Nihilist Violent Extremism

much already happening. This episode is also about the people in government who categorize and classify want to be terrorists, who want the country to collapse faster, and what these changes in categorization methods can tell us about the future of the country. I'm Garrison Davison today I'm joined by a very special guest, philosopher and comedian Michael Burns of the YouTube channel Michael o'burns and formerly wiscrack rip.

we will, we will get into this. Do you want to give like a philosophy one oh one definition of nihilism? A super well known and universally agreed upon term that always means the same thing to everybody.

care more about Heaven than they do about earth. They care more about the life they're going to have an eternity than the life they have in the here and now. So for him, it's like this devaluement of life that happens.

no inherent meaning in reality, but cool. Now, me and the homies can construct meaning as we see fit, which is more like the existentialist response, We're going to create meaning where maybe there wasn't natural meaning in this like old school Platonic or Christian sense.

you know. And of course in that movie, nihilism is represented by a crew of I think Austrian techno producers called Autobahn, who are also nihilists, and they say throughout the film like we are nihilist, we believe in nothing, which is a really and obviously the Coen Brothers made that film, at least one of them was a philosophy major,

so they know what they're doing. That's kind of the really basic, not good enough version of this thing that it seems like the FBI is operating with, like people who don't believe in the goodness of the Western project.

indiscriminate chaos, destruction, and social instability. Nihlis violent extremists work individually or as a part of a network with these goals of destroying civilized society through the corruption and exploitation of vulnerable populations, which often include minors. Now, this is where it's going to get into some kind of weirder

stuff that we will kind of explain later. They have like a second definition here quote nihilist vile extreamists, both individually and as a network, systematically and methodically target vulnerable

populations across the United States and the globe. They frequently use social media communication platforms to connect with individuals and desensitize them to violence, among other things, breaking down societal norms regarding engaging in violence, normalizing the possession, production, and sharing of gore materials, and otherwise corrupting and grooming those individuals towards committing future acts of violence unquote. And that kind of outlines some of the strategy of these groups,

the groups that they're kind of gonna mention here. I've been doing like freelance research on for about four years now. I've been trying to publish a few articles on these guys over the years, but it's always it's always tricky, and we will get to kind of the darker corners of that in a sect. But let's let's first kind of talk about what this new term, this nvees nihilist violent extremists. What this is kind of replacing the in

the FBI lexicon. Now, it seems that this term is being used in place of two previous FBI terrorism categories. This is from a November twenty twenty FBI bulletin quote

anti government or anti authority violent extremism. This threatet ncompasses the potentially unlawful use or threat of force or violence in furtherance of ideological agendas derived from anti government or anti authority sentiment, including opposition to perceived economic, social, or racial hierarchies, or perceived government overreach, negligence, or illegitimacy.

at these structures of belief in the world. So rather than being like motivated by hatred or love or fear or whatever, a more classically nihilists few is just again like, oh, I've been sold a bill of goods on what the meaning of existences or what the undermining underlying principles of political reality are, And now I see that they are maybe bs.

racially or ethnically motivated violent extremism. Right, this is like your what term assists your neo nazis. The FBI defines it as quote. This threating compasses the potentially unlawful use or threat of force or violence and furtherance of ideological agendas derived from bias, often relating to race or ethnicity held by the actor against others or a given population group.

Racially or ethnically motivated Violet extreamists purported to use both political and religious justifications to support their racially or ethnically based ideological objectives and criminal activities. This was the group that saw like a massive, a massive explosion and growth the past ten years, really starting around twenty sixteen to twenty seventeen, with you know, the Neo Nazi mass shooting like epidemic, especially around like twenty seventeen to twenty nineteen.

