Trump's Brown Shirts

There were gays, Hispanics, African-Americans, Jews, union members... even Muslims, who voted for Trump in 2016 and some of them plan to do so again next year. Are they all crazy? Ignorant? Stupid? Some thing like that. I always wanted to know-- but never found anything definitive-- how many Jews voted for Hitler in the 1932 presidential election and for Nazi Party in the Reichstag elections in 1932 and 1933. The elections in July and November of '32 and in March of 1933 led to the deaths of 6 million European Jews. Between 1932 and 1939 about 300,000 German Jews wisely fled the country. Subsequently, 180,000 German Jews were murdered. Wouldn't you like to know how many of them had voted for Hitler and his party?

In 2016, about 24% of Jews who voted, voted for Trump. Blacks were much smarter; only 8% voted for Trump. 29% of Hispanics-- many of them Cuban rightists-- voted for him. 29% of Asian-Americans did. And 14% of LGBTQ voters pulled the levers for Trump. 16.8% of Muslim voters, picked Trump. Are all these people suicidal? Maybe.

Yesterday Wall Street Journal reporters Georgia Wells and Ian Lovett wrote about The Toxic World Where Mass Shooters Thrive. This is part of Trump world-- no Antifa here, just Trumpists, wall to wall Trumpists. And they would like to kill all these gays and Jews and blacks and Hispanics and Asians, including the ones who voted for their man. Suspects in recent attacks posted to hate-filled forums in this dark, fringey corner of TrumpWorld, such as 8chan, which brim with racist content. They tout "kill scores." Wells and Lovett wrote that "Less than two weeks after a gunman killed more than 50 people at two mosques in New Zealand, law-enforcement officials found a disturbing piece of graffiti outside a San Diego County mosque that had been set on fire. 'For Brenton Tarrant -t./pol/,' it read. The cryptic message, which paid homage to the alleged New Zealand shooter and a dark corner of the internet where such shootings are celebrated, foreshadowed a string of violence."

I'm the least racist... by Nancy Ohanian

In April, one month after the graffiti appeared, John Earnest, the man who police say vandalized the mosque, allegedly attacked a nearby synagogue, leaving one person dead. Then, in August, a shooting in an El Paso Walmart killed 22. One week later, a Norwegian man allegedly opened fire at an Oslo mosque.

The trio of suspects don’t appear ever to have met, but they all idolized Mr. Tarrant and were part of a hate-filled online community that is emerging as an important front in law-enforcement efforts to ward off future attacks.

The online forums, known as /pol/ for “politically incorrect,” offer a platform for hate speech where posts are almost always anonymous, making it difficult for law enforcement to identify who is using the sites. Hateful ideologies, including white supremacy, are promoted across the sites and used to incite violence, forming a chain of influence that appears to have led from one mass shooting to the next. When one site is shut down, users swiftly migrate to another.

Mass shooters are revered on the forums, which brim with racist and antigay content. Posts encourage attacks against mosques, synagogues and immigrants. Large numbers of fatalities are celebrated as “high scores.”

When a gunman in West Texas opened fire on Saturday, the forums lit up, with users demanding to know his “kill count” and saying they hoped he was white and his victims Hispanic. The alleged shooter doesn’t appear to have ties to the forums.

The most popular site among extremists, 8chan, has been largely knocked offline in recent weeks after tech-support providers cut off service. But extremists and violent rhetoric are popping up elsewhere. The alleged attacker at the Oslo mosque posted on another site, Endchan. A letter New Zealand authorities said Mr. Tarrant sent from jail, which warns of bloodshed soon to come, was posted on another site, 4chan. The sites are unconnected.

Lawmakers and law-enforcement officials are trying to better understand how the sites function and what can be done to combat the calls to violence posted there. Democratic and Republican leaders of the House Homeland Security Committee subpoenaed Jim Watkins, 8chan’s owner, to testify Thursday about extremist content. The committee is weighing whether the government should take a more active role in trying to prevent the spread of such content, and how the sites can flag potential violence to law enforcement, according to a person familiar with the committee’s plans. Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS) has vowed to hold hearings to discuss how to better fight what he calls domestic terrorism.

Counterterrorism experts and others who study the forums say they provide inspiration for some participants to act, catalyzing a succession of lone-wolf shooters who try to one-up one another. Shutting them down entirely will be all but impossible, said Robert Evans, who has investigated internet extremism for years with research collective Bellingcat. “I expect we will see shootings that are inspired by these manifestos but posted on places other than 8chan because the site is down,” he said.

