Submitted September 17, 2024
My name is Patrick Riccards, and I am executive director and CEO of Life After Hate, the United States’ leading violence intervention organization and one of the world’s leading social service organizations helping individuals successfully disengage from violent extremist groups and online hate spaces.
Now, more than ever, our nation needs individuals and organizations who are committed to building safer communities by combating violent extremism and hate crimes. By offering practical paths to help individuals disengage from their lives of violent and destructive hate, Life After Hate is without peer in providing a place where violent extremists can take accountability for their past actions and reintegrate into society in meaningful, productive ways.
The data is clear. The United States continues to experience a surge in homegrown domestic terror incidents. This reality is flooded into our lives on a daily basis through social media platforms and news outlets. Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Charleston, Orlando, Jacksonville…. the deadly violence of domestic terrorism continues to threaten our nation on overwhelming levels. And recent public opinion data from Life After Hate clearly shows Americans believe that ideologically-driven violence has gotten worse over the last decade.
The vast majority of these incidents come at the hands of white supremacists, antisemetics, xenophobes, homophobes, and anti-government extremists. According to data compiled by the Center for Strategic International Studies and analyzed by The Washington Post, “since 2015, right-wing extremists have been involved in 267 plots or attacks and 91 fatalities, the data shows.” Recent FBI data shows ideology-based violent crimes at their highest levels in more than a decade.
This frightening data only accounts for physical, in-person actions. It doesn’t begin to factor in the attacks, threats, vitriol, tropes, and the hate and rhetoric that is being circulated across social media platforms for promotion and recruitment purposes. Hate is stronger, and continues to grow in many who have the protection of hiding behind a keyboard, and equipping themselves with the tools to terrorize communities.
Simply put, violent extremism in the United States poses a clear and present danger to our nation, our communities, and our loved ones. Research study after research study demonstrates that ideology-based violence continues to rise, year after year. Despite the data and despite the public understanding, we, as a civil society, still do very little to address this scourge. We fear that calling out the violent far right is somehow a political statement, rather than one targeting hate-based ideology. We fear that calling out violent antisemitism, for instance, is somehow an endorsement of islamophobia. We fear that calling out violent misogyny or attacks against the LGBTQ+ community is an affront to the male ego. And we fear that calling violent extremism what it is — domestic terrorism — is somehow an idea that can be misunderstood, misapplied, or misperceived as an overreaction, a misrepresentation, or a fiction.
So I commend the Senate Judiciary Committee for taking on this issue, and taking it seriously.
Last year, Life After Hate conducted a national survey, determining public perceptions about this trend. It found that 66% of Americans believe that the number of violent hate crimes has increased over the last decade, while 68% believe that violent acts of hate should be considered domestic forms of terrorism. But almost half, 48%, also believe that those who commit such acts cannot reform or change their ways. We recognize that the threats posed by hate crimes are very real, and growing, but we doubt there is anything that really can be done to combat it.
As a result, much of the collective work focused on addressing issues of violent extremism in the United States is a nibbling around the edges of our societal fabric, doing very little to actually step the tide of hate crimes in America. We take action, but not too much out of fear of being targeted. We treat the primary and tertiary care necessary to help individuals disengage from hateful ideology much like Hogwarts did with Voldemort — work that should not be named. We seek out labels that will not offend, we minimize the risks not addressing the problem causes, and we struggle to adequately discuss the benefits of confronting violent extremism and the societal costs of not doing so.
If we are to take hate crimes and those who commit them seriously, we need to adopt approaches that require individuals, groups, and the government to take specific action.
It means not only acknowledging that hate crimes are a problem, but also being ready to commit to a solution. That means transforming one’s personal or societal concerns into a call to arms to demonstrate to a variety of audiences, in dramatic and memorable ways, that there are real solutions for addressing violent extremism, solutions that are the right ones for the particular problems we now face.
It means realizing that ideologically driven violence is not only an urgent concern, but it is also one that demands those available solutions. If one has been successful in defining the scourge of violent extremism in the correct terms, it will be easier for us to state solutions convincingly.
It means being prepared for the inevitable reality that some people will reject the proposed solutions. This leads to the most difficult stage of successful social change. Some will be reluctant to face the truth regarding the size, scope, and impact of violent extremism today, others will say the tradeoffs and the costs that come from making violent extremism public enemy number one aren’t worth it, and will try to poke holes in our solutions. This resistance may be heightened by misunderstanding, narrow thinking, wishful thinking, or resistance to change.
It means that, once one has pushed through this resistance, they can weigh the choices rationally and look to a variety of options for moving recommendations into practice. As leaders in this process — with a unique awareness of how decisions are made — groups like Life After Hate can clarify the pros and cons of each decision and allow time and opportunity for deliberation. Those that matter must see that violent extremism is a growing problem, that there are viable acts for confronting it, and that those acts are worth our time and attention.
