The rise in right-wing attacks in modern society has had a profound effect on the current understandings of how the incidents should be addressed, calling for not only a political change but also a cultural one. The semantic labelling of far-right attacks following the recent timeline of events has unearthed a dominant historical framework which lacks understanding of the fundamental meaning and purpose of the attacks that often becomes overshadowed and concealed in much of its coverage. This archaic cultural ideology has become intertwined with current understandings of right-wing attacks, which results in the framing of the incidents as ‘political’ rather than ‘terrorist’ by the government and wider society reinforced by the mass media. This label has particularly for white offenders become a myogenic labelling process meaning that they avoid being associated with the ‘terrorist’ stigma, which can be reflected upon following the aftermath of recent attacks in Charlottesville. In this case the offender was charged with murder and hate crimes although the attorney initially described the attack as ‘the definition of domestic terrorism.’ Previous cases demonstrate an overarching double standard in how different perpetrators of terrorism offences are portrayed which is embedded in the political and judicial infrastructure of the majority of societies.
These labels allow a large proportion of right-wing offenders to ‘escape’ from more serious charges including counts of terrorism and extremism, alongside the negative social stigmas that come parallel to the detrimental framing of the offender’s identity. Instead they are given a cultural, political and lawful bypass into being treated as significantly less severe as other well established terrorist groups such as radical Islamic extremists who are at the forefront of the political, media and cultural attention. The media has taken a pivotal role in disseminating the double standard culture into the social sphere through associating non-terrorism labels with the identity of right-wing attackers. The media has reinforced this concept through the association of non-terrorism labels with the identity of right-wing attackers such as ‘shooters, suspects and white-supremacists.’ Whilst for similar instances the media directly links Islamist attacks (of the same nature) including the Manchester bombings and Las Ramblas attacks as undeniably terrorist incidents.
Previous instances have been pivotal in understanding the political and social relationship between far-right attacks and terrorism which has created a pool of misunderstanding as an unprecedented by-product within modern culture. This narrative has had detrimental consequences for many Western communities that are sub-consciously prioritising their efforts into the prevention of international radical Islamist terrorist threats which has produced a greater circumference for domestic far-right terrorism threats to expand in both capacity and severity.
To fully understand the true velocity of upcoming terrorism threats, the Christchurch shootings has re-emphasised that the global political and social innocence surrounding right-wing extremism as a severe terrorist threat needs to be re-evaluated. The recent attack in Christchurch has resurfaced the double standard narrative, leading to many discussions within both academia and politics surrounding the current injustice within the terrorism framework and how this negatively affects the political and judicial systems. The event has led to a progressive movement towards understanding and reframing right-wing attacks as a direct form of terrorism. The New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Arden has been at the forefront of this change through explicitly highlighting the coherent relationship between the Christchurch attacks and terrorism. These actions have significantly changed how the scale and severity of right-wing extremism is understood and has recognised right-wing extremism as an underrepresented threat that needs to be addressed consistently as an equal threat to other well-established extremist groups.
This framework has rippled into the New Zealand Home Affairs with positive and progressive effects, which has rededicated its efforts to tackling white supremacy as an extremist ideology. Although this change may only be representative of one community, the effects and global impact of the Christchurch attack has shown promise for a nuanced and upcoming narrative of understanding right-wing extremism that is influencing cultural, political and societal change to reframing its relationship with understanding modern terrorism threats. The actions made by New Zealand should be an example for other law enforcement agencies, as refocusing efforts and removing the double standard will allow agencies to truly grasp the velocity and origin of upcoming threats.
This will require a societal change from the current archaic ideology that there is a single overarching terrorist threat, which will undeniably push a new framework that recognises that the origins of security threats are as domestic as they are international*. By realigning the ideologies woven into the judicial, law enforcement and societal frameworks societies can become truly equipped and knowledgeable about upcoming threats and can plan public safety accordingly.
* See e.g., CENTRIC’s TRANSRAD project