This is the most lethal group and it grew exponentially during that period, and we're kind of seeing some of these groups start to reform now. Now there's been some reporting that this that this anti government or anti authority violent extremism, which I'm just going to say agave, which is the acronym, which does make me a little bit

hungry for a glucose syrup, but it's fine. Now, there's been some reporting that state agave is specifically like a Biden era term, but it actually like predates the Biden presidency and was in use under Trump. In fact, a lot of the internal FBI reforms that are being reported on right now are actually undoing changes and counter terrorism strategies that started under the first Trump presidency. But we'll

get more on that later. We're gonna go on an ad break real quick and return to talk about a gruesome act of violence in Wisconsin last month. All right, we are back. I'm gonna get more into how the government is using this term and like what they are applying it to, what they're applying the nihilist of violent

extremism labeled to. Earlier this year, a Wisconsin team mal Nikota Cassup killed his parents in an attempt to gain the financial means and autonomy necessary to carry out a plot to assassinate President Trump and accelerate the collapse of the United States. I'm going to read a quote from a federal criminal complaint filed last month. Quote. On March third, twenty twenty five, County sheriffs obtained a search warrant for

casp cell phone. During the review, they identified material on the phone related to quote unquote the order of nine angles. The sheriff's review of the phone identified possible usernames for Cassup, including Accelerationists fourteen and Awoken unquote. Now, Michael are you unfortunate enough to be familiar with the Order of Nine Angles?

especially through radicalizing US soldiers. At this point, they're pretty mythic with their writing and tactics, leaving a strong lingering presence across the left hand Path, fascist, occult mill u. We also have a reference to quote unquote accelerationism here,

which kind of similar to nihilism. Is like this philosophical term which has kind of been like warped and changed VIA's people's application of it in politics, and specifically kind of the way that we're going to be using this word here is this idea of trying to like accelerate the collapse of the country, mostly to install like a white spremacist AFT in a state after the country has collapsed.

This is how most Nazis use the term, even though it has a slightly different cultural back ground with the work of Nick Land and Fisher.

In other exchanges on TikTok, he shared information with a user named Nihilis about how to find Nazi telegram channels. I'm gonna I'm gonna read through some of this. Some of this chat transcript Nihilis, Hey, dude, do you know any telegram groups where niners that's oh, nine A and drex can interact and exchange info. Awoken, that's cassup. Sorry No, I'm mostly in NSWP telegram groups l ol. If you do find any, it'd be nice if you tell me nihilis.

What's WP awoke, Wikipedia dot org, slash national underscore, socialism underscore, white power, nihilus, Oh, white power cool? Awoken? Do you know any on nine A telegram groups? Nihlis? Oh, not a group, but a channel. You can find documents there. Awoken? All right, send awoken? Can you send me the link to the account? Awoken? It says, I can't access the message, Nihlis, How can I do that? Wait a second? Awoken. Here's

my telegram user name, Accelerationists fourteen nihilis. I sent a message, So there you go.

race from quote unquote Jewish controlled politicians. The third page of the document contains images of Adolf Hitler with text that reads quote Hail Hitler, Hail the White Race, Hail victory. Now, from what I can read of this manifesto, it's pretty basic. It's heavily plagiarized, like most of these kind of white supremacist accelerationist manifestos are It talks about how Jews control

white countries and are promoting white genocide and degeneracy. Talks about the need to quote unquote collapse Jewish occupied governments. The manifesto states that his motivation for wanting to kill Trump was to sow chaos and raise public awareness that quote assassinations and accelerating the collapse are possible things to do. Unquote not that possible since he's arrested and did not

accelerate the collapse. But he also advocates that people unable to commit to taking direct action instead make connections with other white supremacists and grow a network to take over

the country once America collapses. He recommends the writing of not accelerationists, including James Mason, who wrote the influential Nazi book Siege, and the Terror gram Collective, a group of white premacists from around the world who organized on the messaging platform telegram to share guides on how to do terrorism. He also recommends the writings of former Adam Waffen, members an American accelerationist group, writing quote, there's much to learn

from the successes and mistakes of Adam Waffin. I think it's worth noting that Adam Waffin was also either like infiltrated or partially co opted and inspired by some nine A teachings. This is kind of how the more bizarre and occultic influence of O nine A seeped more into the kind of general American accelerationist Nazi millu. This was

like in like twenty eighteen. Now. Castip advises that if the reader of the manifesto is already like pilled, that you should just skip the theory and just read practical how to guides for terrorism and bomb making, since quote unquote, there is no political solution. Huge amounts of violence will be required long past the days where we can vote for a Hitler to save us. White revolution is the only solution, unquote, which is I guess I'm kind of

desensitized to this sort of stuff. In fact, I just find this slightly funny considering kind of the victory lap that like Steven Miller and like white nationalists are currently having in the government where many of them do think they can just vote for a Hitler to save us, and that Hitler may already be in office forever.

