In this op-ed, writer Lincoln Anthony Blades explores the relationship between white supremacy, terrorism and incidents like the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida.
On Wednesday, February 14, at least 17 people were killed and more than a dozen others wounded inside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. As more details have emerged about the suspect, a former student who allegedly entered the school campus armed with an AR-15 rifle and began opening fire on students in the hallway, controversy has risen over whether or not the shooter was a member of a “white separatist paramilitary proto-fascist organization.”
In an interview on Thursday, Jordan Jereb, a captain of a white nationalist militia called the Republic of Florida, which identifies itself as a “white civil rights organization fighting for white identitarian politics,” told the Anti-Defamation League that the shooter had trained with them. The Daily Beast quotes Jareb as telling it, "He was part of our organization. He wasn’t particularly active in it, but at some point he came to Tallahassee with I believe the Clearwater RoF.” Jareb claimed that the shooter was well aware of the organization's white separatist ideologies. “I don’t know precisely what he believes. I know he knew full well he was joining a white separatist paramilitary proto-facist organization. I know he knew that much," Jareb said.
On Thursday afternoon, after multiple mainstream news media outlets reported on the alleged association between the shooter and the Republic of Florida, Jareb walked back his comments. According to a statement given to the Tallahassee Democrat by Leon County Sheriff's Office spokesman Lt. Grady Jordan, local authorities have yet to find any information linking the shooter to the Republic of Florida. “We are still doing some work, but we have no known ties between the RoF, Jordan Jereb or the Broward shooter,” Jordan said. The Southern Poverty Law Center, a legal advocacy organization that specializes in fighting for civil rights and exposing hate groups, released a statement saying that Jereb has "always been somewhat of a publicity seeker" who even wrote to SPLC's office in 2014 to complain that the Republic of Florida had not yet been listed as a hate group.
While the shooter's attachment to the hate group hasn't been clearly established, one of his former classmates identified him as an outwardly antagonistic Trump supporter who had two separate Instagram accounts, posting pictures of himself holding weapons on one of the accounts.
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Another former classmate informed The Daily Beast that the shooter had a history of making racist remarks and propagating white supremacy.
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And therein lies the important point that is being overlooked in this hand-wringing over whether or not the shooter was a card-carrying member of some fringe, white-nationalist org: It actually doesn't matter.
As the Anti-Defamation League has pointed out, "extremist connections to some murders often take years to be revealed," meaning we may not know the true extent of the shooter's possible connection to white nationalist organizations for a while, until all of the minute details are unpacked and published for the world to see. But based on the claims of his classmates, it seems he may have subscribed to white supremacist ideology, whether he claimed a specific racist organization or not. And to believe in white supremacy is to believe in terrorism.
We've entered a point where we've developed a particular comfort with viewing racist white supremacy more as an ideological leaning, instead of what it truly is: a violently regressive worldview that endangers the very existence of all Americans, especially minorities. In America, white supremacy has been the impetus for the transatlantic slave trade, the genocide of Indigenous tribes, thousands of anti-black lynchings, Islamophobic violence, and domestic terrorism. That violent legacy has steadily continued into our current society, where, even as some have regarded the threat of neo-Nazism as a mostly harmless affront to "triggered" university students who can't deal with those who hold opposing views, we've collectively witnessed a rise in white male terrorists and right-wing extremism. In the name of white supremacy, America suffered the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, the worst act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history, which decimated both black and white lives of all ages. In the name of white supremacy, six people were killed inside a Sikh temple in Wisconsin in 2012, and nine black men and women were mercilessly slaughtered in Charleston, South Carolina's Emmanuel AME Church in 2015. That isn't just the legacy of white supremacy, it's the point of it. How we've allowed these views to be positioned as an intellectual struggle for free speech is truly an insult to the countless millions of people who've fallen victim to violent white supremacy throughout the history of this nation and the many millions of Americans who are threatened with its violence today.
While we don't need to drown in hand-wringing over whether a person had formal ties to a specific white nationalist group, it is important that we identify the symbols that white supremacists fight for. While there are many in our society comfortable with myopically associating violent racism solely to symbols such as Swastika flags, Klan hoods, or skinheads in bomber jackets and Doc Martens, it should be understood that those are just a few recent examples of the outwardly proud legacy of violent prejudice. The blood of black Americans, Muslim Americans, undocumented Americans, and Indigenous peoples has spilled in the street from white supremacists praising everything from the confederate flag to the American flag. And now, the Trump hat is sometimes a dog whistle of barbaric white supremacy, and that is a massive problem.
While xenophobia predates our current administration, it is without doubt that many extremists have felt empowered to behave far more boldly with the current administration in office, especially when that group of politicians enacts harmful policy (such as travel bans) that supports the white nationalist worldview. Trump has consistently been supported by white supremacists, and he has gone out of his way to avoid demonizing them, going as far as calling those participating in rallies "good people" even after a white supremacist killed a young woman in Charlottesville last year. For a sitting president to become a meme of white supremacy is horrifying, especially as incidents of domestic terrorism have engulfed the news cycle, necessitating an answer to the main question currently plaguing our society: What is the source of their radicalization? For some, the answer to that is the president of the United States.
At some point, America must confront this legacy of racist white supremacy in a manner reflective of what it truly is: a violent revolution threatening to devour our society and everyone who peacefully exists in the name of diversity and progress. White supremacy is not just the worldview of a problematic Twitter account, it is a call to violence. The creation of a white ethnostate isn't rooted in politely asking people of color to leave America in a peaceful exchange — it's a call for an armed and violent insurrection. White supremacy is terrorism, and the extent to which that terrorism is being carried out in the name of the president is far more important than whether or not the shooter trained with a specific militia.
Related: White Male Terrorists Are an Issue We Should Discuss
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