Law-enforcement officials say Mr. Earnest, the 20-year-old accused in the San Diego attack, Patrick Crusius, the alleged shooter in El Paso, and Mr. Tarrant all posted racist pronouncements to 8chan’s /pol/ forum ahead of their attacks. In each case, other users responded while the shootings were going on.

“He at least did something, thats respectable,” one 8chan user posted about Mr. Earnest’s alleged synagogue shooting.

“So what’s his kill count?” said another.

Tore Bjørgo, director of the Center for Research on Extremism in Oslo, said: “You have this idea that they should outdo each other.” Sites such as 8chan, he said, are “where they find their inspiration….That’s where they expect to get fame and recognition.”

Messrs. Tarrant and Earnest have pleaded not guilty. Mr. Crusius hasn’t yet been arraigned. Mr. Earnest’s lawyer declined to comment. Lawyers for the other two suspects didn’t respond to requests for comment.

8chan didn’t respond to requests for comment. In postings on Twitter and YouTube after the subpoena, Mr. Watkins, who resides in the Philippines, said he isn’t an extremist, and he defended 8chan as a bastion of free speech.

Mr. Watkins said the site had a million users, and 4chan has said its site has more than 20 million. SimiliarWeb, an internet traffic research firm, estimates 8chan has 10 million to 20 million visits a month.

Founded in 2013, 8chan gained popularity the following year when 4chan, a similar site with less hate speech and more moderation, cracked down on users who were harassing women who developed and reviewed videogames. 8chan embraced those users.

The site calls itself “the darkest reaches of the internet.” Its home page carries a disclaimer saying that some topic sections, or “boards,” might “have content of an adult or offensive nature,” and only content violating U.S. laws is deleted.

Anonymity is protected. Users are given a random ID number for each discussion, and frequently use jargon alien to outsiders-- derisively referred to as “normies.” The stripped-down user interface seems straight out of the 1990s. It contains lists of links to discussion boards on such topics as anime, pornography and videogames.

Unpaid moderators on 8chan’s /pol/ forum promote certain ideologies, according to one researcher of radical online communities who has studied the site for years. One moderator deleted anti-Trump statements, the researcher said, while others argue about whether to support patriotism or white nationalism. Recruiters for the Atomwaffen Division, a neo-Nazi terrorist group, lurk on the site, he said.

Often users show up on 8chan airing vague frustrations. The tone often starts as mocking and sarcastic. Then other users encourage them to express anger at groups they identify as the enemy-- often Jews, feminists, black people and other minorities-- giving the newcomers a sense of purpose, according to the researcher.

Anti-Semitic cartoons, diatribes against race mixing and proclamations of a coming “race war” dominate 8chan’s /pol/ board. A popular meme depicts images of murdered white women, a message intended to persuade white women not to associate with nonwhite men and justify promoting race-based violence. Another popular meme asks users: “What have you done today for the white race?”

Anders Breivik, the Norwegian neo-Nazi who killed 77 people in 2011, is lionized, and his 1,500-page screed, which was frequently shared on 8chan, is a touchstone. Mr. Tarrant cited Mr. Breivik as his guiding light.

Mr. Evans, of Bellingcat, analyzed how 75 extremists on the internet said they had become radicalized. In about half of the cases, their paths started with a radical YouTube video, typically anti-Semitic or Holocaust-denying, which pushes conspiracy theories. YouTube has said it has taken steps to reduce extremist content.

“8chan’s /pol/ board is the end of a journey of radicalization,” he said. “It’s to radicalize you into taking the next step.”

8chan played a major role in Mr. Earnest’s transformation, according to his online message and people close to him. He wrote that he had a lot going for him-- a loving family, great friends, a church-- and that he was doing well in nursing school. He said his family never taught him the ideology behind his attack.

The people close to Mr. Earnest said he began diverging politically from his family in 2016, when he began supporting then-candidate Donald Trump for president. He then started watching YouTube videos from right-wing commentators.

By late 2017, Mr. Earnest wrote, he had found his way to 8chan. People close to him said he began talking about Pepe the Frog, a cartoon character appropriated by white supremacists as a sort of mascot, and started tossing around clichés of anti-Semitism: Holocaust denial and the supposed existence of a Jewish conspiracy controlling government, Hollywood, major organizations and trade unions.

“He made it clear that 4chan was like amateur league, and he had risen to 8chan,” one of the people close to him said.

He also started using the N-word, prompting objections from family members, who noted that the pastor’s wife at their Orthodox Presbyterian Church is black. Mr. Earnest would respond that it wasn’t a big deal.

His family grew concerned and warned him that he could be manipulated by the anonymous people he was talking to online, said the person close to him. “That was not enough to overcome the grab that these ideas had on him that he gained from these anonymous sources,” this person said. Mr. Earnest always had a “canned” response defending his ideology.

