Published in the Providence Sunday Journal
July 28, 2024
If you were driving anywhere between Westerly and Woonsocket last week on Route 95, you might have seen the billboard. Featuring a brightly lit matchstick, it read, “A few matches can set a house ablaze. A few pieces of misinformation can set a country ablaze.”
A student at Cranston High School East, Eduardo Velasco, age 17, created this winning message for the Courageous Rhode Island Youth Media Contest. He’s growing up in a culture where the rise of political violence has certainly shaped his understanding of American democracy.
Eduardo was only 10 years old when white supremacy groups held a march in Charlottesville, Virginia where one person died. The year he started high school, Eduardo watched news coverage of the attack on the U.S. Capitol where a violent mob sought to prevent the certification of election results. He may even have experienced extremist ideologies on his own social media feed, along with nearly 18% of teens, as reported in a study conducted by New York University’s Center for Business and Human Rights.
With the assassination attempt on the life of former President Trump, Eduardo will hopefully come to understand how the dramatic and emotional intensity of political violence can disrupt the critical thinking and reasoning needed by citizens in a democracy.
In the days ahead, journalists and law enforcement experts will probe the life and death of the attempted assassin, including his motives for this heinous act. But extremists are not born, they are made; they are our children, our nephews, and our neighbors. They are media consumers who revel in the stories of our culture, where heroes are justified in their use of violence, where us-vs-them tropes are everywhere, once you start to look for them.
Extremist violence has also become normalized in popular culture. Ideas that were once confined to fringe groups are now lyrics sung as danceable music grooves on TikTok. Extremism can be found in the casual racism expressed by online game players. Even the youngest children can run into provocative comments from likeable influencers on YouTube who express a kind of “playful hate” conveyed by memes, slang, and hashtags.
Unfortunately, anger and hatred are a particularly effective way to coalesce and unify a group. That’s one reason why more Americans are willing to undertake, support, or excuse political violence. A recent survey by the Public Religion Research Institute found that 23% of Americans agreed that “Because things have gotten so far off track, true American patriots may have to resort to violence in order to save our country.”
Eduardo and other Rhode Island young people must navigate a world where grievance and desperation are becoming normalized as unemployment, poverty, discrimination, intolerance, isolation, or exclusion can lead to feelings of uncertainty about the future.
Experts who study the process of extremist radicalization have found that the need for status and belonging draw people into extremist ideologies. How do they get out? Studies of former extremists show that media literacy and open access to information appear critical to deradicalization.
We can’t fight hate with hate. Indeed, when political leaders wield the threat of violence as a partisan tool, it can create a descending spiral, as Martin Luther King, Jr. observed when he noted that violence begets “the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it.”
That is why we must practice the art of listening, especially in response to the most difficult and controversial issues like immigration, racism, environmental sustainability, and income inequality. We must rebuild bonds of trust and respect, applying care and compassion combined with active listening and community engagement.
Courageous community conversations are needed now, more than ever, to help prevent violence by reducing the fear and hate that is harming our democracy.
Renee Hobbs is Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Rhode Island's Harrington School of Communication and Media.
I couldn't agree more!