3min chapter

The Gray Area with Sean Illing cover image

Democracy in crisis, part 1: Ross Douthat isn't too worried

The Gray Area with Sean Illing

CHAPTER

The Mainstream Republican Party Wants a Return to Civil Rights, and That's Where the Violence Comes From

The greatest violent threats in the united states right now emerge from white nationalist groups and par military organizations that oppose the current political order wholesale. They take these mainstream controversies as symbols that politics are moving in a more extreme direction. And that can motivate them to act more violently, which could spark larger scale violence than we've seen right now.

00:00
Speaker 2
I do want to get into the point about election law in a second, but i a, i want to stick wath this violence claim first, because i think thre's an important difference that's worth teasing out, which is, it is not the case that the mainstream republican party wants a return to, i don't now es, say, pre 19 65 america in terms of civil rights. But that's what the fringe wants, and that's where the violent actors come from. In the united states. The greatest violent threats in the united states right now emerge from white nationalist groups and par military organizations that really do oppose the current political order wholesale, and do oppose the idea of a multi racial democracy. And one thing that comes up again and again in research on countries that have had conflicts is that you only need a very small percentage of people who are actually invested in violence to spark large scale conflict. And they don't need to be as alliant with the main stream party, as you know, the fringe factions, violent factions in redemption ere right. It can just be the case that these groups used that as a pretext to launch their own violent campaigns worare motivated by mainstream political activity. So take the example of january sixth. The people who very clearly were plotting more extreme violence than they actually got away with that day. Some of the oath keeper factions, based on the documents that we've seen coming out in lawsuits righ where they stashed a bunch of weapons in virginia like these. These people were preparing for serious violence. But you have plenty of groups in the united states that are interested in doing that. And the point is that main stream political controversies, even if there's not an explicit i want you to act in a particular way, when trump ays things like, the proud boys stand by, i believe, is the exact quote, these groups take that as a message. They take these mainstream controversies as symbols that politics are moving in a more extreme direction. And that can motivate them to act more violently in ways that i think, like very clearly, could spark larger scale violence than we've seen right now. Timothy mc vay style bombing of federal buildings are not out of the question,
Speaker 1
right? But they are never out of the question. I mean, the timothy mc vay bombing of the federal building happened in the midst of the 19 nineties, which we now remember as sort of, you know, the peak of american self confidence and political stability, which is but
Speaker 2
scholars of wrightwyng militia movements also see that as a peak rise in those kinds of activities that declined somewhat in the two thousands, but then sparked again under a bomba, and has continued escalating since.

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