520
Speaker 1: takes time, it's a good thing to find out the

460
00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:29,119
Speaker 1: entire story. How scary is it to think that people

461
00:25:29,160 --> 00:25:35,040
Speaker 1: are being radicalized online and then they are going out

462
00:25:35,520 --> 00:25:39,800
Speaker 1: and in some cases, as we've seen, killing scores of

463
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:46,520
Speaker 1: people as a result of this indoctrination. It's really scary

464
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:49,080
Speaker 1: for me because, you know, over everything else, I could

465
00:25:49,119 --> 00:25:50,720
Speaker 1: have been one of those people if I had gone

466
00:25:50,720 --> 00:25:53,679
Speaker 1: down the path, if I had gone down further, you know,

467
00:25:53,760 --> 00:25:57,920
Speaker 1: anyone has the capability to be radicalized fully, and I'm

468
00:25:57,920 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 1: no exception of that. No one's an exception of that.

469
00:26:02,440 --> 00:26:05,760
Speaker 1: Sam's story was shocking. After all, If a kid from

470
00:26:05,760 --> 00:26:09,200
Speaker 1: a stable home and a progressive Jewish family at that

471
00:26:09,600 --> 00:26:14,640
Speaker 1: could find himself identifying with white nationalists, what exactly does

472
00:26:14,680 --> 00:26:17,440
Speaker 1: that say about the power of this movement to draw

473
00:26:17,600 --> 00:26:23,360
Speaker 1: people in. Up next, an expert explains how widespread far

474
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:41,359
Speaker 1: right online radicalization has become. I'm here with Keegan Hankus

475
00:26:41,359 --> 00:26:45,560
Speaker 1: of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project. Keegan and

476
00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:50,520
Speaker 1: his team closely monitor right wing extremists online. Again, I

477
00:26:50,600 --> 00:26:53,280
Speaker 1: know that you keep a close eye on these communities

478
00:26:53,359 --> 00:26:56,720
Speaker 1: and what's going on in these circles. So how and

479
00:26:56,800 --> 00:27:00,639
Speaker 1: where exactly are these people congregating online and what is

480
00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:05,240
Speaker 1: it about these spaces that makes them so appealing to them? Well,

481
00:27:05,320 --> 00:27:08,560
Speaker 1: the modern hate movement is really marked by a lot

482
00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:11,439
Speaker 1: of internet and online activity at this point. So we

483
00:27:11,520 --> 00:27:13,880
Speaker 1: see a lot of these communities cropping up across all

484
00:27:13,920 --> 00:27:17,200
Speaker 1: of the same major social media platforms that all of

485
00:27:17,200 --> 00:27:19,720
Speaker 1: those us in our everyday lives, but we also see

486
00:27:19,760 --> 00:27:24,520
Speaker 1: them trailing off into more disparate and more underground online

487
00:27:24,560 --> 00:27:27,520
Speaker 1: spaces as well, especially as more pressure has been put

488
00:27:27,520 --> 00:27:30,480
Speaker 1: on them in recent years. I know a huge part

489
00:27:30,520 --> 00:27:33,959
Speaker 1: of the appeal I understand is the use of humor

490
00:27:34,040 --> 00:27:37,520
Speaker 1: and irony and memes. How does that play into this?

491
00:27:38,280 --> 00:27:42,960
Speaker 1: That's exactly right. Humor, irony, memes, other forms of visual propaganda,

492
00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:46,879
Speaker 1: video and audio propaganda tremendously important. There's a whole cottage

493
00:27:46,920 --> 00:27:49,720
Speaker 1: industry in the racist movement around this. I think a

494
00:27:49,760 --> 00:27:52,399
Speaker 1: lot of this has to do with this culture that

495
00:27:52,440 --> 00:27:55,640
Speaker 1: they're building for themselves. There's a very intentional project going

496
00:27:55,680 --> 00:27:58,840
Speaker 1: on across these movements to build content that's going to

497
00:27:58,920 --> 00:28:01,879
Speaker 1: keep people engaged, is going to keep pushing people towards

498
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:06,439
Speaker 1: more extreme beliefs. And they also then claim, you know,

499
00:28:06,560 --> 00:28:09,919
Speaker 1: plausible deniability and say, oh, we were just kidding around,

500
00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:13,480
Speaker 1: we thought this was funny. If they get busted, yeah,

501
00:28:13,560 --> 00:28:16,720
Speaker 1: you frequently see people say, oh, I was just being

502
00:28:16,800 --> 00:28:19,760
Speaker 1: quote edgy, or this was just humor that was taken

503
00:28:19,760 --> 00:28:22,159
Speaker 1: out of context. I think what's notable is that a

504
00:28:22,200 --> 00:28:25,840
Speaker 1: lot of these communities are built around these uh this activity.

505
00:28:25,960 --> 00:28:27,920
Speaker 1: So if you think about a platform like h Chan,

506
00:28:28,520 --> 00:28:30,760
Speaker 1: which we've seen a number of manifesto show up on

507
00:28:30,880 --> 00:28:34,680
Speaker 1: in the last year or so. Um these communities, it's

508
00:28:34,680 --> 00:28:37,320
Speaker 1: more common to see death threats and in a joking

509
00:28:37,359 --> 00:28:39,840
Speaker 1: and almost presented as an ironic manner, than it is

510
00:28:39,880 --> 00:28:44,000
Speaker 1: to not see them. I spoke with Keegan in September,

511
00:28:44,120 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 1: about six weeks after the El Paso shooting. Following El

512
00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:52,080
Speaker 1: Paso and christ Church and pow Way, there was talk

513
00:28:52,120 --> 00:28:55,360
Speaker 1: of shutting down eight chan, the site where all three

514
00:28:55,360 --> 00:29:00,400
Speaker 1: shooters posted violently racist manifestos. Ah Chan went dark for

515
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,080
Speaker 1: several months as it struggled to find a company willing

516
00:29:03,120 --> 00:29:06,280
Speaker 1: to host it, but re emerged on the so called

517
00:29:06,520 --> 00:29:11,920
Speaker 1: clearnet in November as the rebranded eight coon. Keegan told

518
00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:15,480
Speaker 1: me more about how the site works h chan. I

519
00:29:15,480 --> 00:29:18,280
Speaker 1: would first describe it as probably one of the darkest

520
00:29:18,520 --> 00:29:21,240
Speaker 1: and grimmest places on the Internet, particularly some of the

521
00:29:21,280 --> 00:29:25,520
Speaker 1: boards that are dedicated to politics and more specifically to extremism.

