Hate Sites: Using the Broader Abortion Argument to Spread Racism, Extremism
Specifically, in this research, Ophir and his team wanted to better understand how white nationalists not only use abortion debates online to further their cause, but also apply different moral standards to whites and non-whites.
By analyzing posts made between 2001 and 2017 on Stormfront – a discussion board founded by former Ku Klax Klansman, Don Black – the authors found a marked difference in the way far-right extremists conceptualized abortions for whites versus non-whites.
Abortions among white women were described as “murder.” Using an entire topic labelled “avoid abortions,” Stormfront users accused white women considering terminations as being “deeply unethical” and even “treasonous” to the white race and their gender role. For example, talking about abortions among white women, a user stated that “abortion is the worst thing of all, it is killing a child. Killing a child is worse than bringing him/her up without a father. Adoption is always an option.”
Whereas with non-white women, posts often excused abortion: in order to limit non-white populations.
The authors say that such discourse could be used to recruit members and to “normalize extreme, racist ideologies.”.
To protect the public, Ophir says people, including children, need better tools to navigate the “misleading information environment that is the 21st century.”
Additional themes identified on Stormfront, included “The Great Replacement conspiracy theory” – a supposed plot to replace white people with non-white immigrants that is said to have inspired the Buffalo grocery store killings suspect.
Something, which Ophir and colleagues argue needs more attention from the mainstream press, as they are concerned there is a spread of the ‘great replacement conspiracy’.
“Potential solutions should not end with social media and the internet. We also need to pay more attention to the rise of such conspiratorial thinking among television channels like Fox News and prominent political figures,” he says.
Stormfront posts analyzed by the team were supplied to the researchers by the Southern Poverty Law Center and by other academics.
The site is focused on propagating white nationalism, anti-Semitism, and islamophobia, as well as anti-Hinduism, anti-feminism, homophobia, transphobia, Holocaust denial, anti-Catholicism, and white supremacy. As of 2015 the website was estimated to have than 300,000 registered members.
