Factual Dispatch #62 - Stochastic Terrorism Redux

Gamergate, swatting, and fake news will make 2024 uniquely dangerous

Stochastic Terrorism is different from traditional Terrorism in that it doesn’t produce a chain of guilty parties, at least according to American speech law. 9/11, the 7/7 bombings in the UK, IRA-led car bombings before that, any major terror event that comes to mind, probably had organizers/inciters, and those who carried the act out. This topic was actually the first I wrote on, back in November 2018 (Editor’s Note: We are so tired). Which resulted in me testifying on the topic to a jury in a West Palm Beach murder trial, in case you were wondering what I was doing while on break from writing.

Incidences of “regular” terrorism involve the inciter & the actor being confidants, colleagues, or co-workers at the worst company ever, if you will. In Stochastic Terrorism, the inciter calls for violence, and then someone in the inciter’s audience carries it out, at random. On their own accord, on their own time, with their own budget, and sometimes, with the help of local law enforcement.

This involves a fake 911 call that sends a severe emergency response to the target’s home, usually involving a SWAT team, risking the target’s life, safety, and security. During gamergate, women, and minorities were hit by this practice, egregiously. This practice has become so common that we have 4 distinct subclasses, celebrity, gamer, partisan, and hate swatting. The FBI started tracking these calls last year, but this is as effective at preventing new swattings, as thoughts and prayers have been to prevent mass shootings.

Disinformation creates alternative facts that motivate people to hurt the enemies of the tribe. In case this doesn’t sound possible, there have been bomb threats at public libraries, synagogues, schools, corporate headquarters, and against politicians on both sides of the aisle. GOP members Marjorie “Shivan Dragon” Taylor Green, and New York Rep Brandon Williams have been swatted since the beginning of this year alone.

Anyone in Trump’s way should be expecting it these days, as Dr. Fauci can tell you. Since January 1st 2024, Trump has been fined for disparaging a law clerk, and declared Shenna Bellows (Maine Secretary of State, pulled Trump from the ballot), Judge Engoron (judge of Trump’s fraud trial), Judge Tanya Chutkan (DC Judge of Trump’s criminal trial) and DoJ special counsel Jack Smith as “enemies.” Guess what happened next? They have all been swatted since.

It’s not just swatting, Trump called for violence directly a dozen times in his presidency, and hasn’t stopped since leaving office, even after being kicked off Meta & Twitter. The MAGA bomber (remember him?) and the Tree of Life synagogue mass shooting, are both textbook cases of Trump-driven Stochastic Terrorism. Ask the guy who attacked Pelosi’s husband with a hammer about his right wing media consumption. After Trump whined about Mar-a-Lago getting raided, An Ohio Trumper named Ricky Shiffer tried to breach the FBI field office in Cincinnati.

WaPo, Vox, ABC News, Axios, and even local outlets like northjersey.com have called a spade a spade. You can draw a straight line from 2015’s Gamergate to the calls for violence that Trump is making almost daily in 2024. Since no one has stopped him, he’s claiming there will be “bedlam” if Trump is prevented from becoming president.

Additionally, 20+ states are now signaling they’ll follow Texas fighting federal agents who are trying to cut razor wire at the border, in accordance with a Supreme Court decision. Guess who is cheering them on from Truth Social? The guy threatening to deport “millions” if re-elected.

Our laws need to change, especially if we want to keep the 1st Amendment. Many other countries restrict speech severely to prevent shouting “set fire to this crowded theater,” but that is usually not enough. In Modi’s India inciting violence is a crime, that goes unpunished if the violence is against Muslims. The same occurred in Bolsonaro’s Brazil.

We can prevent that from happening here, if we’re honest about the harm that’s being caused, and who is causing it. A “prolific” swatter was just arrested, and was shown to be just a teen, so we might not even be understanding the problem correctly. On the other hand, the NYTimes recently covered “swatting” in infuriatingly centrist terms, as if the problem is the breakdown of law enforcement norms, not the people being harassed or the lives being ruined. As if the problem is that political leaders aren’t condemning swatting loudly enough. Not that our cops are so trigger happy, we all know that calling the cops on someone can be a death sentence. Let’s start there, perhaps.

Keep your head up,
tn