522
00:29:26,080 --> 00:29:28,600
Speaker 1: It's an image board that has some text in it,

523
00:29:28,640 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: and this is content that's basically organized in threads and

524
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:35,520
Speaker 1: is almost always dedicated to some form of extremism. There

525
00:29:35,520 --> 00:29:38,200
Speaker 1: are participants from all across the world, especially in the

526
00:29:38,240 --> 00:29:41,400
Speaker 1: last year, so what we've seen is basically cheerleading on

527
00:29:41,400 --> 00:29:45,000
Speaker 1: this site around massive violence. What's the difference between eight

528
00:29:45,120 --> 00:29:48,000
Speaker 1: chan and four chan? They're very very similar. H chan

529
00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:51,800
Speaker 1: it was designed to be an even more extreme version

530
00:29:51,960 --> 00:29:54,680
Speaker 1: of four chan. It's four Chan with even fewer rules

531
00:29:54,720 --> 00:29:59,520
Speaker 1: around moderation. Almost no content at its inception was taken

532
00:29:59,560 --> 00:30:01,800
Speaker 1: off of h N. We've seen that change a little bit,

533
00:30:01,880 --> 00:30:03,680
Speaker 1: especially as there's been a lot of attention put on

534
00:30:03,720 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 1: the site for the number of manifestoes that have been

535
00:30:05,600 --> 00:30:09,440
Speaker 1: posted there. But it is very uncommon for content to

536
00:30:09,480 --> 00:30:12,280
Speaker 1: be taken down no matter how extreme. Do you worry

537
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:16,600
Speaker 1: about shutting down these sites that they'll go further underground

538
00:30:17,320 --> 00:30:23,640
Speaker 1: and be harder to monitor by law enforcement and other authorities. Well,

539
00:30:23,680 --> 00:30:26,040
Speaker 1: the first thing I would point out is that sites

540
00:30:26,080 --> 00:30:28,880
Speaker 1: like h N are already incredibly difficult for law enforcement

541
00:30:28,880 --> 00:30:32,960
Speaker 1: to monitor. The posters are almost always anonymous. It requires

542
00:30:33,400 --> 00:30:37,080
Speaker 1: a heavy investigative lift to go and unravel some of

543
00:30:37,080 --> 00:30:40,360
Speaker 1: these threads as they're happening. Um, so it's already a

544
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:43,440
Speaker 1: really big problem. The bigger issue with the site like

545
00:30:43,680 --> 00:30:46,160
Speaker 1: HN being online is that it's well known and it's

546
00:30:46,280 --> 00:30:49,120
Speaker 1: very notorious, and that people know to go there to

547
00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:52,120
Speaker 1: look for this type of content. It has a wide audience,

548
00:30:52,680 --> 00:30:55,000
Speaker 1: so whenever I get asked about, you know, the danger

549
00:30:55,040 --> 00:30:58,720
Speaker 1: of driving this content further underground, I actually propose an

550
00:30:58,760 --> 00:31:01,960
Speaker 1: idea more akin to containment. Right, we should be striving

551
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:04,600
Speaker 1: to make this content as hard to find as possible,

552
00:31:04,640 --> 00:31:07,640
Speaker 1: because you are then limiting the potential pool of people

553
00:31:07,640 --> 00:31:10,360
Speaker 1: who may be susceptible to its messaging. So you'd be

554
00:31:10,440 --> 00:31:13,440
Speaker 1: okay to have it go into sort of the darkest

555
00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:16,480
Speaker 1: corner of the dark web. Absolutely. It also makes it

556
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:18,840
Speaker 1: easier for researchers like myself and my colleagues of the

557
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:22,840
Speaker 1: SPLC to track these communities. We follow these extremes wherever

558
00:31:22,880 --> 00:31:25,480
Speaker 1: they go, and there's this interesting tension in the hate

559
00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:29,280
Speaker 1: movement where they can never go entirely underground. So if

560
00:31:29,280 --> 00:31:32,120
Speaker 1: your entire project is based around the idea that doing

561
00:31:32,160 --> 00:31:35,720
Speaker 1: nothing or not bringing more followers into your movement means

562
00:31:35,760 --> 00:31:37,720
Speaker 1: extinction for white people, which is what many of these

563
00:31:37,720 --> 00:31:41,800
Speaker 1: individuals believe, then you necessarily have to have some entry

564
00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:44,560
Speaker 1: points into it. Well, that brings me to the next question,

565
00:31:44,720 --> 00:31:48,120
Speaker 1: how do they convert people and how easy is it

566
00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:52,760
Speaker 1: for them to have access to vulnerable targets. Well, it

567
00:31:52,800 --> 00:31:56,280
Speaker 1: has become disturbingly more easy to find vulnerable targets. With

568
00:31:56,320 --> 00:31:58,880
Speaker 1: the rise of social media, in particular in the last

569
00:31:59,440 --> 00:32:01,680
Speaker 1: decade or so, as we've seen a lot of these

570
00:32:01,680 --> 00:32:05,280
Speaker 1: tech companies really drag their feet, uh to enact meaningful

571
00:32:05,320 --> 00:32:09,480
Speaker 1: policies and to enforce them against hate and extremism. One

572
00:32:09,520 --> 00:32:11,920
Speaker 1: of the things that they commonly do is go to

573
00:32:12,800 --> 00:32:15,600
Speaker 1: online spaces, whether it be on social media or certain

574
00:32:15,800 --> 00:32:18,080
Speaker 1: you know, right leaning news sites, where they know that

575
00:32:18,120 --> 00:32:21,160
Speaker 1: there are people who are near their ideological beliefs but

576
00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:24,240
Speaker 1: still part of the mainstream, and they will start using

577
00:32:24,360 --> 00:32:27,040
Speaker 1: very targeted propaganda to try to push them further and

578
00:32:27,080 --> 00:32:30,120
Speaker 1: further to the right. They call this red Heilene. Is

579
00:32:30,160 --> 00:32:33,880
Speaker 1: that right? Yeah, So that's common vernacular on a lot

580
00:32:33,920 --> 00:32:35,640
Speaker 1: of these sites and in a lot of these communities

581
00:32:35,680 --> 00:32:38,840
Speaker 1: for uh, you know, bringing someone into this set of

582
00:32:38,840 --> 00:32:42,200
Speaker 1: extremist beliefs. You know, it's it's reminiscent of the matrix

583
00:32:42,240 --> 00:32:44,080
Speaker 1: of course, right where you take this red pill and

584
00:32:44,120 --> 00:32:46,840
Speaker 1: suddenly you see reality for what it is. Do potential

585
00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:55,320
Speaker 1: recruits share anything in terms of demographics, geographics, socio economic backgrounds.

