Traumatic events prompt extremists to reconsider accepted worldviews.

Evidence

These included a gun possession charge, rejection by the military, a friend’s suicide, and an extended period of unemployment. For some white supremacists, the reorienting events involved black individuals. — Ryan Andrew Brown, Todd C. Helmus, Rajeev Ramchand, Alina I. Palimaru, Sarah Weilant, Ashley L. Rhoades, and Liisa Hiatt (RAND Corporation), Violent Extremism in America, 40

Categorization

• XREF: These reorienting events echo concepts in existing radicalization literature on ‘turning points’ and crisis-triggered identity change. — connects to: Recent traumas resist nation-building reframing until they grow mythic — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on…, 738; Unconscious aggression drives some traumatized individuals to terrorism while others choose cults or conformity — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4098; People mid-way out of a worldview need acceptance alongside facts — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice: How to Communicate…, 313 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Political events can re-trigger radical feelings years after an extremist exit. #expands (0.84) — Ryan Andrew Brown, Todd C. Helmus, Rajeev Ramchand, Alina I. Palimaru, Sarah Weilant, Ashley L. Rhoades, and Liisa Hiatt (RAND Corporation), Violent Extremism in America, 457
• People mid-way out of a worldview need acceptance alongside facts #qualifies (0.82) — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice, 313
• Unconscious aggression drives some traumatized individuals to terrorism while others choose cults or conformity #complicates (0.80) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4098
• Violently interrupting the institutional repetition of a worldview can destroy it #expands (0.79) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1222
• Recent traumas resist nation-building reframing until they grow mythic #qualifies (0.78) — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, 738
• Deradicalized former extremists can directly report what changed their beliefs #expands (0.76) — Ryan Andrew Brown, Todd C. Helmus, Rajeev Ramchand, Alina I. Palimaru, Sarah Weilant, Ashley L. Rhoades, and Liisa Hiatt (RAND Corporation), Violent Extremism in America, 129