Anti-Government Movement Hits the Mainstream
Advocating for a Violent Uprising
Cristal M Clark
No matter what the movement is these days it seems that more and more they gain speed by hitting social media. The latest is the uprising of a movement which advocates extreme violence targeting liberal political opponents and law enforcement. The movement calls for a new and more violent civil type of war.
According to Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI), an independent non-profit of scientists and engineers that tracks and reports on misinformation and hate speech across social media has been watching this movement.
For years the movement dubbed the Boogaloo, spread offline or via special invite only until recently, when it suddenly leapt onto social media platforms and took off for lack of better words.
In short, it’s what the FBI would consider yet another hate group and the platforms it’s been able to gain advocates from are but not limited to, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Reddit, as well as 4chan.
The current boogaloo movement was first noticed by extremism researchers in 2019, when groups from gun rights and militia movements to white supremacists began referring to an impending civil war using the term boogaloo, a joking reference to “Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo,” a 1984 sequel movie about breakdancing. The term is used to describe an uprising against a seemingly tyrannical or left-wing government, often in response to a perceived threat of wide-spread gun confiscation, which is one of the biggest reasons these groups tend to grow.
They spread misinformation about gun rights and gun ownership and nothing pisses off a gun owner more than the potential for the United States Government to take away the right to keep and bear arms.
NCRI researchers analysed more than 100 million social media posts and comments found that through the use of memes and inside jokes commonly in the form of images extremists have pushed anti-government and anti-law enforcement messages across social media platforms. They have also organised online communities with tens of thousands of members, some of whom have assembled at real-world events to watch and learn, perhaps looking for weak spots in the events security measures.
The study reveals some alarming intel into the movement, Boogaloo extremists have used social media to develop strategic plans, share instructions for explosives and 3D printed firearms, distribute illegal firearm modifications, and siphon users into encrypted messaging boards en mass and to spread racism.
The group has thousands of followers and it’s favorite way to send messages out to the masses is the use of memes. The language of a meme permits the network to organize violence secretly behind what looks like inside jokes and of course plausible deniability.
What’s more is that NCRI was able to identify cyber swarms and viral insurgencies in nearly real-time as they are happening.
The report comes as U.S. law enforcement officials and researchers at various levels have issued warnings about the growing threat posed by domestic extremists motivated by fringe ideologies and conspiracy theories.
The group is gaining at an alarming rate in popularity, it seems to really center primarily around anything anti-gun, mass shootings, and of course any attempt to remove Trump from office, posting, sharing and spreading misinformation under the guise of fake news or funny memes.
Cristal M Clark
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