Texas mall shooter part of new 'choose-your-own-adventure' generation of extremists: former FBI agent
May 08, 2023
Accused Allen, Texas shooter Mauricio Garcia, who was killed by police after a massacre that murdered eight people, was reportedly a follower of white supremacist and neo-Nazi ideology — but also belonged to a number of other extremist movements.
This isn't a one-off, argued former FBI agent Clint Watts on MSNBC's "The ReidOut" Monday — indeed, he said, young extremists are increasingly developing their own unique brands of hate from a mix of different ideologies.
"This person, just to give his background," said anchor Joy Reid. "A military background, in the military for three months before he was booted for a physical or mental condition. Did not complete basic training. He had this right-wing death squad patch on, which we have seen the Proud Boys wear. We have a picture of the shooter showing this right-wing — there he is, showing the RWDS patch. And on the right, we have member Jeremy Bertino of the Proud Boys, who has pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy. That's from the posting he made on his social networking platform. And I have one more thing to show you, Enrique Tarrio, who just got convicted of seditious conspiracy, also wearing a vest with RWDS. Explain this tie to the military and to neo-Nazism, particularly since this person is Hispanic and not white."
"One thing I would note is over the last, probably, decade, but particularly during the social media era, you see a blending of ideologies," said Watts. "It's a choose-your-own-adventure of extremism ideologies. You could see this pretty consistently, people staying at home, picking their ideology, whatever their hateful ideology, is and mixing and matching it. There are already suggestions it wasn't just white supremacy, it was also incel misogyny. He also connections to Russian platforms."
That sort of mix of extremist affiliations, Watts continued, is "highly common in these online spaces."
"You'll see a lot of overlap between these groups," said Watts. "That's why you'll see it showing up in a group like the Proud Boys having that patch that inspires other individuals in extremism circles. I think the key point of this is online spaces are the connective tissue. In person, it is the access to weapons. I mean, just rabid access to weapons. Someone has an ideology. They want to decide to do it, there's an idea known as accelerationism. Let's accelerate a race war by producing violence and indiscriminate targeting, just to do that is a sign that they wanted to escalate the violence to try to tip off others or to inspire others as well."
Watch the segment below or at this link.
Leave a Comment
Related Post