altered in esthetic multiple times. Frankly, if you spend enough time on Twitter now in the comments of blue check Neo Nazis, you can find some of these edits where they have like you know, like techno techno like fast paced sometimes like Russian music set to like you know, glorified images of like like like Rome or Nazi Germany,

or a large variety of stuff. But the gore genre is specifically unique to kind of the to the oh nine to a like a cultic Nazi branch, because they think that like viewing these images like increases your power level of like evil.

have access to a gun. He later told his classmate that he would befriend someone with a gun and then steal it, and told him that he was in contact with a male in Russia via telegram and that they were both plotting to overthrow the government of the United States and assassinate President Trumps told the classmate that when he saw ten consecutive attacks in the news, it would have to be him.

So again, not a very good attacker, I guess. But no, like this, this kid murder of his parents sat in the house with their decomposing bodies for twelve days before trying to carry out the rest of his attack on the United States. So yeah, though though he did not succeed in his larger goals like these, these people still

absolutely do get like groomed into doing violence. And this is something that that happens at a pretty frequent basis, honestly, to the point where these types of things don't make giant headlines anymore. They would have maybe in twenty seventeen, but now a lot of journalists are desensitized to this, and because it happens so frequently, it is less newsworthy, which is a very unfortunate place to be in for a country. Do you know what else is unfortunate? Michael?

like useful. Well, we'll learn something together. So at the end of this section of this complaint that attempts to just describe Cassip's collapse driven political ideology is the appearance of this new term, nihilistic violent extremists. Right now. This was actually the second time this term has appeared in

court documents. The earliest appearance of this term was in a March sentencing memo for a child sexual abuse material case first filed in November twenty twenty four, which was linked to the seven six' four child extortion and exploitation. Network Ken, kleppenstein who first reported on the use of the nihilism, term missed this first appearance and attributed the origin to the cassup. Case, michael are you similarly unfortunate enough to be aware of seven six?

Discord telegram instagram social. Media apps they're kind of inspired by some ASPECTS of OZ, nine a but they are much more focused on the production and distribution of child sexual abuse materials and trying to manipulate groom and like blackmail and extort miners into producing. THIS material a lot of it's done by other, Miners too like a lot of this is teens targeting, other teens with adults kind

of helping this. Process along it's a pretty. Big problem there's been some good reporting on It in Wired And the guardian the past, few years if you want to. Read, more Now this march sentencing memo for the seven six four case describes seven six four and related groups as quote nihilist violent extremists who engage in criminal conduct Within

The united states and engage with other. Extremists abroad seven six to Four networks accelerationist goals include social unrest in the downfall of the current, world order Including The united. States government members of seven six four work in concert with one another towards a common purpose of destroying civilized society through the corruption and exploitation of, vulnerable populations. Including, MINORS now i think this this definition may be a bit,

too generalizing but it's. Not incorrect, like this this is correct in what the explicit goals of this, group are

maybe not just every individual member of. This GROUP but i think it would be a mistake to kind of dismiss this definition as, outlandishly, Grandiose right it kind of it calls into like my, you know like, conspiracy theory, like framing because it sounds very like extravagant, and complicated and it kind, of is but it's also it's also, like simple it's it's people trying to automate the process

of producing and distributing. Illegal MATERIALS but i do believe it is a mistake to completely, dismiss this both in terms of like the government trying to ascribe political motive for the distribution of, these materials and also the ideological justifications held by some members of. These groups now there have been two more seven six four Cases from april of twenty twenty five that have used the nihilist of

violent extremism designation in. Court, documents now part of kind of the struggle with, this is Like ken, kleinpenstein, reported quote it sounds to me like some demented philosophical justification for just being, a pedophile and like, It is but that doesn't mean the political motivations shouldn't, be discounted because those motivations impact how, they operate how these, groups spread which targets, they pick and other political actions members, might

take like mass shootings targeting, racial MINORITIES targeting. Lgbtq individuals, SO yeah i get this is kind OF why i pushed back a little bit on this kind of dismissive tone towards this, like larger almost conspiratorial kind of matrix put onto groups like seven. Six, four now part of the tricky thing with use of this new nihilism term is that it's being used to rope in a variety of horrific incidents under a singular. Nebulous, Category right so let's take the Case.

evolved into its own complex machine about five. Years Ago but cassup openly admitted to being Radicalized by nazism and the white power, movement online and yet in his criminal complaint contains an expanded version of the nihilist violent, extremism definition which is literally copy and pasted from a child sexual abuse material sentencing memo from five, days before so they just used the same thing despite it not really applying.

