Collective Identity Changes in Far-right Online Communities: The Role of Offline Intergroup Conflict
Ana‐Maria Bliuc, John Betts, Matteo Vergani, muhammad iqbal, Kevin Mark Dunn · 2019
The role of online communities in shaping behaviours ‘in real life’ (IRL) is well-established, however, less is known about how such communities are affected by offline events. Thus, we investigate here the ways in which the collective identity of a far-right online community is affected by offline intergroup conflict. That is, we examine over 14 years of online communication between members of a national division of the global white supremacist community Stormfront.org. We analyse members’ language use and discourse before and after significant intergroup conflict in 2015, that is, local racist riots in Sydney, Australia. We found that the riots were associated with significant changes in the collective beliefs of the community (as captured by members’ most salient concerns and group norms), emotions and consensus within the community. Overall, the effects of the local riots were manifest in a reinvigorated sense of purpose for the far-right community with a stronger anti-Muslim agenda.