In the months before the attack, he seemed more sullen and slower to laugh, the people close to him said. Still, those around him didn’t think he was dangerous. They hadn’t visited the site themselves or seen what he may have been posting there.

“I believed this was going to resolve,” one of them said. “We obviously did not understand the trajectory of where this would land.”

In the statement Mr. Earnest allegedly posted to 8chan shortly before the shooting began, he offered gratitude to 8chan and said Mr. Tarrant had inspired him.

“I’ve only been lurking for a year and a half, yet, what I’ve learned here is priceless,” the statement said about 8chan. “Tarrant was a catalyst for me personally….I only wish to inspire others.”

Mr. Tarrant had worn a camera and live-streamed his New Zealand attack, a practice that experts say turns shootings into a twisted form of entertainment. Mr. Earnest allegedly planned to film his attack, too. During the shooting, a link to a Facebook Live stream was widely shared on the 8chan /pol/ board, although people on 8chan said they couldn’t load it. Users joked and offered critiques, some mocking him for failing to kill more people.

“What the f— shooting style is this,” said one. “Garbage.”

“Go over to the synagogue and finish this retard’s work,” said another.

“I don’t think you get the title of ‘mass shooter’ unless you score at least 2,” said a third.

Still another weighed in: “Contrary to popular belief, shooting them in the nose doesn’t kill a jew?”

For law enforcement, 8chan postings and discussions are potential evidence-- and a breeding ground for more violence. After the San Diego area attack, the Federal Bureau of Investigation served a warrant to 8chan, seeking IP addresses and information about all the people who responded to Mr. Earnest’s posting or commented about it. “Some of the individuals may be potential witnesses, co-conspirators and/or individuals who are inspired by the subject posting,” the warrant said.

Mr. Crusius, the El Paso shooting suspect, cited similar motivations to Mr. Earnest’s in the statement he allegedly posted on 8chan. He wrote: “I support the Christchurch shooter and his manifesto,” a reference to Mr. Tarrant. “This attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.”

Commenters on the site celebrated. “The new guy deserves some praise, he reached almost a third of the high score,” one wrote, a reference to the largest death toll in any mass shooting.

Under pressure following the El Paso massacre, internet-infrastructure provider Cloudflare Inc. stopped supporting 8chan, making it difficult to access. Cloudflare called the site “lawless by design.”

Some users circulated a document with instructions for finding 8chan on a hidden server on the dark web, a network of computers that use special software to conceal their true locations. Others migrated to other sites or to encrypted chat apps, where they are finding a thriving community similar to the one they left, according to Megan Squire, a professor of computer science at Elon University in North Carolina, who studies online extremism.

“They are following ISIS. They are under the same pressure to avoid detection,” she said.

Exactly one week after El Paso, Philip Manshaus, a 21-year-old Norwegian, allegedly posted a message on Endchan, another fringe site that has more moderation and less focus on violence than 8chan.

“It’s my time,” said a posting that carried his name. “I was elected by Saint Tarrant,” a reference to the New Zealand suspect. He also posted a meme celebrating Messrs. Earnest and Crusius as “disciples” of Mr. Tarrant.

Mr. Manshaus then allegedly went to the Oslo mosque and opened fire, injuring one person before being subdued by congregants.

The post attributed to him said he tried to set up a live stream of his attack on Facebook but wasn’t able to get it to work.

Endchan moderators quickly deleted the post and briefly took their site offline. They said a “large influx” of 8chan refugees had hit their site and many sites like theirs.

“This shooter is NOT representative of our regular user base,” Endchan said in a post on Twitter. “We have operated since 2015 without any incidents like this.”

Mr. Manshaus’s message was reposted on 4chan, where it spread quickly, generating scores of comments.

“God i hope he got a solid kill count on some actual shitting islamic invaders, not women and children,” one anonymous poster wrote.

When it became clear no one had died, many commenters mocked Mr. Manshaus in posts riddled with racist, anti-Semitic and anti-Islamic slurs.

“what a f—ing disappointment tho. no deads. no livestream,” one commenter wrote. “how many times will this happen? f—ing train at least”

“Some people aren’t made to kill,” wrote another. “He probably freaked out. Anders Breivik was stone cold, he went out like a terminator.”

4chan didn’t respond to a request for comment.

A group on chat app Telegram called The Bowlcast-- a reference to the bowl-style haircut of Dylann Roof, who killed nine black churchgoers in Charleston, S.C., in 2015-- posted a series of podcasts about which of these shooters they should canonize, according to Ms. Squire, who has viewed the posts and listened to the podcasts. Mr. Earnest, from San Diego, earned sainthood, they decided, but not Mr. Manshaus, because he was overtaken by worshipers at the mosque.