586
00:32:55,520 --> 00:32:57,920
Speaker 1: It's a really difficult question, and the reason for that

587
00:32:58,040 --> 00:33:00,560
Speaker 1: is it's really difficult to know just how many people

588
00:33:00,560 --> 00:33:03,239
Speaker 1: have been exposed to these beliefs. What we see, at

589
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:06,200
Speaker 1: least from monitoring the extremist groups themselves and their leaders,

590
00:33:06,240 --> 00:33:09,800
Speaker 1: is a really concerted effort to recruit young white men

591
00:33:09,840 --> 00:33:13,000
Speaker 1: into these movements. Uh. And there's a couple of mechanisms

592
00:33:13,000 --> 00:33:15,800
Speaker 1: that they used to do that. So one of those

593
00:33:15,880 --> 00:33:19,480
Speaker 1: is that they play up this narrative of basically declining

594
00:33:19,520 --> 00:33:21,840
Speaker 1: prospects for young white men. You know, they make a

595
00:33:21,960 --> 00:33:24,560
Speaker 1: narrative about you know, what's being taken from them, are

596
00:33:24,600 --> 00:33:27,440
Speaker 1: deprived for them, and they ascribe that to you know,

597
00:33:27,520 --> 00:33:31,280
Speaker 1: a target community, say it's this group's fault that you

598
00:33:31,280 --> 00:33:33,360
Speaker 1: did not get what you were expected, or this is

599
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:35,240
Speaker 1: the group that took what you thought you were owned,

600
00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:39,360
Speaker 1: and sort of grievance politics. Right, that's absolutely right. Do

601
00:33:39,400 --> 00:33:42,720
Speaker 1: you think the number of people who are gravitating towards

602
00:33:43,040 --> 00:33:47,360
Speaker 1: these groups has exploded? What role do you think external

603
00:33:47,400 --> 00:33:51,560
Speaker 1: factors are playing into this? I e. Political rhetoric that

604
00:33:51,640 --> 00:33:56,200
Speaker 1: we hear, the immigration debate, the whole focus on diversity

605
00:33:56,240 --> 00:34:00,280
Speaker 1: and inclusion in kind of all aspects of society, and

606
00:34:00,920 --> 00:34:04,240
Speaker 1: by the way, changing demographics. So it's interesting you actually

607
00:34:04,240 --> 00:34:07,160
Speaker 1: just named the three largest drivers that we point to

608
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:10,200
Speaker 1: when we explain that we listed the largest number of

609
00:34:10,200 --> 00:34:12,320
Speaker 1: hate groups that we've ever counted last year. You know,

610
00:34:12,360 --> 00:34:14,240
Speaker 1: there were a thousand and twenty of them in the country.

611
00:34:14,360 --> 00:34:17,400
Speaker 1: And in that number, we saw fifty rise in the

612
00:34:17,480 --> 00:34:20,480
Speaker 1: number of white nationalist groups. And when you're explaining or

613
00:34:20,520 --> 00:34:22,800
Speaker 1: when we are explaining how that happened, those are a

614
00:34:22,840 --> 00:34:25,600
Speaker 1: lot of the factors we point to. Demographic change is

615
00:34:25,640 --> 00:34:28,480
Speaker 1: absolutely the biggest driver of these groups and what is

616
00:34:28,520 --> 00:34:32,000
Speaker 1: giving them so much energy this tremendous anxiety about the

617
00:34:32,040 --> 00:34:34,640
Speaker 1: idea that you know, whites will no longer be an

618
00:34:34,640 --> 00:34:38,120
Speaker 1: absolute majority in this country. This rhetoric has been very

619
00:34:38,160 --> 00:34:41,880
Speaker 1: effective in driving people these movements, and it has coupled

620
00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:45,160
Speaker 1: really dangerously with a lot of the toxic political rhetoric

621
00:34:45,200 --> 00:34:47,759
Speaker 1: that we've seen from the halls of power, particularly the

622
00:34:47,760 --> 00:34:50,400
Speaker 1: White House in recent years. A lot of this anxiety

623
00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:53,279
Speaker 1: about immigration, for instances showing up in the manifestos of

624
00:34:53,320 --> 00:34:57,160
Speaker 1: mass shooters. Uh. And it is almost indistinguishable from some

625
00:34:57,200 --> 00:34:59,440
Speaker 1: of the statements we see from politicians when it comes

626
00:34:59,440 --> 00:35:01,640
Speaker 1: to the pres it in do you think that he

627
00:35:01,800 --> 00:35:07,280
Speaker 1: has made or sent implicit or explicit messages to these

628
00:35:07,640 --> 00:35:11,560
Speaker 1: very groups by saying things like they're very fine people

629
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:16,640
Speaker 1: on both sides, or just failing to criticize and come

630
00:35:16,719 --> 00:35:19,279
Speaker 1: out and say this is wrong. Well, he's done both.

631
00:35:19,280 --> 00:35:21,839
Speaker 1: I mean it's been explicit and implicit, and this is

632
00:35:21,880 --> 00:35:24,799
Speaker 1: obviously not lost on these communities. I mean they see

633
00:35:25,160 --> 00:35:27,840
Speaker 1: the president's language, whether they agree with him on every

634
00:35:27,840 --> 00:35:31,239
Speaker 1: issue or not, as the ultimate validation of their worldview.

635
00:35:31,560 --> 00:35:33,839
Speaker 1: What can be done about this, Well, there's a number

636
00:35:33,840 --> 00:35:35,880
Speaker 1: of things. I mean the first, at a high level,

637
00:35:35,960 --> 00:35:38,360
Speaker 1: especially when we're talking about this issue of radicalization and

638
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:41,440
Speaker 1: online spaces, you know, we need to demand more of

639
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:44,440
Speaker 1: the technology companies that play such a large role in

640
00:35:44,440 --> 00:35:49,280
Speaker 1: our lives. For instance, we should have meaningful policies banning

641
00:35:49,320 --> 00:35:53,280
Speaker 1: all of this content on every major social media platform,

642
00:35:53,320 --> 00:35:56,320
Speaker 1: and not only that, we expect them to enforce this stuff.

643
00:35:56,520 --> 00:35:58,680
Speaker 1: That is an easy first step, you know. One of

644
00:35:58,719 --> 00:36:00,560
Speaker 1: the other things that speaks to the drivers that you

645
00:36:00,600 --> 00:36:03,400
Speaker 1: brought up earlier, because you know, we as citizens and

646
00:36:03,440 --> 00:36:07,640
Speaker 1: voters need to be making forceful demands that politicians speak

647
00:36:07,680 --> 00:36:11,040
Speaker 1: out against hate and extremism, and also candidates should be

648
00:36:11,120 --> 00:36:14,520
Speaker 1: including these planks in their platforms. And the other piece

649
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:16,200
Speaker 1: of this is, you know, we need to find ways

650
00:36:16,200 --> 00:36:18,680
Speaker 1: of a civil society level to break down these feelings

651
00:36:18,680 --> 00:36:22,200
Speaker 1: of social isolation and really do more to counter what

652
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:26,120
Speaker 1: the racist hate groups have been so good at perpetuating,

653
00:36:26,120 --> 00:36:29,959
Speaker 1: which is this narrative that you know, demographic change and

654
00:36:30,040 --> 00:36:33,120
Speaker 1: diversity in this country and multiculturalism is somehow a threat

655
00:36:33,160 --> 00:36:36,960
Speaker 1: to white people. What about the free speech argument? I