The process of moving from awareness to action takes time. If we, as a civil society, are committed to standing up and rejecting violent extremism and its resultant hate crimes, then we have to accept that we are taking on ideologies that issues that are largely driven by emotion and in the absence of fact or truth. Ideologically based hate is emotional. Hate crimes are emotional. Terrorism is emotional. There is no getting around it.
That is why we must harness the power of compassion, of understanding, of redemption, and of community to combat such emotions. If one believes that violent extremism is a clear and present danger threatening the our communities and our collective strength, we must engage it head on, with all that we collectively possess.
Commitment to Mission
Violent extremism (VE) in the United States today includes violence-justifying white supremacist, antisemitic, misogynist, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-immigrant, anti-Latino, anti-Asian, anti-Muslim, and anti-government beliefs. As previously shared, Life After Hate’s primary mission is to help individuals disengage from violent extremist groups and online hate spaces and reintegrate into society after involvement in VE. We provide services at the individual, family, and local community levels in conjunction with public education initiatives to weaken the growth and impact of violent extremist groups by showing individuals pathways away from hate and ideologically-driven violence.
Life After Hate is clear that our priority is the safety and wellbeing of those we serve and of society at large. This means that the decisions and recommendations made to exiting individuals should align with our commitment to the safety of society, the individuals’ wellbeing, and with best and promising practice.
The tertiary intervention services that Life After Hate is pioneering is but one way that our community can prevent future acts of violent extremism, an essential part of a comprehensive approach to preventing and countering violent extremism today. That care requires that the exiting individual, and not the organization itself, be the focus. Those committed to the exit process should not be exploited as PR tools to help boost an organization’s public position, and no former extremist should ever be forced to tell his or her story. The individual, their successful exit from violent extremism, and the safety of society must always be our priority. Life After Hate will continue to release our policies and guidance for organizations working with exiting individuals and Formers that will demonstrate a commitment to focusing on the client, as we have over the past few years.
The Mental Health Aspects of Hate Crimes
In our work, we find that the scope of violence often far exceeds the traditional definition of terrorism and violent extremism. If we focused our services only on hate crimes, we would be placing exiting individuals, their families, and our communities at risk from other forms of violence. Unfortunately, countering violent extremism (CVE) programs are not often composed of multidisciplinary teams with the training and experience working with other forms of violence, such as intimate partner violence and child abuse, nor recognizing, assessing, and managing risk for suicide. Sometimes, this means that interventions or advice that focuses solely on addressing violent extremism causes or can cause harm to those individuals in an extremist’s environment.
Based on the Life After Hate data, we determined:
- 88% of exiting individuals endorsed experiencing at least one mental health symptom or risk factor such as suicidal ideation, violence ideation, depressed mood, anxiety, panic, major shifts in mood, angry outbursts, or low self-esteem.
- Nearly 50% of exiting individual reported some form of risk at intake, with 42% reporting suicidal ideation and 28% reporting violence ideation or intent within the past 30 days.
- When asked, 42% of exiting individuals reported feeling alone and 35% reported feeling helpless. Individuals who were actively involved in violent far right extremist groups and those who had recently disengaged were most likely to report feeling alone and helpless, while those who had been disengaged for multiple years were less likely to endorse those feelings.
Mental health is a key consideration to confronting hate crimes today, and programs who seek to support self-referred individuals who are or have been involved in violent extremism should be prepared to assess for and respond to mental health needs. This reinforces the need for a multidisciplinary team with licensed behavioral health providers who are trained to recognize, screen, and respond to mental health needs. Though mental health symptoms or disorders may not be the reason the individual became involved or remained in violent extremism, they may be barriers to disengagement and reintegration.
Loneliness and helplessness are major factors, and programs working with exiting individuals should address issues of loneliness and social isolation. Direct social support, such as peer mentoring, or through services that promote the development of healthy social support networks such as education or skills training to develop interpersonal skills may be helpful. Likewise, programs should empower and support socially responsible self-determination in exiting individuals through future-oriented planning, goal setting, and services to address barriers to achieving personal goals.
These realities demonstrate the challenges that organizations like Life After Hate face at the start of each exit and highlights the need for the changes we are currently adopting in the services we provide. The individuals coming to Life After Hate are grappling with serious issues. For years, there is much that providers like Life After Hate believed, based on anecdotal evidence. Now, there is clear data directly from those individuals who are involved in and exiting violent extremism to support those assumptions.
Tertiary Care Provided by a Multidisciplinary Team
While the proverb, “It takes a village …” is grossly overused, it is a truth when it comes to countering violent extremism and helping individuals successfully disengage from lives of violent hate and reintegrate into civil society.
