What Leads People to (and Away) from Violent White Supremacy?

About this episode

This episode explores the beliefs that lead individuals to embrace violent white supremacy and discusses strategies for engaging with those who hold racist ideologies.

What beliefs make people willing to commit violence, and what could change their minds? In this episode, we explore what makes individuals vulnerable to white supremacist beliefs, what it means when extremism becomes mainstream, the surprising permeability of these groups, and how to talk to people in your life who express racist ideology. Peter Simi is a professor of Sociology at Chapman University, and an expert on extremist groups and violence in the US. Among his many publications, he is co-author of American Swastika: Inside the White Power Movement's Hidden Spaces of Hate , and Out of Hiding: Extremist White Supremacy and How It Can be Stopped . Find out more about Peter at: https://www.chapman.edu/our-faculty/pete-simi.aspx. Sara Winegar Budge holds a doctorate in Psychology and is a licensed psychologist in Oregon. She is the Director of US Programs at Moonshot, which builds technology to identify and disrupt organized crime, child sexual exploitation, and trafficking, among other forms of abuse and violence. Her clinical work focuses on individuals who are or have been involved in violent extremism. Find out more at https://moonshotteam.com/ In this episode, we talk…

People in this episode

Guests: Peter Simi, Sara Winegar Budge

Topics covered

• violent extremism
• white supremacy
• psychology of hate
• mainstream extremism
• communication strategies
• social vulnerability

Keywords

• white supremacy
• extremism
• violence
• Sociology
• psychology
• hate groups
• communication
• radicalization

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Chapman University, Moonshot, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum

Books & works: American Swastika: Inside the White Power Movement's Hidden Spaces of Hate, Out of Hiding: Extremist White Supremacy and How It Can be Stopped

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