Shortly after the Oslo shooting, Mr. Tarrant surfaced again, this time via photographs posted on 4chan of a letter he allegedly wrote from his New Zealand prison. The letter, which received hundreds of comments on 4chan, concluded with talk of a “great conflict” on the horizon that would involve “a great amount of bloodshed.”

“Enjoy life,” he signed off, “but do not forget your duty to your people.”

Andrew Whitehead teaches sociology at Clemson University and is the Assistant Director of the Association of Religion Data Archives. Samuel Perry teaches sociology at the University of Oklahoma. They have a book coming out in February, Taking America Back for God: Christian Nationalism in the United States. They penned a piece yesterday for NBC.com with Landon Schnabel a sociology teachers at Stanford (whose book, Is Faith Feminine? What Americans Really Think about Gender and Religion, is also due out soon), about mass shootings and evangelical Christian who put their faith in guns instead of Jesus. They noted that "Trump, as he has after other shootings, offered thoughts and prayers but no promises on how he will respond. On Sunday, he said that the Odessa shooting 'really hasn't changed anything' about how lawmakers are approaching gun control legislation. Given Trump’s support and then opposition to gun control legislation in the weeks after the shooting in El Paso (but before Odessa), his most recent comments aren’t surprising."

74% of evangelicals-- about 40% more than normal Americans-- believe that "the absence of God from our public schools and places" contributes "a great deal" to gun violence. This is evangelical dogma, taught as fervently as the word of Jesus. About 44% of evangelicals see a connection between gun violence and the easy availability of guns. Most evangelicals are taught to blame gun violence on the mass media and pop culture "despite the rejection of this causal link by most criminologists who study violence in popular media."

No political appetite... by Nancy Ohanian

[T]he idea that evangelicals don’t want to “politicize” this issue, as the above quotes might suggest, rings untrue. Rather, it is certain political solutions that they oppose.

Evangelicals are far less interested in laws that limit the number of guns or restrict who can buy them. But evangelicals are more in favor of policies that increase the number of “good guys with guns” (security guards, teachers and school officials, all law-abiding citizens).

...In other words, the solution to mass shootings for evangelicals is less about eliminating the possibility of gun violence (which evangelical leaders are often quick to point out cannot be done), but to ensure that evil gun violence can be conquered with “righteous” gun violence.

So why are evangelicals so different from other Americans regarding guns? One explanation is because of how guns make them feel.

Significantly more gun-owning evangelicals than all other gun-owning Americans report that owning a gun makes them feel safe (77 percent), confident (59 percent), patriotic (48 percent), and more valuable to their family (44 percent) and their community (41 percent).

For gun-owning evangelicals, more so than other gun-owning Americans at least, gun ownership and rights go hand-in-hand with being an American and a good citizen.

The pervasiveness of Christian nationalist ideology and rhetoric within the evangelical subculture inclines them to view their Second Amendment rights as sacred, handed down by God for the benefit of the nation (which helps us understand why owning a gun would curiously make them feel more patriotic).

But in addition to their more “spiritual” concerns, social and psychological drivers matter for those in the evangelical subculture as well. Gun ownership is an expression of civic responsibility and helps them feel useful to those they care about. And it makes them feel secure and self-reliant.

When guns evoke such positive (even sacred) feelings of security and national belonging, is it any wonder that so many evangelicals refuse to consider gun control as a possible solution to America’s epidemic of mass shootings?

One of the newest Blue America-endorsed candidates, Jason Butler in northeastern North Carolina, has a very different view of morality. Jason is a very progressive pastor running for the 2nd district seat occupied by Trump rubber-stamp George Holding. Yesterday he wrote that he's running for Congress largely because the country is facing a moral crisis. Like I said, a very progressive pastor. He's worked as a community organizer, has founded two non-profits to help care for the vulnerable, has a history of fighting for racial justice, LGBTQ+ inclusion, and the economic flourishing for North Carolina's under-resourced communities. Please read what Jason has to say about the moral crisis informing his campaign and if it appeals to you, click on the thermometer and contribute what you can. Jason:

We are in the midst of a moral crisis in America and we cannot move forward without recognizing that we have allowed fear to drive us to do things to people we would never want to be done to us. Where is our “golden rule” or our collective moral integrity? We are separating families at the border; allowing record profits for corporations while millions go uninsured; and allowing the environment to die a slow death while we chant, “send her back…” No, these are not just policy issues-- they are issues of life and death and we must face them with a courageous conviction for the common good, or we will never be the same.

