Music Hath Charms 0
Following the Milwaukee massacre, the press has discovered the seamy underground of white power punk (as an SPLC supporter, I was already aware of it and other manifestations of the mongers of extreme hate).
Psychology Today blogger Anthony Lemieux, who has studied that music, considers the message in the music and its use in recruiting haters. A nugget:
A couple of years ago, one of my former students did a detailed research study examining the lyrical themes in White Supremacist music and in short found a series of reliable and recurrent themes. Those mentioned here are just a small (but representative) sample of what we found. But it is important to note that emphasizing the need for ‘awakening’ is one of the themes that is particularly important in the context of violence, because violence is positioned as the means by which the masses can be shocked from their collective complacency. Not only are the perceived problems and threats that Whites face attributed to racial and religious minorities, but the solution to those problems is purported to be through the embracing of eliminationist themes and justification of violence.
