Julia Ebner Interview (Mostly Unedited)
Added 2023-09-16 10:14:18 +0000 UTCPlease enjoy an advance release of an interview we recently conducted with the researcher and author, Julia Ebner. Julia's work has focused on exploring the dynamics of far-right and other extremist networks. Julia is a wealth of information and do not let the knowledge she has published with Chris put you off listening!
We've edited out some technical difficulties but otherwise all the verbal tics and long-winded questions are there unedited. Audio version to follow after some processing.
Comments
I, too, want to learn more about how we can intervene and even prevent radicalization in the first place before people get hurt. My sense is that education, social safety nets, and more community building for the most vulnerable are key, but having concrete ideas of what we can do would help. If nothing else, it seems that the IDW muddy the terrain, making it more difficult to figure out who are the ones just soaking up the conspiracies yet doing nothing beyond grousing and voting for crazies from those who become violent.
Linda Sears
2023-09-19 12:19:09 +0000 UTCGood interview, lots of food for thought there. I liked the idea behind the digital citizen concept. Particularly the aspects of public education and the ideas of mobilising pro-social instincts amongst the wider public and civil society as a whole, rather than leaving the task to the state institutions or its ngo adjuncts. Julia mentioned also an interest in moving beyond the rather narrow (and somewhat circular) confines of how the counter-extremism (CX) milieu defines "radicalisation" as restricted to ideological tendencies that produce politically-motivated violence as outcomes. In general there are a number of issues with the CX outlook that I think act as restraints or blockages on the development of research approaches to far right (and other) ideological movements. (I limit myself to the FR here, bc that's my main field of experience, but ovs the questions generalise to other ideological quarters). I find the limitations of the CX framework (inevitably I'm caricaturing here, due to lack of space) in 3 areas: foundational, diagnostic and remedial. On the foundational limitations, I follow Michael Billig's critique of using cognitive psychology as the default starting point for social psychology approaches to ideological movements (cf his essays in "Ideology and Opinions" and other texts from that era). Billig started as Henri Tajfel's doctoral student and took part in the design and execution of the original minimal group experiments that Social Identity Theory came out of, so he knows whereof he speaks. After his doctorate, Billig moved onto more concrete research of prejudice in interviewing members of the National Front in the mid-70s, so his views are grounded in practical experience of researching the FR, and well worth a look. The second issue with the CX framework - diagnostics - is really a result of the attempt to have a "non-political" approach to ideology. This can lead to a "symptomatic" approach to reading rather than a semantic or hermeneutic approach to engaging with the actual narrative and actanct-mythologising content. The result of trying to short-circuit the interpretative question by referring solely to violent outcomes, makes it very difficult to answer the "pipeline" question that came up in the interview. How do you actually know if this IDW layer that lies between the mainstream and more extreme radical right ideological territory is acting more as a pipeline from the former to the latter, or some kind of ideological "wetland" that soaks up its audience and acts as a buffer between the shifting sands and the devil's deep blue sea? Finally, the most practical question, in some ways, the remedial one. The anti-fascist (AF) movement has always significantly relied on the role of conversion - that convinced fascists could experience a damascene conversion and start to work for the other side. From Ray Hill, to Martin Collins (UK context here) and many others, the role of conversos has been more than simple intelligence, but actively a part of sabotaging and breaking up FR formations. CX doesn't really have a model for conversion, its a purely negative "ex-extremist" picture ("I used to be a werewolf, but I'm alright nooOOOOw!"). In practice a number of the people claiming "ex-extremist" status are less than honest. Obvious spoofers like Heimbach fool virtually no one. But the CX milieu has a much worse track record than the AF one of telling the spoofers apart from the genuine article. Majiid's career and the Quilliam debacle is a case in point. I'll leave it there (too long already!). But maybe Julia might want to interview Michael Billig, while he's still around and working?
Paul Bowman
2023-09-19 09:55:39 +0000 UTCMine says the opposite. i like violent movies, I like violent videogames and I'm not a bit violent IRL. It's anecdotal but still I don't see a trend. I have serious doubts if even the age requirements for such things have any serious evidence to support.
João Barbosa
2023-09-18 04:18:00 +0000 UTCI noticed that too, what Julia said about the movies. My intuition tells me she’s right. What would be a good experiment to tell? Stuart Ritchie would have to be happy with it, a study good enough to satisfy him. Hmmm…I wonder why people like watching horrible violent things—I sure don’t like it. To me it is such a huge mystery why some people like to watch torture in the movies.
Lucy
2023-09-18 01:48:31 +0000 UTCAt about min 24 she associates the seeing of movies and other content with violence, with IRL violence. This I completely disagree with, but you didn't push back against it.
João Barbosa
2023-09-17 18:52:12 +0000 UTCGreat interview lads. Thank you. Although, not long enough. I only got through half my household chores. :D
LaserRange
2023-09-16 23:34:04 +0000 UTCShe is the first person I see who uses the term "conspiracy myth" as consistently as I do. Then I checked, and of course, she is from Austria too :)
Protagonist Science
2023-09-16 21:37:36 +0000 UTCThank you for this. I've been waiting to learn from her expertise in this area, especially as regards to how traumas, identity crises, and loneliness can make people vulnerable to these extremist groups, even if these groups are only forgerd through internet/ digital interactions. I've mentioned this before that my sister taught Freshman composition to the El Paso shooter a couple of years before his horrible actions, which is why what Julia is saying is so important for us to understand. This student's writings in her class demonstrated some aggression towards immigrants, but he was not unusual in his ideas, unfortunately. Both of us teach young people in an open enrollment community college in Texas, and we are constantly worried that another person we've taught will go off the rails in an area where firearms are all to easy to access and mass shootings have occured not far from where we live. Just this last semester, I had a white male student openly make a lewd gesture towards me in my class because he was not doing well academically, and he probably saw me as "woke" (this just a few weeks after a swatting event at or campus and a week before a mass shooting near our college). I didn't report it out of fear he'd come back to get me, which is not my proudest moment. Neither of us can be directly open in our views because of fears of being fired if a student comes forward with criticisms. We live in an increasingly far-right state where academics with leftist views have been targeted. For example, one of our colleagues was effectively fired for recommending that students wear masks before the vaccines were available. Sorry for the rant--this whole issue strikes a nerve. Please give Julia my appreciation for doing her important work.
Linda Sears
2023-09-16 15:09:55 +0000 UTC