656
00:36:36,960 --> 00:36:41,799
Speaker 1: know you mentioned social media and basically stopping this on

657
00:36:41,840 --> 00:36:46,759
Speaker 1: all platforms. You often hear the free speech argument and

658
00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:49,680
Speaker 1: this being a slippery slope, and I'm curious what your

659
00:36:49,719 --> 00:36:52,200
Speaker 1: reaction would be to that. Well, whenever I have the

660
00:36:52,200 --> 00:36:54,080
Speaker 1: free speech argument presented to me, I bring up a

661
00:36:54,080 --> 00:36:56,880
Speaker 1: couple of different points. You know, there's no one stopping

662
00:36:57,280 --> 00:36:59,560
Speaker 1: these individuals from going out on a street corner and

663
00:36:59,640 --> 00:37:03,080
Speaker 1: yelling racist slogans or trying to convince random passer bys

664
00:37:03,200 --> 00:37:06,359
Speaker 1: of their racism and you know, the truth in their

665
00:37:06,360 --> 00:37:09,440
Speaker 1: worldview as they would see it. However, the difference when

666
00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:11,160
Speaker 1: it comes to the social media companies, as these are

667
00:37:11,200 --> 00:37:16,080
Speaker 1: megaphones that are directed in every direction. Right, this is

668
00:37:16,120 --> 00:37:19,239
Speaker 1: just tremendous amplification for these ideas, and members of hate

669
00:37:19,280 --> 00:37:21,480
Speaker 1: groups and their leaders have proven that they're very good

670
00:37:21,480 --> 00:37:25,480
Speaker 1: at manipulating them. These companies have every right as private

671
00:37:25,520 --> 00:37:30,759
Speaker 1: institutions to set codes of conduct and acceptable use policies

672
00:37:31,280 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 1: against these ideas, and I would argue that many of them,

673
00:37:35,239 --> 00:37:37,719
Speaker 1: if not all of them, have a moral responsibility to

674
00:37:37,760 --> 00:37:40,399
Speaker 1: do so, given the consequences that we've watched play out

675
00:37:40,480 --> 00:37:43,000
Speaker 1: so many times. I would remind all of your listeners

676
00:37:43,000 --> 00:37:44,840
Speaker 1: that you know, what happened in christ Church, New Zealand

677
00:37:44,880 --> 00:37:48,239
Speaker 1: earlier this year is an absolute atrocity, and it's incredibly

678
00:37:48,280 --> 00:37:53,359
Speaker 1: disheartening and was powered by Facebook's live broadcasting mechanisms. The

679
00:37:53,400 --> 00:37:55,400
Speaker 1: fact that that was even allowed to happen and the

680
00:37:55,640 --> 00:37:59,280
Speaker 1: devastating impact that we watched it have across the world,

681
00:37:59,800 --> 00:38:02,160
Speaker 1: UH is a problem in and of itself. So there's

682
00:38:02,160 --> 00:38:03,640
Speaker 1: a lot of work to be done. You know. One

683
00:38:03,680 --> 00:38:05,520
Speaker 1: of the things that we would expect from these companies,

684
00:38:05,680 --> 00:38:08,920
Speaker 1: and these are two concrete suggestions, is you know, we

685
00:38:08,960 --> 00:38:11,480
Speaker 1: want them to be much more transparent about the activity

686
00:38:11,480 --> 00:38:14,880
Speaker 1: of extremists on their platforms, and especially making that data

687
00:38:14,920 --> 00:38:18,279
Speaker 1: available to outside academics and researchers who study this so

688
00:38:18,280 --> 00:38:20,880
Speaker 1: that they can try to find new ways to combat it.

689
00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:24,440
Speaker 1: The other is, and this especially speaks to for instance,

690
00:38:24,480 --> 00:38:27,280
Speaker 1: Facebook Live and the role it played in New Zealand. Um,

691
00:38:27,320 --> 00:38:30,000
Speaker 1: whenever they're rolling out products, we should be testing them

692
00:38:30,000 --> 00:38:33,359
Speaker 1: against civil rights concerns as opposed to just solely looking

693
00:38:33,360 --> 00:38:34,840
Speaker 1: at how much money we can make from them in

694
00:38:34,840 --> 00:38:38,719
Speaker 1: the consequences of not rolling them out quickly. You are

695
00:38:38,920 --> 00:38:43,960
Speaker 1: offering some great suggestions, But when you really think about it,

696
00:38:44,920 --> 00:38:49,520
Speaker 1: do you think, Hgan, that this can be controlled or

697
00:38:49,719 --> 00:38:52,640
Speaker 1: is it just too hard to get a handle on this.

698
00:38:53,280 --> 00:38:55,880
Speaker 1: I think it's too important and the consequences are too

699
00:38:55,960 --> 00:38:59,279
Speaker 1: devastating not to try. And I think there's some obvious

700
00:38:59,800 --> 00:39:02,520
Speaker 1: in easy steps for us to begin taking to go

701
00:39:02,600 --> 00:39:06,400
Speaker 1: down this path. Um. Whether we ultimately succeed, we'll have

702
00:39:06,480 --> 00:39:10,120
Speaker 1: to see. Um. But I just can't accept that the

703
00:39:10,600 --> 00:39:13,200
Speaker 1: normal and regular pace of life is now going to

704
00:39:13,239 --> 00:39:15,480
Speaker 1: be that we're going to see these violent actions taking

705
00:39:15,480 --> 00:39:17,960
Speaker 1: place over and over again in our society. It's I mean,

706
00:39:18,000 --> 00:39:21,480
Speaker 1: it's just devastating to watch and for you, just unacceptable,

707
00:39:21,640 --> 00:39:27,759
Speaker 1: absolutely unacceptable, well should be for everyone. Up next, we'll

708
00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:31,719
Speaker 1: hear from someone who understands exactly what it takes to

709
00:39:32,000 --> 00:39:37,240
Speaker 1: leave extremism behind, an ex neo Nazi who was able

710
00:39:37,280 --> 00:39:45,920
Speaker 1: to turn her life around Angela Hi. It's Katie Curic.

711
00:39:45,960 --> 00:39:49,719
Speaker 1: How are you, I'm well, thank you? How are you today?

712
00:39:49,760 --> 00:39:52,600
Speaker 1: I'm good. Thing. We've talked a lot about how online

713
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:56,799
Speaker 1: radicalization works, but experts in this field also talk a

714
00:39:56,840 --> 00:39:59,919
Speaker 1: lot about what it takes to do you radicalize someone.

715
00:40:00,680 --> 00:40:04,120
Speaker 1: Angela King, a former neo Nazi, has devoted her life

716
00:40:04,360 --> 00:40:08,920
Speaker 1: to doing just that. Her organization Life After Hate, helps

717
00:40:08,960 --> 00:40:15,040
Speaker 1: people disavow far right extremism. Do you believe the radicalization

718
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:19,200
Speaker 1: process today is fundamentally different than it was when you

719
00:40:19,239 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 1: were younger? Fundamentally no, just more streamlined, and individuals have

720
00:40:26,719 --> 00:40:31,160
Speaker 1: the ability to now become radicalized completely online rather than

721
00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:35,799
Speaker 1: in face to face meetings. How did your radicalization happen? Well?

