Global silences as privilege: The international community’s white silence on far-right terrorism

Silence as the unspoken

Silences as the unspoken can be conceptualized as the non-said, the gaps in the spoken, the absences of utterance in the said. These, however, are not just a neutral absence. As mentioned above, all hegemonic constellations are inhabited by various kinds of silences (Dingli, 2015) that constitute the conditions for what is said and the knowledge that is constructed about an issue (Schröter and Taylor, 2018). As such, the spoken and the unspoken are in a mutually constitutive relation; they co-constitute each other. They are gears of the same discourse and they maintain its hegemony and the power structures behind it. Within counter-terrorism, the silences as the unsaid work because the dominant racialized worldview determines what actors and what violence are (not) discussed as a security threat (Gentry, 2020: 62).

The absence of mentions of far-right white violence is the main kind of silence in the international community’s counter-terrorism conversations – i.e. in most cases, the Council does not refer to far-right terrorism. However, these silences are not neutral because they maintain the counter-terrorism formation in place and reproduce its focus on non-white violence. In other words, silences on far-right violence mutually reinforce the focus on non-white violence and non-white subjects. They also reinforce the racialized constructions of non-white subjects as possible security threats, leaving white subjects outside of this construction. Silences as the unsaid, therefore, are a manifestation of white privilege – i.e. the advantage of being unspoken of and unaddressed within counter-terrorism permitted by these subjects’ whiteness. Furthermore, they also safeguard and (re)articulate whiteness, obfuscating political dynamics that may contradict and challenge white supremacy and its legitimacy, e.g. the association of white violent actors with barbaric terrorism (Ali, 2020). Within discourses of security, therefore, silence as the unspoken (re)produces whiteness and renders white privilege invisible, whereas, as the next section illustrates, the ‘spoken as silencing’ safeguards these constructions.

The spoken as silencing

Silence can also manifest itself through the spoken. The Council is a political actor and, as such, it is embedded in contemporary political dynamics (Martini, 2021). In recent years, various far-right attacks and the social pressure for domestic and national responses have led various actors to acknowledge this violence (CTED, 2020) and the Council and its actors have also followed these trends. Nonetheless, as the analysis will show, these mentions do not represent a challenge to the hegemonic formation or to whiteness; on the contrary, they sustain these constructions, legitimize them, and further normalize them (Applebaum, 2011; Shome, 2000).

Specifically, it is in these dynamics that whiteness operates as a technology of power. Here, it is also reproduced, rearticulated, and reified. Whiteness works through the spoken and the silences, and subjugates certain knowledge about far-right white violence (Ali, 2020; Gentry, 2020) while constructing this in a very specific way. Safeguarding the legitimacy of white privilege, whiteness produces what Charles Mills defines as ‘white ignorance’ (Mills, 2007) – the ignorance, silencing, and misrepresentation of certain knowledge that may challenge white supremacy (see also, Sullivan, 2006: 4). Mills adds that these ‘(white) unknowledges’ distort reality in many ways (Mills, 2007: 20) and they represent the ‘contingent ways in which structured non-knowing conceals and perpetuates white supremacy’ (Ali, 2020: 587; Mills, 2007: 20).

When far-right violence is addressed in the Council, the spoken silences certain knowledge in a way that reconciles this violence with the construction of whiteness and maintains its narrative fidelity, all the while safeguarding the structure of power it legitimizes (Gentry, 2020). For example, white violence is discursively individualized, depicted as the action of lone wolves, and, above all, delinked from its structural causes and its (white) political goals linked to the defense of white privilege (Breen-Smyth, 2020; Gentry, 2020: 6; Shome, 2000: 366). The discourse also silences the colonial roots of far-right terrorism as a wider political phenomenon extending back into the international community’s racialized histories (Gentry, 2020).

Overall, these silences function together to (re)produce, maintain, and reify whiteness and white privilege. These processes are observable in the Council, unpacked in the following section as a very specific locus of production of knowledge.

