Homegrown Terrorism: White Nationalists and Neo-Nazis
They are finally getting the recognition they always wanted! Earlier this month, FBI Director Christopher Wray announced that white nationalists and neo-Nazis are now considered a “national threat priority,” which makes America’s in-house terrorists officially adjacent to our well-known international threats, like ISIS or Al Qaeda. Although many have been claiming this about white nationalists and neo-Nazis for years now, it’s still critical that the FBI came to this consensus. Their recognition and denouncement of these groups is only the first step in what the FBI owes American citizens in lieu of all of the wrongful deaths caused by these xenophobic murderers and their continued reign of terror.
Christopher Wray via DailyBeast
America’s identity is entwined with race, whether all people want to acknowledge this or not. America, at its core, is a country whose oppressors were (and at many times, still are) white, and the oppressed were originally black, but all POC are now included in this equation. Talk about range, right? Either way, this white privilege has extended to our most heinous and shameless criminals.
White terrorists in the U.S. have achieved a special place in American textbooks due to their notoriety for choosing victims that are usually innocent of any crime, and of course, killing in masses. Schools, movie theaters, parks, churches. Name a place where people go to just unassumingly mind their business. An angry white guy probably terrorized it with a lethal weapon.
Source: ADL
It is worth noting as per the Christian Modern Science Reports that, “the U.S. has seen a recent surge… led by a more visible and aggressive community of white supremacists and neo-Nazis.” According to these reports, there were 65 terror-related incidents in 2017. Out of these attacks, 37 were tied to anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic, or other xenophobic motivations.
Many of these white nationalists and neo-Nazis resurfaced post-Trump’s inauguration. As much as he does not directly stoke the fire of their prejudiced loins, he does not always necessarily condemn them. So far, turning the other cheek to their actions only emboldened them to see how far they could push the envelope with their crimes. And so, envelope-pushing ensued.
The metaphorical envelope, if you so choose to open it, includes these sordid truths:
Two people died in Tallahassee, FL in 2019.
Nine people died in Charleston, SC at church in 2015.
Six people died in Isla Vista, CA in 2014. A month prior, three people died in Overland Park, KS at a Jewish Community Center.
Six people died in Wisconsin at a Sikh Temple in 2012.
Source: The New York Times. Arrows indicate which shootings were inspired by previous ones.
And that’s just the American envelope. Recently, 50 people died at the Christchurch shootings in New Zealand, and 77 people died during the Norway shootings. They are all connected. As shown in the chart to the left, they are inspired by one another, and our countries, our world, do very little to apprehend the perpetrators. But, why do they get away with it? How?
The insanity plea, if you’ve heard of it, is a very attainable way for white nationalists and neo-Nazis to evade life in prison. Cue the following internal monologue of questions: Is racism a mental illness? Is prejudice a mental illness? Is it something that can be reformed, rehabilitated, and fixed?
And perhaps it is a mental illness; to hate someone you don’t know so much that you engage in a murderous rampage is, well, insane. However, it’s no excuse to kill. There’s never an excuse to kill.
The FBI recognizing white nationalists and neo-Nazis as terrorists now may be a bit late on the uptake, but it’s as vital as ever. This is a step in the direction of not only equality, but safety as well. The less heads that roll on this, the better.