722
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:42,040
Speaker 1: I was raised in South Florida in a household that

723
00:40:43,080 --> 00:40:45,400
Speaker 1: there's no easy way to say it. I was taught

724
00:40:45,520 --> 00:40:49,480
Speaker 1: racism and homophobia from as early as I can remember,

725
00:40:49,640 --> 00:40:53,800
Speaker 1: from my parents and my family, and by the time

726
00:40:53,880 --> 00:40:58,719
Speaker 1: I was an adolescent, I was angry. I had been bullied.

727
00:40:59,280 --> 00:41:04,800
Speaker 1: I was very vulnerable, and when I ran into other

728
00:41:05,360 --> 00:41:08,560
Speaker 1: UH kids my age who were already involved in the

729
00:41:08,640 --> 00:41:11,440
Speaker 1: violence far right, it wasn't a great weak for me

730
00:41:11,560 --> 00:41:17,759
Speaker 1: to become involved. I happen to have ingredients in my

731
00:41:17,840 --> 00:41:23,520
Speaker 1: life and experiences that led to a very negative recipe.

732
00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:28,440
Speaker 1: Let's call it so. You know, I had familial racism

733
00:41:28,480 --> 00:41:33,440
Speaker 1: and homophobia that certainly socialized me in a way to

734
00:41:33,560 --> 00:41:36,200
Speaker 1: think that I was better than others and that that

735
00:41:36,320 --> 00:41:40,319
Speaker 1: kind of behavior and thinking was acceptable. But I was

736
00:41:40,360 --> 00:41:45,920
Speaker 1: also vulnerable. I went through um in acute identity crisis

737
00:41:46,000 --> 00:41:49,400
Speaker 1: at a very young age because of what I was

738
00:41:49,440 --> 00:41:53,600
Speaker 1: exposed to at home and some experiences. I was bullied

739
00:41:53,920 --> 00:41:59,640
Speaker 1: both verbally and physically, and I buckled under that pressure.

740
00:42:00,120 --> 00:42:05,320
Speaker 1: You know, I I honestly felt that my pain emotionally

741
00:42:05,400 --> 00:42:09,640
Speaker 1: and mentally was so intense I could not hold it

742
00:42:09,760 --> 00:42:13,080
Speaker 1: on my own. And it's only in retrospect that I'm

743
00:42:13,120 --> 00:42:18,160
Speaker 1: able to see that as this vulnerable young person that

744
00:42:18,320 --> 00:42:21,560
Speaker 1: was struggling and in so much pain, I tried to

745
00:42:22,200 --> 00:42:28,440
Speaker 1: literally beat my pain into other people. That's really difficult

746
00:42:29,160 --> 00:42:32,759
Speaker 1: to come to terms with. But it's even more difficult

747
00:42:32,840 --> 00:42:36,359
Speaker 1: to see the very same things happening to an even

748
00:42:36,440 --> 00:42:39,319
Speaker 1: larger scale to our young people today. There's a lot

749
00:42:39,360 --> 00:42:43,560
Speaker 1: of fear, and I feel like anger has its roots

750
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:46,799
Speaker 1: and fear one of the big factors that I think

751
00:42:46,880 --> 00:42:52,239
Speaker 1: is contributing to an increase in and extremism and far

752
00:42:52,360 --> 00:42:58,880
Speaker 1: right extremism in particular, is changing demographics. It will be

753
00:42:58,960 --> 00:43:05,480
Speaker 1: a majority minority population. Absolutely. Communities or groups who are

754
00:43:05,680 --> 00:43:10,120
Speaker 1: used to being in positions of power and affluence are

755
00:43:10,360 --> 00:43:14,319
Speaker 1: losing those positions or feeling like they're about to lose them.

756
00:43:14,680 --> 00:43:18,200
Speaker 1: What is terrible is that we are a society that

757
00:43:18,360 --> 00:43:22,760
Speaker 1: is so quick to say this is mine, I'm not sharing,

758
00:43:22,840 --> 00:43:26,280
Speaker 1: you're not taking this from me, instead of sitting down

759
00:43:26,440 --> 00:43:31,240
Speaker 1: and allowing ourselves to be vulnerable and allowing ourselves to say, hey,

760
00:43:31,360 --> 00:43:34,680
Speaker 1: I'm worried about this. There's nothing wrong with being worried

761
00:43:34,719 --> 00:43:39,919
Speaker 1: about the future, but when we allow that to translate

762
00:43:40,040 --> 00:43:45,760
Speaker 1: into violence or into dehumanization. We always talk about learning

763
00:43:45,880 --> 00:43:49,840
Speaker 1: from the past and learning from history. It is becoming

764
00:43:49,960 --> 00:43:54,400
Speaker 1: clear on a daily basis to me that those lessons

765
00:43:54,840 --> 00:43:58,719
Speaker 1: are almost blocked. You know, I don't know if you

766
00:43:59,400 --> 00:44:03,600
Speaker 1: have seen or heard about any of the polls asking

767
00:44:03,680 --> 00:44:08,440
Speaker 1: something as simple as or measuring, you know, people's knowledge

768
00:44:08,440 --> 00:44:13,439
Speaker 1: about something like the Holocaust. That history is slipping away.

769
00:44:13,560 --> 00:44:18,920
Speaker 1: And that's terrifying. When you look back at your own journey,

770
00:44:19,160 --> 00:44:22,879
Speaker 1: was there a turning point when did you say this

771
00:44:22,960 --> 00:44:26,759
Speaker 1: is wrong, I can't do this anymore. This isn't me.

772
00:44:27,200 --> 00:44:32,879
Speaker 1: It took me almost a decade before I had that epiphany.

773
00:44:33,400 --> 00:44:37,560
Speaker 1: I was nineteen. Oh gosh, I just gave my age away.

774
00:44:37,920 --> 00:44:42,160
Speaker 1: I was nineteen when the Oklahoma City bombing happened. I

775
00:44:42,200 --> 00:44:45,960
Speaker 1: had already been involved in the violent far right for years,

776
00:44:46,160 --> 00:44:51,080
Speaker 1: and that was the first thing that I really remember

777
00:44:51,400 --> 00:44:55,560
Speaker 1: kind of shaking me a little bit and even um

778
00:44:55,640 --> 00:45:00,080
Speaker 1: inspiring me to consider my beliefs or my actions. It

779
00:45:00,239 --> 00:45:03,840
Speaker 1: that wasn't even enough. What I was involved with isn't

780
00:45:03,920 --> 00:45:06,759
Speaker 1: something that you know, you just wake up from one

781
00:45:06,840 --> 00:45:09,960
Speaker 1: day and say, hey, you know, nice knowing you have

782
00:45:10,040 --> 00:45:12,520
Speaker 1: a nice life. I'm growing up now or moving on.