The global silence on far-right terrorism

The lack of mentions of far-right violence and its incorporation within the Council’s counter-terrorism formation is the main dynamic observed. Overall, the body’s mentions of this violence are very sporadic within a formation that is centered almost solely on non-white terrorism. The examination of its legal production shows how white privilege can be found in legal and institutional production (Meier, 2022). Leaving white violence unaddressed to date (May 2022), far-right terrorism is never explicitly mentioned in any of the 112 (adopted or vetoed) Resolutions or Presidential Statements. Overall, the groups mentioned in the Resolutions are Al-Qaeda, ISIL, the Taliban, Boko Haram, the Al-Nusra Front – very heterogeneous organizations discursively linked together through the focus on their ‘linkages’, ⁶ associations, ⁷ and ‘the growing presence of ISIL, Al-Qaeda and their ‘affiliates around the world’. ⁸ Al-Qaeda’s leader bin Laden is also mentioned in various Resolutions and, in 2011, a Presidential Statement ‘welcome(d) the news’ of his death. ⁹ Contrastingly, the only vague mention that can be found of far-right terrorism is the Council’s condemnation of ‘terrorism in all its forms and manifestations [. . .] including those on the basis of xenophobia, racism and other forms of intolerance’. ¹⁰ This statement, however, does not refer strictly and explicitly to far-right terrorism and, in fact, similar phrases were used more commonly to condemn also the ‘terrorist acts motivated by extremism and intolerance perpetrated [. . . by] ISIL, ANF and Al-Qaida’. ¹¹

That the Council is mostly silent about white violence is observable in its debates too. Here, this violence is mentioned – directly or indirectly – in only six meetings out of the 148 held since 1998 (4.5% of the total). Furthermore, the topic emerged only after the 2019 Christchurch attacks in New Zealand, an event that received wide international attention for the large number of casualties involved (CTED, 2020). However, despite these mentions, the dynamics of silence were not subverted. Since the 2019 attacks, the body has held 13 sessions and far-right terrorism was mentioned in five. Moreover, these were delivered only by few speakers (see Table 1), a dynamic that restricted the conversation about this violence to a minimum. Therefore, even after 2019, silences on this kind of violence have still been the main pattern.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Table 1.

UNSC’s activity since the attacks in Christchurch (March 2019).

Date	UNSC meeting	UNSC mentions of far-right violence
28 March 2019	S/PV.8496 Preventing and combating the financing of terrorism. ISIL (Da’esh) & Al-Qaida Sanctions List	Breaking the silence 21% of speakers mention far-right violence (15 speakers out of 70)
27 August 2019	S/PV.8605 Ninth report of the Secretary-General on the threat posed by ISIL (Da’esh) to international peace and security and the range of UN efforts in support of member states in countering the threat	Breaking the silence 18% of speakers mention far-right violence (3 speakers out of 17)
16 December 2019	S/PV.8686 International terrorism and the threat it poses to Afghanistan	Silence
7 February 2020	S/PV.8716 Tenth report of the Secretary-General on the threat posed by ISIL (Da’esh) to international peace and security and the range of UN efforts in support of member states in countering the threat	Breaking the silence 5.6% of speakers mention far-right violence (1 speaker out of 18)
31 August 2020	S/2020/852 Foreign terrorist fighters	Silence
18 December 2020	S/2020/1266 International terrorism and the threat it poses to Afghanistan	Silence
29 December 2020	S/2020/1311 Guidelines for analytical support and Sanctions Monitoring Team in the fight against ISIL and Al Qaeda	Silence
12 January 2021	S/2021/48 UNSC’s commitment to the fight against international terrorism and foreign terrorist fighters	Breaking the silence 21% of speakers mention far-right violence (14 speakers out of 67)
10 February 2021	S/2021/98 12th report of the Secretary-General on the threat posed by ISIL (Da’esh) to international peace and security and the range of UN efforts in support of member states in countering the threat	Silence
19 August 2021	S/PV.8839 13th report of the Secretary-General on the threat posed by ISIL (Da’esh) to international peace and security and the	Breaking the silence 5.6% of speakers mention far-right violence (1 speaker out of 18)
	range of United Nations efforts in support of member states in countering the threat (S/2021/682)
17 December2021	S/PV.8934 S/PV.8935 Threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts	Silence
22 December2021	S/PVE.8941 Threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts	Silence

References to specific attacks are also scarce, including ones to the 2019 Christchurch events. As Table 1 illustrates, in the first meeting following the attacks, only 15 members out of 70 speakers (21%) expressed their condolences to New Zealand. Overall, three other far-right terrorist attacks are mentioned but only once and solely by the countries’ representatives. These are the 2011 and 2019 attacks in Norway ¹² and the 2017 Québec City Mosque shooting. ¹³ Remarkably, these were not mentioned at the time of their perpetration, but in meetings that took place after 2019. As I discuss further below, the fact that these mentions took place only after 2019 (re)produces the discursive construction of this violence as new or on the rise, thus hiding its historical continuities (Applebaum, 2011; Mills, 2007; Sullivan, 2006). Moreover, none of these attacks are mentioned in Resolutions or Presidential Statements, which, in contrast, condemned various attacks carried out in previous years by Al-Qaeda, ISIL, and their affiliates such as 9/11, the bombings in Madrid (2004) and London (2005), and others like Kenya and Tanzania (1998 and 2002), Bali (2002), Russia (2002 and 2004), Iraq (2003), Turkey (2003 and 2015), Egypt (2005 and 2015), Nigeria (2015), Tunisia (2015), France (2015), and many others (see, among others, Kundnani and Hayes, 2018; Martini, 2021).