Reading quote individuals are, targeted online often through synchronized. Group chats nihilist violent extremists frequently conduct coordinated extortions of individuals by blackmailing them so they comply with demands of. The network these demands vary, and include but are not, limited to self mutilation online or, in person, sexual acts harms, to, animals sex sexual exploitation of siblings, and others acts, of violence threats, of, violence suicide, and murder so very very.

Dark stuff the definition goes on to state how vulnerable individuals are targeted and members of the group attempt to gain notoriety throughout the network and spread fear among those targeted individuals for the purpose of accelerating the downfall of society and otherwise achieving the goal of nihilist. Violent extremists so while that does accurately describe groups like seven to,

six four it doesn't really relate to the Case. Of kassap it's tricky because a lot of these seven six four guys Are, also nazis and a Lot of nazis are. Also pedophiles some of these guys start off as like evil occultic pedophiles who Associate with nazism because it's a

pretty universal symbol. Of evil and sometimes it's the vice versa where they start off as like An anti semitic, right Winger a nazi Or, a fascist who then associate with this weird pedo occult stuff for variety of reasons, like spiritual perverted pleasure or tactical, network building and usually

usually it's, A mix, klippenstein. Writes quote the Warrant alleges castip was in touch With the Order Of, nine Angles a Satanic neo nazi group that, espouses accelerationism a fancy word for the belief that destabilizing the social order allows for. Radical change that is pretty heady stuff to ascribe to a seventeen year old and ends up having the feeling

of an episode of altered. Carbon UNQUOTE and i kind of like reject this, Dismissive, framing, like no these seventeen year olds are thinking, About this they are getting convinced of this. Material online that is the motivation for this isn't like a science. Fiction thing this is real and it's pretty common among like extremists. This age there's a lot of young teenage. Male extremists that's kind of their, main demographic and this type of stuff, Is, popular like

this is at least popular within this small group. Of extremists, so yeah it is a little, bit heady but this is what they are genuinely thinking. About it it's not incorrect to like ascribe that. To them cassup openly admitted to this, connection well and.

ever of. These things so it doesn't and it doesn't shock me at all that some teen could go down that rabbit hole or even could start reading Like A kurtis Jarvin Or nick land and going down those rabbit holes, and stuff especially now that some of these people are, you know put on Like The New york.

Replaced with though these individuals may be seen as like victims of nihilism and like in like in Like the. Nietzschean, sense now like my main problem with the nihilist violent extremism term is that it's so depoliticized and like in a way that's rife for. Political abuse this term can be used to cover what the government deems as violence stemming from like apathy from frustration, with society as well as like anti tech or anti. Civilization politics and this

is all coming from like. Top down at The New federal Bureau. Of investigation, For Years cash pattel has closely associated with Q. And on has helped the legal defense Campaigns for january, sixth insurrectionists Which Included, Proud, boys oathkeepers Since, three percenters and now as head OF, the fbi HE'S

investigating fbi agents who Worked those january. Sixth Cases, joe kent the new director Of the National Counter, terrorism center has made media Appearances With nick fuentes And neo Nazi YouTuber. David carlson He Hired proud boys to consult in his failed, congressional campaign and his Friends With patriot Prayer Leader. Joey

gibson kent has repeatedly called FOR the fbi To. Investigate antifa the co founder Of The Global project against Hat, And Extremism, heidi barrick has Said THAT patel's QAnon Links and Deputy Director dan bongino's public conspiracism and bigotry make taking the threat of far right extremism qute unquote impossible for these. Two men, she, SAYS quote i think it makes it very unlikely that the far right will continue to be seen as the threat it actually is in

terms of hate crimes and. Domestic terrorism all this marks a huge departure from The first, trump administration where THE the fbi for the first time declared wise premacy the country's greatest domestic. Terrorism threat facts about violence and its perpetuators probably won't matter this, time. Around unquote and these changes are already. Taking place an old counter terrorism strategy

guide was removed From The white house Website. IN january A current fbi agent was Quoted In vanity, fairs, saying quote the key is The Domestic Intelligence. Operations guide if they, Change that patel will be able to shift domestic terrorism investigations away from the accelerationists and the right wing street