783
00:45:12,760 --> 00:45:16,160
Speaker 1: So it was another few years when I was twenty

784
00:45:16,200 --> 00:45:19,360
Speaker 1: three and I found myself sitting in a federal detention

785
00:45:19,400 --> 00:45:22,319
Speaker 1: center because I took part in a hate crime. You

786
00:45:22,360 --> 00:45:26,000
Speaker 1: were arrested for taking part in an armed robbery of

787
00:45:26,080 --> 00:45:29,120
Speaker 1: the Jewish owce store, and you were sent to prison

788
00:45:29,200 --> 00:45:34,279
Speaker 1: for that. Yes, I was. And it was sitting in

789
00:45:34,280 --> 00:45:38,520
Speaker 1: this federal detention center as a result of that that

790
00:45:38,640 --> 00:45:44,000
Speaker 1: I really started to reconsider my life. There was a woman, um,

791
00:45:44,040 --> 00:45:47,560
Speaker 1: a woman of color, who kept looking at me this

792
00:45:47,800 --> 00:45:50,960
Speaker 1: one day and in my mind. I thought, she's going

793
00:45:51,000 --> 00:45:53,600
Speaker 1: to do something to me, she's planning something, she's going

794
00:45:53,640 --> 00:45:56,960
Speaker 1: to try to beat me up, or And she asked

795
00:45:56,960 --> 00:45:59,680
Speaker 1: me if I knew how to play a game, and

796
00:45:59,760 --> 00:46:02,759
Speaker 1: I didn't, So she picked this game up and came

797
00:46:02,800 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 1: over and sat down next to me and taught me

798
00:46:05,120 --> 00:46:09,919
Speaker 1: how to play. And she did that knowing why I

799
00:46:10,000 --> 00:46:14,360
Speaker 1: was sitting in that detention center. She did that, knowing

800
00:46:14,760 --> 00:46:17,000
Speaker 1: that I was there for a hate crime. She did

801
00:46:17,080 --> 00:46:21,440
Speaker 1: that having to look at the racist tattoos I had

802
00:46:21,480 --> 00:46:25,239
Speaker 1: on my body because I couldn't cover them all. And

803
00:46:25,600 --> 00:46:28,640
Speaker 1: over the course of the time I spent in prison,

804
00:46:29,719 --> 00:46:34,359
Speaker 1: I was treated with kindness and compassion by women who

805
00:46:34,440 --> 00:46:37,120
Speaker 1: I never would have had the same respect for had

806
00:46:37,160 --> 00:46:42,920
Speaker 1: I met them prior to entering prison. And it changed me.

807
00:46:43,080 --> 00:46:47,120
Speaker 1: I mean I was changed at the core of who

808
00:46:47,200 --> 00:46:53,600
Speaker 1: I was as a human being. Because I was expecting anger, aggression, hatred,

809
00:46:53,719 --> 00:46:59,560
Speaker 1: potentially violence, I wasn't expecting kindness. That just absolutely disarmed me.

810
00:47:00,280 --> 00:47:03,520
Speaker 1: And it inspired me not only to change who I

811
00:47:03,680 --> 00:47:07,680
Speaker 1: was and to take responsibility, but to come out and

812
00:47:07,800 --> 00:47:10,680
Speaker 1: do something meaningful with my life and to make a

813
00:47:10,719 --> 00:47:14,479
Speaker 1: difference with the unique knowledge and experiences that I had.

814
00:47:14,800 --> 00:47:17,960
Speaker 1: How long did you spend in prison? Almost three years?

815
00:47:18,360 --> 00:47:22,480
Speaker 1: When you got out, I know you started an organization,

816
00:47:22,600 --> 00:47:26,760
Speaker 1: Life After Hate. What inspired you to do that? Well,

817
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:29,799
Speaker 1: I did not start it by myself. I am one

818
00:47:29,840 --> 00:47:34,200
Speaker 1: of six co founders of Life After Hate UM, and

819
00:47:34,360 --> 00:47:39,759
Speaker 1: essentially I did outreach and some consulting for about a

820
00:47:39,840 --> 00:47:43,839
Speaker 1: decade before I met my fellow co founders. In two

821
00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:50,360
Speaker 1: thousand eleven, I was invited to attend a summit in Dublin.

822
00:47:50,600 --> 00:47:55,120
Speaker 1: It was at this conference that I first UM met

823
00:47:55,239 --> 00:47:59,400
Speaker 1: face to face with others who were similar to me,

824
00:48:00,040 --> 00:48:04,080
Speaker 1: and by that I mean other former violent far right extremists.

825
00:48:04,120 --> 00:48:07,839
Speaker 1: On the last day, we talked about how inspired we

826
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:10,960
Speaker 1: were by you know, the individuals that we met and

827
00:48:11,040 --> 00:48:14,480
Speaker 1: the things that we learned, the feelings, you know, the

828
00:48:14,520 --> 00:48:18,840
Speaker 1: emotions that we had, and we all remembered what it

829
00:48:18,960 --> 00:48:22,560
Speaker 1: was like to go through this disengagement from the violent

830
00:48:22,640 --> 00:48:26,640
Speaker 1: far right on our own. And we also talked about

831
00:48:27,120 --> 00:48:30,720
Speaker 1: UM coming back to the US and moving forward together

832
00:48:30,960 --> 00:48:34,520
Speaker 1: as a group. And one of the men had an

833
00:48:34,560 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 1: online journal called Life After Hate, and he said, I

834
00:48:38,000 --> 00:48:41,120
Speaker 1: have the perfect name. Let's take the name of my

835
00:48:41,239 --> 00:48:43,880
Speaker 1: journal and we'll go home and turn it into a

836
00:48:43,920 --> 00:48:48,320
Speaker 1: nonprofit organization, and that's exactly what we did. What is

837
00:48:48,360 --> 00:48:53,440
Speaker 1: the group's primary focus. Our primary program is called Exit USA,

838
00:48:53,680 --> 00:48:58,799
Speaker 1: and Exit USA is a program that helps individuals to

839
00:48:59,000 --> 00:49:04,560
Speaker 1: disengage from the violent far right. So there is UM

840
00:49:04,600 --> 00:49:10,000
Speaker 1: an element of intervention that is involved. There is after

841
00:49:10,160 --> 00:49:13,799
Speaker 1: care and support networks in place. UM. This is not

842
00:49:14,400 --> 00:49:18,719
Speaker 1: a linear process. It is different for every individual and

843
00:49:18,800 --> 00:49:21,480
Speaker 1: it can depend on so many different things. You know,

844
00:49:21,600 --> 00:49:25,279
Speaker 1: why someone got involved, how long they were involved, what

845
00:49:25,520 --> 00:49:29,960
Speaker 1: kind of violent far right group they were involved with them.