A few months ago I had an experience that pushed me to face this choice. I was at a prayer vigil with a group of over 100 Latinx men and women pleading to our legislators to veto a bill that would give ICE unfettered access to our communities. I was standing in the back near a group of their children who were playing nearby. They were playing like there were no problems in the world. They were playing as kids should.

As I watched them, I was struck by the sobering realization that many of these children would go home to their communities and live in the fear of their families being torn apart. That some may grow up with only one parent, because the other was taken.

While I watched them play follow-the-leader, a scripture came to mind and resonated in my heart. In Exodus, Moses has a conversation with God about the enslaved Israelites, and from the burning bush God says, “I have indeed heard the cry of their suffering…”

I believe that God hears the cries of those who suffer. I also believe that God sends us out to fight injustice and relieve suffering, as God did with Moses. Reflecting on that scripture while surrounded by that group of children-- each one of their lives subject to the powers that be, each with uncertain futures and tomorrows-- a conviction rose up in me to run for public office and to work to create a future where these kids, and so many like them, can have a future free of fear and full of liberty.

People sometimes ask, “What qualifies you to run for Congress?” Well, for the last 15 years I’ve worked not only as a pastor but also community organizer and and non-profit leader. In this work I spend my time listening to people, caring for them in their time of need, and organizing communities to develop innovate solutions and push the powerful to do all we can for the common good. Shouldn’t this sort of community service be at the heart of what it means to be a politician?

In this moment of political chaos, we need to see more elected officials consistently offering courageous leadership as a response to the suffering of our communities, and then taking strong action in order to ensure a flourishing future for every single person. Politics, at its best, is not about big money or corporate influence but rather, about the public negotiation of how a society cares for its citizens. I don’t know about you, but I feel like a lot of people are not being cared for right now. Even those who you may disagree with.

As Americans, we are a people who have the morality of liberty and justice for all etched into our collective imaginations. But when we are consumed with uncertainty and economic struggle, personal survival takes precedent. In this, we fight to hold on to what we have instead of fighting for liberty. Here, we find ourselves looking backwards instead of looking forward and allow the fear of what may be paralyze us from the hope filled future we can create. But it is precisely in these moments of uncertainty and struggle that seeking liberty and justice for all rallies us together, pushes against this paralyzing fear, gives us a collective purpose, and re-ignites hope in the future. Seeking the flourishing of my neighbor is the antidote to fear.

The issues we as a country are facing today are not just political issues but rather issues of morality that will define the nation we leave to the next generation. The separation of Latinx families and the detention of immigration children is immoral. The massive economic inequality that leaves many without healthcare while corporations record historical profits is immoral. The predatory behavior of pharmaceutical companies to push opioids on rural communities is immoral. The disregard for our environment’s health is immoral. The discrimination against our black, brown, and LGBTQ+ communities is immoral.

These are pressing issues, and while some politicians might give us complicated excuses to justify their inaction, I think the real problem is that many of our leaders lack the moral courage to do the right, and usually obvious, thing-- to stand up to big money, to ensure affordable healthcare, to refuse to legislate suffering, to inspire us to care for our most vulnerable, and to help us face our historical truths that we would like to pretend do not exist. Although we face challenges as a nation, we have within us the capacity to rise above our differences, push back the forces of fear, and reach towards the American dream of liberty and justice for all. But in order to realize this new future we must build it upon a foundation of equality. A foundation fortified by doing good for one another. We have to learn from our history and stop treating people different from us as less than us.

Fear is a poison that will slowly destroy our hopes and dreams and corrode our faith in each other-- and we must root it out. We don’t need to be afraid of the future-- we can enter it with courage and conviction, together. We need political leaders who can inspire us to these ideals, and who will boldly lead the way in creating a tomorrow that can be better than today.

I’m running for Congress because I know so many in our communities are suffering and need their voices to be heard. I’m running because I believe every child should be free to play without the threat of violence. I’m running because I believe we have the capacity to create a more perfect union if we all summon our deepest courage, work together, and embrace the strength of our diversity.

I’m running for Congress because I believe in equitable and flourishing future for us all and my conviction to fight for this future compels me to action-- even such an action as this. Yes, it may be unconventional, but we may just need some unconventional right now. Sure, I’m an outsider and a deep underdog. I don’t have big money or corporate influence. But maybe that’s exactly the way it should be: Everyday Americans running to create an America for everybody. Yes, it’ll be hard, but I’ve learned that most things that are worth doing are hard to do.

What I do have is a moral conviction for justice and a commitment to grassroots leadership…and well…I’ll take those over big money any day.