The "White Scare" (with soundtrack)

"PARANOID - BLACK SABBATH" (2:46)

      It is not uncommon to hear people mock the "Yellow Peril" of the early 20th Century or the later "Red Scare" about Communist infiltration. Liberals today constantly lambaste anyone that suggests that "the Religion of Peace," Islam, is inherently violent or inexorably linked to terrorism. Yet today, the very same people that would laugh at those concerns as being unfounded, racist, or paranoid, are the one's now pushing a "White Scare" of white supremacist terrorists, fifth columns, and the like.

      Consider this article from Think Progress with the lurid title, "White nationalism is a domestic terror threat. Here are some policies that can address it." The author relates:

As the Washington Post reported, some policy recommendations being advanced center on “a realignment of national security priorities as violence on the far right escalates.” Others echo the U.S. response to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, including increased monitoring of propaganda networks. 

"The Dream Police"--Cheap Trick (4:53 min.)

      Vox breathlessly explains: "The El Paso shooting isn’t an anomaly. It’s American history repeating itself." The author asserts that "[a]t various points in the 20th century, white supremacists reacted viciously against continued immigration from ethnic and religious minorities and tried to suppress movements for black civil rights by force." But, he warns that this is not something relegated to the past, but warns that there is "a sense among white racists that white control over America is slipping."

     Rising diversity and the victories of the civil rights movement threatened white dominance, much as white control was threatened by Reconstruction and mass immigration in the past. Faced with these perceived threats, white supremacists have used violence strategically throughout American history to fend off this demographic shift — or, in the words of the El Paso shooter and President Trump, an “invasion” by nonwhites. Today, their goal is to sow terror in nonwhite communities and radicalize whites, and to lay the groundwork for a return to a more explicitly racist political regime in the United States.

     So while the current wave of white nationalist violence is new, it is at root part of something very old. And any serious assessment of this history reveals something frightening: that the good guys don’t always win.

     Especially when the militants have fellow travelers in positions of power.

(Ominous music plays in background). The author continues:

       Historically, power transitions between ethnic groups have led to violence. In his 2002 book Understanding Ethnic Violence, MIT political scientist Roger Petersen argued that ethnic killing is often caused by a particular kind of collective resentment: the feeling of injustice on the part of a privileged portion of society when it sees power slipping into the hands of a group that hadn’t previously held it.

      Drawing on social psychology, Petersen argued that one of the underappreciated causes of ethnic violence was a change in the legal and political status of majority and minority ethnic groups. Members of dominant groups simply believe they deserve to be the dominant force in their societies, and resent those challenging their positions at the top of the pyramid.

     A 2010 paper published in the journal World Politics tested Petersen’s theory, looking at 157 cases of ethnic violence in nations ranging from Chad to Lebanon. It found strong statistical correlations between a group’s decline in status and the likelihood that it turns to violence against another group.

      Petersen’s research suggests that in advanced democracies, much of this anger will be channeled through the political system rather than mass violence. Hence the rise of Donald Trump, whose voters (particularly in the Republican primary) were disproportionately defined by high levels of racial grievance.

      But the mainstream can’t be separated from the extreme quite so cleanly. Indeed, experts think Trump’s rise to power played a crucial role in inspiring the current wave of white nationalist violence — in helping turn inchoate anxiety about demographic change into real, deadly action.

* * *

      “We are in a surge of white supremacy right now,” says Pitcavage. “Whenever you have white supremacists increasing in anger and increasing in numbers, you’re going to see the violence increasing too.”

The author lists his boogeymen: the alt-right, white voters, President Trump, the KKK. And then he ends with another warning: "If history has taught us anything, it’s this: White violence can exert tremendous influence on American politics and society. We underestimate its rise at our peril."

"Led Zeppelin Immigrant Song" (2:25)

     But hope is not lost for the denizens of the Left, for AlterNet describes "This is how the conservative movement will finally die." And by "conservative movement," he means white people and the few "token" minorities that support them. The author writes:

    ... Democrats have a few advantages at the moment. The kids at the train station prefer the look of their vehicle to the beat up jalopy the Republicans are using as a taxi. Immigrants that gain citizenship prefer to ride with the Democrats, too. Suburban voters, particularly women, are repelled by the GOP. A lot fewer of the Democrats’ passengers die each year. And, there are a ton of people idling around looking for a lift whose only option right to now is to hop in with the Democrats.

     Finishing up with this analogy, there will probably not be a point at which the conservatives willingly hand over the keys to the Republican Party’s car. As we’ve seen in California and New England, they’d rather get no fares than change their ideology and rhetoric to attract the wrong kind of passengers. It looks like Texas is the next state on the list, and if it falls to the Democrats it will signal the end of the conservative movement’s viability as a taxi company. ...

     What’s different about Texas is its impact on the Electoral College. During the wilderness years, the Republicans still manage to elect Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, and Poppy Bush. The party’s congressional misery was thus offset to a considerable degree by their potential to own the White House. If Texas goes blue, it will end that hope for conservatives of the future.

     Perhaps at that point, the financiers of the right will finally conclude that conservatives need to find another ride.

Or maybe there will be war:

Or they may not be so quiet, armed as they are with enough guns to fight a Central American civil war. The recent gun violence we’ve seen from this group probably signals that they anticipate their coming fate and don’t plan on giving up easily. 

So be careful. They (the white supremacists) might be your neighbors, friends, sitting in your church, or even members of your family. There everywhere!

"Kinks - Destroyer" (3:43)