How US neo-Nazism actually works - from a former neo-Nazi member

Good share. My take away is that groups like this are born from people living a life dictated by fear and an over-reliance on force/violence as the mechanism for change or protection. This is exacerbated by extreme black and white thinking (you're either white or not, you're either with us or not).

I found it interesting that there was in-fighting amongst skinheads, the anti-racist skinheads vs racist skinheads. Also interesting that the guy said, "first you have to convince the person that they are white and that is their main identity" lol like "just so you know, you are WHITE!" but it makes sense, it's what I hope someone can use to convince women who vote against their best interests that they are "WOMEN" before they are white/rich/etc.(this probably comes off as crass, but I have seen many times people thinking they will be spared when the chopping block comes because they are "different" from the other girls...)

I'm also grossed out, but not shocked, that so much of this desire to join groups like this comes from not having a girlfriend? Like, is this really some people's entire identity? Whether they have a partner or not?(partner is a generous term, because I suspect these people want a mom/sex slave).

He makes a really interesting point related to the above that the groups are very self-selecting. You would get initiated by doing weird stuff like extreme drinking or beating people, and those that couldn't cut it, would leave. People who couldn't get girlfriends left. It points out that you really will see the EXTREME people when these groups form. I always wonder what the people who left did? Did they tell other people, "god damn was I misguided, I should tell my friends to look out for this type of behavior in themselves." Or did they stay silent and think, "phew, that was close, moving on." ?

Props to this man, for reforming himself and using his position to help others. You can tell he's truly repentant and has done a lot of soul searching to have such insight.

Bonus quotations:

• "The entire existence of a neo-nazi is rationalizing hypocrisy, you're doing it every single day...it's exhausting"
• "The hate itself is exhausting, from an addiction standpoint"
• "What was most exhausting was when people I claimed to hate treated me with kindness...when I least deserved it, but needed it the most"
• "My de-radicalization was the Midwest rave scene"

Also my god, the amount of alcohol involved O_O, but weed is the devil, obviously.

His suggestions at the end to help solve the problem are admirable, but it rubs me a bit the wrong way. Especially the part about how a white guy may not feel he has any middle ground between being racialized as a white person with privilege or not, and thus we need to create those spaces - starting by dismantling things like X and other social media echo chambers. I realize my reaction to this is because I am close/sensitive to this issue, so my feelings that "no we need to actually focus on you first realizing you are privileged, before we even get to how I am going to make your life better" are obviously emotionally charged as well as rationally charged. It just gets my goat, because people who need to hear this the most (you are privileged and have received benefits said privilege, whether you know it or not)always skip over this part and want to go right to problem solving. Acknowledging is the first step to building trust, it's hard to build bridges when you don't feel like you have the same foundation.

Complete aside, Business Insider has been amazing. Almost all of its content slaps, it's almost like a different version of "How it's Made" modern TLC?

This is a great find! Thanks for sharing