846
00:49:30,040 --> 00:49:34,719
Speaker 1: We do not go out seeking UM. Individuals come to

847
00:49:34,840 --> 00:49:41,959
Speaker 1: us concerned family loved ones. We get UM referrals, so

848
00:49:42,280 --> 00:49:46,400
Speaker 1: it can be anyone from you know, a teacher, to

849
00:49:46,560 --> 00:49:50,760
Speaker 1: a parent, to a sibling, to a spouse, to UM

850
00:49:51,000 --> 00:49:55,080
Speaker 1: law enforcement to somebody from you know, a human rights group.

851
00:49:55,280 --> 00:49:59,799
Speaker 1: We also get individuals who contact us directly and say, hey,

852
00:49:59,840 --> 00:50:02,920
Speaker 1: I have been involved in this for this long, you know,

853
00:50:03,040 --> 00:50:06,080
Speaker 1: and for whatever reason, I don't want to be involved,

854
00:50:06,120 --> 00:50:08,600
Speaker 1: but I don't know exactly how to get out. What

855
00:50:08,760 --> 00:50:11,920
Speaker 1: is the success rate? I mean, are you more often

856
00:50:11,920 --> 00:50:16,600
Speaker 1: than not able to extricate people from this world? You know?

857
00:50:16,760 --> 00:50:21,080
Speaker 1: It all depends, UM. There are so many factors involved.

858
00:50:21,719 --> 00:50:25,640
Speaker 1: Part of it depends on the individual. It is not

859
00:50:25,840 --> 00:50:29,960
Speaker 1: at all uncommon to see a certain level of recidivism

860
00:50:30,160 --> 00:50:34,480
Speaker 1: with this when individuals get involved in these types of groups.

861
00:50:34,719 --> 00:50:41,000
Speaker 1: It's not necessarily because someone wakes up one day and says,

862
00:50:41,520 --> 00:50:44,959
Speaker 1: I decided I hate everyone who doesn't look like me today.

863
00:50:45,239 --> 00:50:50,120
Speaker 1: A lot of times there are so many other mitigating factors.

864
00:50:50,480 --> 00:50:55,520
Speaker 1: So maybe somebody has grievances, maybe somebody's looking for protection,

865
00:50:56,160 --> 00:51:01,520
Speaker 1: maybe somebody's looking for acceptance, are belonging somewhere, so when

866
00:51:01,600 --> 00:51:06,120
Speaker 1: they find these things, they gravitate to the group, and

867
00:51:06,360 --> 00:51:10,640
Speaker 1: they're so grateful for having found or filled whatever was

868
00:51:10,760 --> 00:51:16,480
Speaker 1: missing for them that they take on the entire identity

869
00:51:16,520 --> 00:51:20,080
Speaker 1: of the group. This affects every aspect of life, the

870
00:51:20,200 --> 00:51:23,000
Speaker 1: kind of clothes they wear, the kind of music they

871
00:51:23,080 --> 00:51:26,200
Speaker 1: listen to, the kind of food they eat, the people

872
00:51:26,440 --> 00:51:30,520
Speaker 1: that they associate with. So imagine having all of that

873
00:51:30,960 --> 00:51:34,880
Speaker 1: and then disengaging. You lose all of that, So you

874
00:51:34,960 --> 00:51:39,160
Speaker 1: lose your entire identity and need to reshape a completely

875
00:51:39,200 --> 00:51:43,120
Speaker 1: new one. So a lot of times we see individuals

876
00:51:43,280 --> 00:51:48,480
Speaker 1: who we call it, you know the difference between disengagement

877
00:51:48,560 --> 00:51:53,640
Speaker 1: and de radicalization. So for someone to disengage. They can

878
00:51:53,680 --> 00:51:59,839
Speaker 1: disengage from you know, physically being in proximity to the individuals.

879
00:52:00,120 --> 00:52:03,719
Speaker 1: They're not going to events any longer. They're not you know,

880
00:52:03,800 --> 00:52:07,640
Speaker 1: going to meetings or out you know, physically recruiting people.

881
00:52:08,080 --> 00:52:13,120
Speaker 1: But that doesn't necessarily mean that they've left behind the ideology.

882
00:52:13,680 --> 00:52:17,840
Speaker 1: De radicalization, on the other hand, that's at the cognitive level.

883
00:52:17,960 --> 00:52:21,800
Speaker 1: So that's deconstructing the beliefs and the ideology and leaving

884
00:52:21,840 --> 00:52:26,920
Speaker 1: that behind. Um So it's a very very complicated process.

885
00:52:27,080 --> 00:52:30,320
Speaker 1: Like I said, it's not linear, and it's really hard

886
00:52:30,680 --> 00:52:33,680
Speaker 1: to go into success and failure because then we have

887
00:52:33,760 --> 00:52:38,040
Speaker 1: to stop and ask, how are we measuring success? How

888
00:52:38,080 --> 00:52:43,160
Speaker 1: do we measure what was prevented? So, for instance, look

889
00:52:43,200 --> 00:52:45,040
Speaker 1: at you know, we can look at things like the

890
00:52:45,120 --> 00:52:50,759
Speaker 1: cost to society. What if we prevent people from committing

891
00:52:50,960 --> 00:52:54,840
Speaker 1: mass violence, you know, like a mass shooting. Is it

892
00:52:54,960 --> 00:52:58,520
Speaker 1: successful if we prevent someone from picking up a gun

893
00:52:59,560 --> 00:53:02,120
Speaker 1: and going out and doing something like that, but they

894
00:53:02,160 --> 00:53:06,960
Speaker 1: maybe still have the belief. It's very complicated and it's

895
00:53:07,040 --> 00:53:13,720
Speaker 1: something that I think is going to remain complicated probably forever.

896
00:53:14,200 --> 00:53:18,080
Speaker 1: Is there anything you would say to someone listening today

897
00:53:18,160 --> 00:53:21,640
Speaker 1: who might be worried about a loved one who might

898
00:53:21,840 --> 00:53:26,120
Speaker 1: be attracted. I can't imagine people attracted to these beliefs

899
00:53:26,160 --> 00:53:30,200
Speaker 1: necessarily be listening to my podcast, honestly, but you never know.

900
00:53:30,920 --> 00:53:33,680
Speaker 1: What would you say to those people if they're in

901
00:53:33,760 --> 00:53:36,600
Speaker 1: fact out there listening right now. I would tell them

902
00:53:36,600 --> 00:53:42,440
Speaker 1: that their novelone that you know, things don't have to

903
00:53:42,520 --> 00:53:47,719
Speaker 1: be that difficult. We have a community of individuals who

904
00:53:48,640 --> 00:53:53,319
Speaker 1: understand from having the experience there, and you know, we

905
00:53:53,360 --> 00:53:56,719
Speaker 1: are individuals who have gone on and worked hard to

906
00:53:56,800 --> 00:54:00,480
Speaker 1: be so much more than just former extreme you know,

907
00:54:00,560 --> 00:54:04,640
Speaker 1: we're educated, we've worked on, you know, making amends, and

908
00:54:04,920 --> 00:54:09,759
Speaker 1: you know, really going for personal and professional growth. So

909
00:54:09,800 --> 00:54:13,480
Speaker 1: I would say, you know, to everyone, whether it's an

910
00:54:13,520 --> 00:54:16,800
Speaker 1: individual who wants to come out or a concerned loved

911
00:54:16,800 --> 00:54:21,960
Speaker 1: one or family member, change is possible. Transformation is possible.