fighters and towards THINGS like Blm and. Antifa unquote patel has Cut The Domestic terrorism office staffing and reassigned agents and, intelligence analysts with NEW senior fbi officials reportedly considering to disband the entire domestic terrorism. Operations section, in ADDITION the fbi has discontinued their previous Domestic terrorism, tracking tool where they take relevant investigations to identify and track trends for

terrorism probes across. The country sources for Outlet's like reuters say that changes to the agency will reduce counter terrorism operations against far right and racially motivated the creamists. And Militias, jacob ware a domestic terrorism expert At the Council On, foreign Relations told, reuter's quote there is a, BROADER desire i think within the administration to at best ignore data and put their head in, the sand and at worst

to realign resources away from this. BATTLE unquote a Spokesperson For higher Representative Of jim Jordan told reuters that the termination of the domestic terrorism tracking tool is a quote great step in the right direction of RETURNING the fbi to its primary crime fighting. Mission Unquote representative jordan previously in twenty, twenty three ran a congressional panel that ALLEGED the fbi terrorism case tagging tool was being improperly used to.

Target Conservatives after, january sixth THREE former fbi agents testified At the republican, led panel and two of those former agents admitted to being Paid, by patel who at the time was not director OF. The fbi he was just a right. Winger influencer after being kicked out of the government after The first, trump administration we've also Seen The Joint Terrorism task force largely shift their efforts towards, immigration ENFORCEMENT helping ice, with deportations and the so called Wave of.

Tesla terrorism and like the other thing is that this new nihilist violent extremism term isn't just REPLACING. A gave it's not just replacing the anti government or anti authority of violent extremism BECAUSE the agave term itself has, three subcategories as referenced TO an fbi document that outlines domestic terrorist activity from twenty fifteen to, twenty nineteen this includes a militia, violent extremists anarchists, violent extremists and sovereign citizen.

Violent extremists and even in addition to, those three there's actually a newer subclassification from twenty twenty three CALLED a, gave other which really isn't a great term. At all this is the problem with trying to use these like tracking and tagging tools is that they can get. Very convoluted but now they've seemingly collapsed all of these and are just using the.

that's stemming from frustration. With society and that's that's a. Huge problem and in, doing so they're shifting focus away from right wing militias who do the majority of like actual.

Lethal violence when these reports from like the past five years, talk about, you know militia, violent extremism it talks about how there is an increase to lethal threat from these militias to law enforcement and government personnel due to factors related to grievances from the perceptions of fraud in the twenty, twenty election government measures RELATED to covid nineteen and legislation

to restrict firearms or expand immigration or manage. Public land and these are the people that do the vast majority

of planned attacks or. Executed attacks this report between twenty three outlines two attempted bombings by militia violenctreamists in early twenty, twenty one one by an individual targeted against data center thought to provide services TO the FBI, and cia the author by two people against A State democratic party Headquarters, In, sacramento california as well as the quote unquote do dozens

of militia violenctaramists arrested for their Involvement in. January sixth so even though we're going to take the gas off of groups like those as well as as racially motivated, violent creamists this definition can still include a lot of like anarchist, violent creamists WHICH the fbi admits in a twenty twenty three report are most likely to engage in non lethal criminal activity and just impact law.

posts left like. Anarchistic extremism but in the, administration's mind the previous terms for this were tainted by crackdowns on right wing or patriot Movements after, january sixth and like the nihilist of violence streamism term is not replacing the term terrorism necessarily like The way clippenstein's suggested in, his article the word terrorism appears frequently in these very documents

that we've. Been discussing nor does the term terrorism have quote unquote limitations, in Law as klippenstein said that like prevent its use in. Political prosecution, if anything it carries kind of special powers of punishment which can be over

applied to increase, the sentences, swayed juries and. Strip rights we've seen bills To label antifa as terrorists introduced to, this year The whole tesla, terrorism thing, and historically like the use of terrorism has been used as a repression Tool In Atlanta's Stop cop, city movement which similarly has

like a climate focus like. You mentioned and what this new nihilism term lets them do is it ALLOWS the dromp administration to see to their base that they aren't going to be going after like right wing malicious style, groups anymore not, anti government anti. Authority, extreamists instead they're just going to target zany weirdos who want to destroy society it's, a looser more flexible term that can be

