The events of the mass killing of innocent people at prayer on 15th March 2019 led to feelings of shock and despair resonating far beyond Christchurch. However, underlying these reactions was another feeling amongst observers – a looming realisation that such a terrorist attack was not as surprising as it should be. In an environment of political polarisation in which debate has become febrile and brittle, in which extreme ideologies of the far-right are given too much freedom to roam, there has long been a risk of violence spilling into our societies and communities.
This dual sense of shock and expectance present amongst observers suggests two things about the extreme far-right violent: firstly, in many ways, the far-right is just as violent and dangerous as other kinds of extremism and should be treated that way; and, secondly, in other ways, right-wing extremism is more dangerous, exceptional because of its ubiquity.
Such attacks clearly show us that the extreme-right is just as capable of enabling attacks as so-called ‘Islamist’ forms of violence. What has been exposed is a stubborn bias that has persisted in discussion on violent extremism that has prioritised ‘religious’ formations – particularly acts that have been justified using Islamic language – over and above other forms of violent extremism and polarisation. As the Christchurch shooting demonstrates with great macabre is that religion is not, and should never, be considered a defining feature of violent extremism. In fact, the factors involved in how individuals choose to engage in terrorist acts – irrespective of their motive as either ‘religious’ or ‘non-religious’ – bare similarities across different contexts, and understanding these similarities is important in determining how individuals become involved in violent extremism.
