Hate speech can express displaced personal unhappiness rather than genuine ideology

Evidence

Criminal psychologist Lydia Benecke refers to a discussion she had with a right-wing populist who had made hate comments about her on Facebook for what he thought was justifying criminals. “Looking at his profile, I noticed that he was mourning his childhood and had a totally unsuccessful current life.” When she approached him about it, she was initially met with astonishment, “But the funny thing is that he then went into it and said, ‘Yeah, I’m unhappy and talking about how shit all the refugees are right now because I’m not doing well,’ and got to the point of saying, ‘Maybe I should go to therapy and think about myself again.’” — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice, 239

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the broader theme of understanding why people hold irrational beliefs — evokes the ‘function a belief fulfills’ framing in the chapter title and beyond. — connects to: Hatred of welfare claimants actually expresses hatred of one’s own work. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1708
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: what share of online hate speech actually traces to personal misery versus strategic political signaling?