Extremism Conference Encourages Thoughtful Community Conversation

On November 4-5, the Cinema Arts Centre hosted the most extensive conference on the topic of extremism in our region, Extremism: Confronting Hate without Fear. This conference examined dimensions of extremism in the country and around the world. Through independent documentary films and facilitated discussion with experts, authors, journalists, academics, and film directors, this conference launched a powerful community dialogue.

Championed and spearheaded by CAC Board member Jacqueline Strayer, who conceptualized the idea of this conference, the program was inspired by her work as a faculty member at New York University and Columbia University. She created the program agenda and worked tirelessly with Cinema Arts Centre staff over the past four months to bring this to our community. “I brought the topic of this event to Cinema Arts Centre leadership and Board, and they unanimously and immediately endorsed it. Working on this event, it has been so gratifying to have the profound and passionate involvement of the outstanding speakers and panelists we were able to bring to our community. Importantly, I was proud to see so many of our community join us and many of my students attend this event, the entire weekend. And I was delighted fellow Board members joined me and local sponsors and members to underwrite student attendance." She added “It is vital this message reaches young people, where we have the most opportunity to influence and change minds. It is our hope they will share what they learned with their colleagues and communities,” she added.

CAC Board Member, and partner with presenting sponsor Rivkin Radler LLP, Mike Troisi discussed what this weekend meant. “The only way to confront any problem is to have a dialogue about it and to try to learn more about it.” He added, “[The Cinema Arts Centre] is a real community meeting place. It is a safe place. It is a place where people can come and have their opinions heard in a respectful, thoughtful manner.”

Programming for Friday, November 4:

Next Generation Now: Growing Influencers in the Alt Right and the Language That They Use

Kicking off the event, Jacqueline welcomed the audience, explained the weekend program, and then introduced the film WHITE NOISE, that director and journalist Daniel Lombroso created while working at The Atlantic (now he is at The New Yorker). Beginning at the age of 24, Daniel filmed WHITE NOISE over three years, documenting three alt right young influencers. He chronicled the activities of white nationalist Richard B. Spencer, men’s rights activist Mike Cernovich, and anti-feminism and anti-immigration activist Lauren Southern. “I followed them across twelve states and five countries – Russia, Belgium, France, U.S., Canada – and I was called to do that for personal reasons, because of my family’s story. I’m Jewish. My grandmothers are holocaust survivors, so I felt it was really important to pay attention to this dangerous ideology.”

Joining Jaqueline and Daniel in the post-screening discussion was crisis expert, author and award winning academic, Helio Fred Garcia, who discussed his recent book Words on Fire: The Power of Incendiary Language and How to Confront It. Fred shared with our audience that central to his work has been to “study patterns of leadership, and audiences’ response to leaders, along with the resulting patterns of consequences of speech.” He continued, “I catalogued forms of language and I identified twelve distinct kinds of communication that I call the playbook that leads to violence. The first is to dehumanize a group, to call them animals, to call them vermin, to say that their presence is an infestation.”

After a robust discussion with the audience, the opening evening concluded with a reception in the Sky Room, giving audience members a chance to spend time with the speakers and each other, while enjoying multicultural foods from local restaurants and an inspiring musical performance from the R&B artist SheShe.

In addition, Fred made his book available to attendees at a discount and contributed half the proceeds to benefit the Cinema Arts Centre. Fred also made a donation of his book to local libraries.

Programming for Saturday, November 5:

Saturday opened with a panel discussion The Breeding Ground of Extremism: Exploring the Use of Social and Online Media, exploring the use of the Internet and social media as a recruitment tool for hate groups and ideologies rooted in white supremacy and anti-Semitism. Moderated by Marilyn Markham, Board President of Cultural Encounters, the panel included Senior Spokesperson for the Southern Poverty Law Center Michael Edison Hayden, Senior Reporter at Huff Post Christopher Mathias, and Life After Hate CEO Patrick Riccards. Marilyn explained, “[This panel] looks at how social media has become a breeding ground for extremism. So first of all, let’s define the terms… and then look at what does it actually look like or feel like, because we are all on social media and we may not realize when we stumble into the dark corners of the web. And then we want to talk about how this translates into everyday life, because a lot of what’s online manifests in real life, and I think it’s not always clear what the link is.”

Michael Edison Hayden shared data from Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups. He shared with the audience that the increase in hate groups in 2001 was not the result of the terrorists attacks on September 11, but rather this increase was attributable to the release of surveys showing that whites are on track to become a minority in the United States. These were used as a recruiting tool for white supremacist groups. In recent years there has actually been a decrease in hate groups. Michael explained, “It’s coming from social media largely. Because here you have these atomized, separate extremists that are being radicalized online and they don’t need a hate group anymore. You don’t need to organize with a white supremacist group to be a white supremacist. You can be radicalized online.”

