A Manson of the online era
THE murders committed by Charles Manson’s deadly Californian cult in 1969 were intended to bring about a race war between blacks and whites.
As Manson saw it, that war would end with all whites dead and Manson’s “family” becoming the leaders of surviving blacks.
Things did not exactly turn out that way. Manson and several of his followers – mostly middle-class white women – were arrested just months after a two-day killing spree and, following their trials, were initially sentenced to be executed.
A few, those who haven’t already died, are still behind bars.
Accused Australian terrorist/white supremacist/anti-capitalist/ecofascist Brenton Tarrant also aimed to provoke a race war in the US.
According to the idiot’s manifesto, his slaying of 50 people in Christchurch would “ultimately result in a civil war that will eventually Balkanize the US along political, cultural and, most importantly, racial lines.
“This balkanization of the US will not only result in the racial separation of the people within the United States ensuring the future of the White race on the North American continent, but also ensuring the death of the ‘melting pot’ pipe dream.”
Tarrant is the first person in history to attempt launching a US race war from the South Island of New Zealand by killing worshippers at two mosques. It all makes sense to him, just as Manson’s deranged plan made sense to his brainwashed followers.
What makes even less sense is the effort to blame Tarrant’s alleged murders on various mainstream Australian media figures and outlets.
“In Australia, as in Europe and America, mainstream politicians and mainstream media commentators have increasingly toyed with extremist ideas in the pursuit of popularity,” academic Greg Barton wrote on the weekend.
“Many have openly brandished outrageous ideas that in previous years would have been unsayable in mainstream political discourse or commentary.”
Thus is drawn a straight line from mainstream media to the Christchurch atrocity. Twitter leftists go even further, singling out conservative columnists as being responsible for Tarrant’s actions.
Yet the accused killer’s manifesto reveals just how unlikely it is that he drew inspiration from any Australian commentators. He was opposed to conservatism, capitalism and the press, so presumably would not be reading anything by pro-capitalist, mainstream conservatives.
“Conservatism is corporatism in disguise, I want no part of it,” Tarrant wrote. “Conservatism is dead. Thank god. Now let us bury it and move on to something of worth.”
As for the media, Tarrant responds to his own question about from where he received, researched and developed his beliefs: “The internet, of course. You will not find the truth anywhere else.”
He’s a Manson of the digital age, and has as little to do with our broader debates as Manson had to do with Disneyland. Tarrant lived, thrived and killed online, in a perverse world he shared with like-minded maniacs.
“All the evidence suggests this was a horrific, cold-blooded, terrorist attack aimed not at the audiences of traditional news organisations,” ABC News executive editor Craig McMurtrie noted on Saturday, “but at reaching and triggering atomised and often extreme online audiences.”
Seems about right. So does a line from an Iraqi immigrant to New Zealand named Sama, who spoke to News Corp reporter Paul Toohey at Christchurch Hospital. Sama, like so many others in his community, had arrived at the hospital seeking further news on the shooting’s victims.
“We don’t hate the Aussies because of this,” he said. “It’s just him. He’s just a dickhead.”