applied to a much wider swath. Of people and like the kind of FINAL thing i WANT to i want to note here is that four groups like like seven, six four we really don't have a good term. For them like some people have defended this nihilistic term specifically for groups like seven, six four since that was where it originally appeared in an industry that these groups kind of defy. Classic categorization some of them are certainly motivated by racial bias in the Case, of cassup who's like

tied With, oin a but not specifically seven. Six four but a lot of these other seven six four guys who are mostly in it for, the pedophilia still do have anti government ideologies that they are roped. In WITH now i have seen a few alternative terms lofted by certain independent researchers that don't really do a good job but are gaining Influence under. Trump's government there's This like freeland Researcher named rebecca Or, bix wrights who mostly Operates.

On twitter she's proposed the term satanic accelerationism or s act Not good and this kind of outlines my problems with this person's research now because all of the legitimate extremism researchers have kind of moved Away from twitter and are Just On. Blue, sky now people like this have like exploded in Influence under elon's Shepherding, of twitter and like this this person just spreads like satanic panic style writing that appeals To conservative. Christian audiences she boasts about

how many mutuals she has With these. Nazi terrorists she Posts, on rumble she went On, info wars so that kind of tells you everything you need to know about. This person and like a big part of her work is trying to downplay the right wing and a white supremacist influence. In extremism she excitedly, posted QUOTE the fbi has coined

a new term for this type, of individual nihilist. Bilin extremists this makes me so happy because it indicates that law enforcement are listening to researchers on the grid and are no longer considering these Groups neo nazis or quote unquote. White supremacist, so yeah this is a big part of this push is appealing to these types of people who don't want their weird pedo freaks to be labeled as, right wing even though they all are pretty far right

wing terrorists in. Most cases this researcher also falsely Linked cast up With A ukrainian nazi GROUP. Called mku she later retracted this claim, on substack but left the original viral tweet up online because. Hey engagement her substack post, reads QUOTE when i first heard the News of Nikota, cast up my mind immediately darted to ANOTHER nine A and mku linked Individual. Named nikota this turned out to be a, MERE coincidence, i know because The other nikota

reached out to me personally. To clarify it's moments like these that caused me to reflect on just how big this movement really is and just how close to THE fire i. Am unquote this is not how you do. Extremism reporting this is not how you, do journalism but This does i'm. And straight kind of the problem with this term, is, that yeah groups like this do need a, different term maybe, like accelerationists violent. A creamists that's a term you could use that if you're going to remove

all the. Other acronyms but certainly the nihilism label just kind of complicates things and allows for the targeting of just a massive swath of the population that could become like political prosecutions that then get linked to these child sexual abust. Material, cases okay that is my that's my that's. My, script michael how do you feel about that? Info dump i'm, so.

always turned. To philosophy i've been recommending different books to, different Friends and i'm kind of interested in what you have to say about kind of what philosophy can offer us in these times of like. Existential.

than developing their subjectivity, for themselves and that one's. Really great in terms of more, Contemporary stuff i've Been Very frederick jamison pilled recently NICE and, I think, I mean I've read jamison before on, and off but recently dove in. More deeply and There's, ONE okay i have it at, arms REACH so i can say that the title Correctly

that i've really. Been enjoying it's Called An American Utopia dual power In The universal Army By, frederick jamison edited By, Saw voygijiak and it's This large jamison essay about what he sees as an alternative for leftist Power, in america responses from a bunch of. OTHER scholars i have found it.

Very interesting but, for me AT least i find comfort in the fact that others have accurately diagnosed and understood what is happening right now and at least give us the tools to understand the thing so it feels less nebulous.

on and not feel the need to try to, like it cause every, you know philosophical evolution to come about via your. Own, thought yeah you don't have to be the one to.

and it's it's useful to know what. They've thought and like this, is like, you know my work is mostly looking at like current events and like trying to track but like extremism and like what the government, is doing and, you know more information always helps me choose how to navigate in. The world THAT'S why i do episodes, Like THIS and i think philosophy is just one other side.

Of that unless you have anything else, to say do you want to talk about where people can find you online and your new.

the social and interpersonal Levels that i'm working on A thing i'm excited about on like depression and capitalism and.