Christopher Mathias went on to explain how the January 6^th attacks were largely organized online and grew out of conspiracy theories that were disseminated online. “We should talk about January 6^th as very much a phenomenon of social media groups and people being radicalized on social media. The coalition that attacked the capital grew out of conspiracies and conspiracy groups online, Q Anon, COVID denial, election denial, and a lot of other conspiracies working in tandem together.”

Patrick Riccards explained to the audience that these extremist groups target young people in chat rooms on the Internet and find them when they are most vulnerable. The young people they reach out to often feel they are misunderstood and estranged from their families and their communities, he explained. He went on to discuss that through finding common ground with their targets, such as through music or gaming, extremists cultivate relationships with them and then bring them into their extremist movement.

The panel was followed by a brunch, and then our afternoon session, Extremism and Bioethics: Exploring the Moral Dimensions of Abortion, Vaccination and Public Health, which included a screening of PERSONHOOD and discussion with guest speakers exploring the growing criminalization and policing of pregnant people in America.

PERSONHOOD director Jo Ardinger explained, “We wanted to draw attention to this issue of the criminalization of pregnant people. Usually we look at this issue through the lens of abortion, but there are so many ripple effects to these laws.” Jo also shared, “I was so excited to be a part of this conference on extremism because that’s exactly what this film is about.”

Jacob M. Appel, MD, JD, MPH, a renowned bioethicist, discussed trends influencing reproductive health and gave context to larger health issues that are surfacing as a result of extremism. He said, “One of the reasons we have so much extremism in our society is that we have very little opportunity for meaningful civil discourse, and an ability to understand complex issues in bioethics and reproductive decision making. A forum like this, and particularly the thrill of being on a panel with Jo and seeing a film like PERSONHOOD gives us an opportunity to really grapple with the complex issues so that an audience is educated, can go out into the world, and share their knowledge with others.”

Dr. Appel, author of 20 books, also made a contribution of his book, Who Says You’re Dead? Medical and Ethical Dilemmas for the Curious and Concerned, which discusses bioethical questions, to our local libraries.

Our final segment featured Life After Hate CEO Patrick Riccards. Life After Hate is a non-profit committed to helping people leave the violent far-right to help them reclaim their lives, connect with society, and find meaning and purpose. Life After Hate was recently contracted to produce counter-narrative videos to support the domestic terrorism efforts of the FBI. These videos were premiered and showcased to our attendees during this closing segment in the program.

Patrick explained about his organization, “Life After Hate is an organization that believes in second chances, quite honestly. We work with individuals who have been part of the violent far right, who have been active – whether it be online or in person – in really doing some horrible things in their communities. And they realize that that’s not the life they want anymore. They want to start a new path. They want to be positive, contributing members of their community. They come to us to help them figure out how to get out of that life. How do they leave a life of violent extremism? We work with them. We have licensed counselors and social workers that work with them. We have peer counselors, who are exit specialists who themselves have been formers. They’ve literally worn the same boots.”

Patrick reflected on the importance of community dialogue and holding events like this one held at the Cinema Arts Centre. “We’ve reached this point in the last few years where talk about what is the future of civil society? What is the future our communities? I think organizations like the Cinema Arts Centre just become so important because it allows us to bring our communities together in a respectful way, to have these discussions without judgement, to talk about what’s important to us as individuals as well as what’s important to us as a community. ...it allows us to talk about those ideas and more importantly, these are the new town squares.”

To support the transformative work of Life After Hate, please visit https://www.lifeafterhate.org/donate-1.

To support the work of the Cinema Arts Centre, please visit https://cinemaartscentre.org/get-involved/donate/.

Thanks to Rivkin Radler LLP, support from CAC’s Board of Directors, and support from generous individual donors and local businesses, this conference was fully funded and we were able to offer underwriting of tickets for local students and community groups representing underserved and/or historically excluded constituents.

Special thanks to contributors Jacqueline Strayer, Steve and Shelly Rubin, Ellen and David Reynolds, Steve Fisch, Sandy Friedman, Martin and Laurie Butera, Renée Ashley, and Brian Atkins.

Thanks to our community partners: LEAD Mentoring, Long Island Activists, Long Island Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, New York Progressive Action Network, and Pride for Youth.

Thanks to our reception sponsors: Butera’s Restaurant, Kohaku, Nice Day Chinese Takeout, and Thai USA.

Thanks to Greg Blank who provided in-kind videography services and Iris De Vita who provided in-kind photography services.