Those who have known Life After Hate since 2011 may have noticed that we have evolved tremendously as an organization in recent years. Today, our work is built on priorities like transparency, professional standards, codes of ethics, data-driven practices, and outcomes. We have evolved from being the first nonprofit organization in the United States dedicated to facilitating exit from the violent far right to now being the national leader in tertiary intervention from violent extremism, while working with individuals from around the globe on their journeys out of ideological hate and violence. We continually recognize our responsibility to society, our clients, the organization, the nation, and the world.
This evolution was intentional. Today, all of Life After Hate’s work is based on a simple philosophy – compassion with accountability. It isn’t every non-profit organization that can put such a statement forward as its mantra. For us, though, it is a statement that reflects our commitment, our passion, and our work.
Declaring such a goal is easy. Fulfilling it, particularly in the CVE space, is far more challenging. One key to Life After Hate’s work is our commitment to a dynamic and diverse team of professionals focused on our mission and the difficult work at hand. By employing a multidisciplinary team with psychologists, social workers, and former extremists, there is a higher likelihood of success in promoting disengagement and reintegration. By creating and maintaining a safe space to build awareness of the dangers of ideology-based violence, we address a range of issues within our communities of influence. In many instances, our models and approaches have been adopted by the community – and by partners and competitors – who recognize our work as being industry-leading.
Our case managers are trained as social workers, providing case management services, psychoeducation, and skills training to promote exit from violent extremism. Our team offers psychoeducational support groups that are developed for exiting individuals and led by these case managers and by our Exit specialists, all of whom have successfully left behind their past lives of violent extremism to now stand as exemplars of the second chances society can provide if one takes responsibility for their past actions.. Today, these Exit specialists work with individuals to challenge and modify violent extremist beliefs, behaviors, and social networks to promote reintegration into society.
These services, and the teams that provide them, are an essential tool to helping build safer communities and prevent future acts of violent extremism. When Life After Hate was first established, we were simply a group of former violent extremists looking to offer our own experiences to others. At the time, such support was all that was necessary. Over time, we came to realize that the people we were mentoring often had complex needs that required the skilled intervention and support of a variety of professionals, including social workers and mental health professionals. Today, we realize that addressing hate crimes and those responsible for them requires far, far more than simply meaning well and trying hard. It demands services developed and led by an interdisciplinary team of licensed professionals, partnering with those with shared, lived experiences. Those services are delivered by Life After Hate professionals virtually, allowing us to protect confidentiality, ensure the safety of our team, and serve individuals in need across the globe.
The role of former extremists in the process is central to the success of this work. Formers play an essential role to exiting individuals, as no one else brings the experiences they do in understanding both living a life of violent hate and the struggles and benefits that come from ultimately leaving it and taking responsibility for the hate crimes they have committed. Our Exit specialists are some of the strongest individuals one will find, each day taking accountability for their past actions and each day making amends through their current work. From my point of view, a dedicated commitment to reducing ideology-based hate crimes in the United States is not be possible without the hard work, the proven achievements, and the dedication of this population of professionals with lived experiences in violent extremist groups and online hate spaces.
The policies, standards, and procedures adopted by Life After Hate and organizations like it further our collective commitment to compassion with accountability. All members of our team, regardless of their histories, should be held accountable both for their past actions and current work. If we expect exiting individuals to take accountability for their actions, then we must do the same ourselves. Accountability is a non-negotiable in this work, along with compassion, empathy, integrity, and redemption.
The services Life After Hate provides to exiting individuals is labor intensive. Our participants come to us in various stages of disengagement from violent behavior; it can take months or years to completely disengage from VE and reintegrate into society. To see this through completion, our multidisciplinary team sustains meaningful connections and partnerships with those that we serve.
In addition to being intensive, this work is getting more and more complex. Recent efforts to provide targeted services to women engaged in violent extremism is one example, with case managers and specialists collaborating to offer the individual and group support these individuals need to successfully disengage. The complexity of this example pales in our recent commitments to take on court-mandated cases and to work with juveniles (often also court mandated). As a mandate-to-report organization, we do this not only because we are asked, but also because we know it is necessary to make our communities safer and to confront the growth of violent ideology in society.
Conclusion
I’m often asked if “these people,” those seeking to exit lives of violent hate, are worth the time, effort, and expense. One only needs to see the impact a multidisciplinary team can have on a struggling individual, providing the roadmap and supports necessary to travel the road of redemption and rebirth. These skilled team members make our communities stronger and safer each day, strengthening the roots a modern civil society demands and helping law enforcement prevent future hate crimes. Equally important, they show individuals the kindness, empathy, and tough love necessary to reject violent extremism and leave behind lives of violent hate. They show that life after hate is indeed possible, both in their work and in the impact it has on the many individuals they help.