912
00:54:23,239 --> 00:54:25,640
Speaker 1: One of the hardest things that we have to do

913
00:54:25,880 --> 00:54:28,160
Speaker 1: is to listen to each other and to try to

914
00:54:28,320 --> 00:54:33,719
Speaker 1: understand one another's grievances, not to concede our own position

915
00:54:34,160 --> 00:54:39,120
Speaker 1: that these beliefs are heinous and they're wrong, But we

916
00:54:39,200 --> 00:54:42,760
Speaker 1: are not going to just right off the individual human

917
00:54:42,800 --> 00:54:46,839
Speaker 1: being because their beliefs are ugly. People can come back

918
00:54:46,880 --> 00:54:50,600
Speaker 1: from this. I know this is true. Um, probably you

919
00:54:50,600 --> 00:54:53,480
Speaker 1: know more than I know anything else in this life,

920
00:54:54,120 --> 00:54:57,799
Speaker 1: because I've I've gone through it myself. So I would

921
00:54:57,840 --> 00:55:00,520
Speaker 1: just say, you know, there is help out there. We're

922
00:55:00,560 --> 00:55:03,840
Speaker 1: here to listen. We're not, you know, going to judge,

923
00:55:04,280 --> 00:55:07,880
Speaker 1: and it's possible we we can find a way to

924
00:55:07,880 --> 00:55:10,920
Speaker 1: get through it. We've talked about earlier, you know, the

925
00:55:10,960 --> 00:55:14,960
Speaker 1: Holocaust and the lessons of the past. I have in

926
00:55:15,000 --> 00:55:21,080
Speaker 1: the past two years had experiences with survivors who have

927
00:55:21,320 --> 00:55:24,480
Speaker 1: said things like, it was never supposed to happen again,

928
00:55:24,480 --> 00:55:27,640
Speaker 1: and it's happening again. Why Why are we letting this happen.

929
00:55:27,719 --> 00:55:32,319
Speaker 1: Why isn't anyone doing anything? Why don't people care? It's

930
00:55:32,360 --> 00:55:38,279
Speaker 1: horrifying to me that we have individuals, an entire generation

931
00:55:38,840 --> 00:55:42,680
Speaker 1: that they're almost gone, their voices are almost gone from

932
00:55:42,680 --> 00:55:46,080
Speaker 1: this world. What they survived and what they went through

933
00:55:46,760 --> 00:55:49,239
Speaker 1: no human beings should have to go through. And we

934
00:55:49,320 --> 00:55:53,600
Speaker 1: are on the same path again. It sure is enough

935
00:55:53,640 --> 00:55:57,040
Speaker 1: to motivate someone to keep going. Well, thank you for

936
00:55:57,120 --> 00:55:59,719
Speaker 1: the work that you're doing, Angela, and thank you for

937
00:56:00,480 --> 00:56:05,640
Speaker 1: having such a profoundly open and honest conversation with us

938
00:56:06,080 --> 00:56:11,040
Speaker 1: about your own story and about the larger story that

939
00:56:11,520 --> 00:56:16,000
Speaker 1: unfortunately is unfolding in this country. Thank you. I am

940
00:56:16,320 --> 00:56:20,839
Speaker 1: one of the lucky ones. Angela is in fact one

941
00:56:20,840 --> 00:56:24,320
Speaker 1: of the lucky ones. Clearly she had the strength, support

942
00:56:24,520 --> 00:56:28,880
Speaker 1: and newfound empathy that opened her heart to understand others

943
00:56:29,040 --> 00:56:33,080
Speaker 1: and ultimately herself. It seems to me people are attracted

944
00:56:33,120 --> 00:56:36,719
Speaker 1: to these groups because they're lonely, isolated and want a

945
00:56:36,800 --> 00:56:39,879
Speaker 1: sense of belonging. If you need help or know someone

946
00:56:39,960 --> 00:56:43,480
Speaker 1: who does, you can go to Life After Hate dot org,

947
00:56:43,960 --> 00:56:49,040
Speaker 1: or you can text or call six one two eight exit.

948
00:56:51,680 --> 00:56:53,880
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening everyone. I hope you

949
00:56:54,000 --> 00:56:57,719
Speaker 1: learned something from this episode. I certainly did. By the way,

950
00:56:57,800 --> 00:57:00,879
Speaker 1: if you're feeling overwhelmed by news and ormation these days,

951
00:57:00,880 --> 00:57:03,359
Speaker 1: and let's face it, who isn't, you can sign up

952
00:57:03,360 --> 00:57:06,239
Speaker 1: for my daily newsletter, wake Up Call by going to

953
00:57:06,360 --> 00:57:09,240
Speaker 1: Katie correct dot com. And of course I'm a social animal,

954
00:57:09,520 --> 00:57:12,680
Speaker 1: so you can follow me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

955
00:57:13,360 --> 00:57:17,840
Speaker 1: Until next time and my next question, Thanks again for listening.

956
00:57:21,440 --> 00:57:23,560
Speaker 1: Next Question with Katie Curic is a production of I

957
00:57:23,680 --> 00:57:26,880
Speaker 1: Heart Radio and Katie Curic Media. The executive producers are

958
00:57:26,960 --> 00:57:30,440
Speaker 1: Katie Curic Lauren Bright Pacheco, Julie Douglas, and Tyler Klang.

959
00:57:30,760 --> 00:57:34,440
Speaker 1: Our show producers are Bethan Macaluso and Courtney Litz. The

960
00:57:34,480 --> 00:57:38,320
Speaker 1: supervising producer is Dylan Fagan. Associate producers are Emily Pinto

961
00:57:38,440 --> 00:57:42,360
Speaker 1: and Derek Clemens. Editing is by Dylan Fagan, Derek Clements,

962
00:57:42,400 --> 00:57:46,400
Speaker 1: and Lowell Berlante. Our researcher is Barbara Keene. For more

963
00:57:46,440 --> 00:57:49,280
Speaker 1: information on today's episode, go to Katie Currek dot com

964
00:57:49,320 --> 00:57:52,000
Speaker 1: and follow us on Twitter and Instagram at Katie currec

965
00:57:58,280 --> 00:58:00,640
Speaker 1: For more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the i

966
00:58:00,720 --> 00:58:03,760
Speaker 1: heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to

967
00:58:03,800 --> 00:58:04,640
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.