White Supremacy: The Truth Behind The Rhetoric

Politicians and the media have whipped up a frothy narrative about the explosive growth of white supremacy in the United States.  These co-conspirators hope to frighten Americans.  They understand fear is the enemy of truth.  However, the facts do not support their emotionally-charged rhetoric.

Before diving into the data, let me make it clear at the outset.  Hate in any form, including white supremacy, is evil.  Those who foment this malignant contagion are to be condemned.  We can't deny its existence.  Such wickedness has no place in America and it must be confronted. 

However, those who claim the Klu Klux Klan, neo-Nazi's and associated white supremacy groups are stealthily recruiting armies of disciples have no proof.  The FBI, Justice Department and other federal agencies have published no data on the these organizations.  Evidence simply does not exist.

Despite this fact, Democrats and the mainstream media want you to believe hoards of angry white men preaching racial purity are overrunning the country.  They point to the riot in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 as an example of a virulent strain of white supremacy that is poisoning America.

In that incident, there were "about" 50 neo-Nazi's marching and chanting in the streets.  They were confronted by around 1,000 counter protesters.  A melee ensued because the state and local police failed to intervene quickly enough, according to a report by the City of Charlottesville.

Do 50 crackpots waving Nazi flags represent a clear and present danger to the United States? Hardly. No one sanctions hateful speech, but is a single incident a legitimate indicator that white supremacy is on the rise?  Of course not.  However, it is a siren call for vigilance to prevent another episode.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, certainly no conservative group, published data in 2016 that claimed there are "between 5,000 and 8,000 Klan members, split among dozens of different and often warring organizations that use the Klan name." There are 323 million Americans.  Do the math.

In the report, the center estimated there were 130 KKK groups in the country in 2016.  According to its figures, the Klan has been in decline since 2010 when its numbers reached 221 loosely affiliated organizations.  This is a far cry from the Klan's presence in the 1920's.

Historians estimate there were between four-and-five million Klansmen during the 1920's.  Membership began to decline even into the 1960's when the KKK attracted whites opposed to civil rights legislation.  Best guesses are the Klan membership then was in the hundreds of thousands.

Some conspiracy theorists claim white supremacy has gone underground to avoid detection.  That is clearly not the case since there are websites and social media posts spewing the nefarious doctrine. Law enforcement officials believe most of the venom is coming from just a handful of individuals.

Journalists recently uncovered a 2006 FBI Bulletin that warned of the threat of white nationalists and skinheads infiltrating law enforcement as evidence the problem has been ignored.  There have been isolated cases of police being outed for their white supremacy views.  But nothing widespread.

Yet there must be acknowledgment that hate crimes are on the rise, according to FBI data.  Incidents increased 17% in 2017, the latest available figures.  But the agency noted there are more law enforcement agencies reporting hate crimes than in the past.  It may account for some of the increase.

There were 7,175 cases reported by 2,040 of the more than 16,100 law enforcement agencies that submitted data.  The majority (58.1%) were categorized as hate crimes targeting a person's race, ethnicity or ancestry, while religious bias was found in 22% of cases.

Digging deeper, you find that 48.8% of the race, ethnicity or ancestry crimes were anti-African-American, 17.5% were anti-white, 10.9% were anti-Hispanic, 5.8 percent were anti-Native American and 3.1% were anti-Asian.  Clearly, hatred respects no racial or cultural boundaries.

Even in a country with chasms of disagreement on issues surely we can stand together in opposition to all forms of hatred.  The lesson of Nazi Germany is a reminder that if hatred of races, religions or ethnicities festers there are deadly consequences.  It cannot be excused or condoned in America.