Overall, these silences reveal how counter-terrorism is a formation based on the uttered security threat vs the non-uttered non-securitized. The spoken/unspoken (re)articulates the security focus on non-white violence while leaving white violence mostly unaddressed. These silences maintain the formation’s hegemonic focus on non-white violence, thus (re)producing the white privilege of not becoming the focus of security – a dynamic that is reinforced by the silencing processes illustrated below.

The global discourse on far-right silencing of white supremacy

It should not be surprising that a few mentions of far-right violence can be found in the Council’s meetings. The body is embedded in contemporary political dynamics and, in recent years, concern about this kind of violence has increased (CTED, 2020). It is, however, in these mentions that whiteness forms discursive patterns of white ignorance that reconcile the construction of whiteness – and the legitimacy of white privilege – with the (few) discussions of far-right violence. These mentions do not represent a challenge to the hegemonic racialized formation, as the various discursive patterns that emerge maintain the formation in its hegemonic position, as this section illustrates.

Racially, ethnically, and politically motivated terrorism and extremism

The Council’s discourse constructs ‘Islamic terrorism’ as a transnational and monolithic phenomenon structured around various interlinked organizations that the discourse homogenizes. Throughout the 2000s, the Council focused specifically on ‘Osama bin Laden and his network’, ¹⁴ understood also as ‘a global network of groups’. ¹⁵ Here, the discourse linked various groups and constructed them into ‘a complex international network,’ ¹⁶ a discursive move that merged heterogeneous organizations and returned the image of a single, monolithic phenomenon. This process continued throughout the 2010s, when other groups as ISIL, ANF, and Boko Haram were linked to Al-Qaeda through a discursive thread that merged them, to become ‘ISIL, ANF and all other [. . .] groups [. . .] associated with Al-Qaida’. ¹⁷ Despite the heterogeneous nature of these groups and even their enmity, these organizations were treated as manifestations of a single phenomenon. Erasing local specificities and focusing only on transnational features, the discourse shaped the idea of a ‘globalization of terrorism’. ¹⁸ In other words, a ‘single phenomenon’ ¹⁹ of ‘global terrorism’ ²⁰ was discursively constructed as it was understood that ‘the new wave of terrorists is like a spider’s web that connects practically all continents’ ²¹ – a thread that also reinforced the monolithic and international interpretation of this violence.

This feature contrasts with the discursive construction of far-right terrorism. This violence’s transnational character and global linkages of its organizations are mostly silenced discursively, and the discourse mostly individualizes this violence, interpreting it only as individuals’ behaviours and concealing its collective and structural dimensions by hiding its specific organizations. For example, it was stated that ‘today, we face transnational terrorist threats, like those of Da’esh and Al-Qaida’ and ‘individuals and groups that commit terrorist attacks connected to xenophobia, racism and other forms of intolerance’. ²² Here, non-white violence is described as a transnational threat linked to specific organizations – therefore, as a global threat the Council should face. Contrastingly, white violence is linked to individuals’ and (unnamed) ‘racist movements based on intent to incite phobia, hatred of and hostility against Muslim nations, immigrants and individuals’, ²³ as Saudi Arabia argued. Resolution 2617 (2021) also condemned

terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, and all terrorist acts, including those on the basis of xenophobia, racism and other forms of intolerance, or in the name of religion or belief. ²⁴

However, constructing far-right violence as ‘racially or ethnically motivated’, ²⁵ as the USA put it, returns the image of a somewhat individual violence. Not only do the specific groups remain unnamed and hidden, but the collective dimension of this violence is disregarded through a process of individualization – i.e. the understanding that this violence is caused by individuals’ attitudes and ideologies. As Corbin argues, xenophobia, intolerance, and racism are not structural issues, but subjective ideologies and mostly individual beliefs (Corbin, 2017: 462). Therefore, the discursive identification of these as root causes of far-right violence shifts the focus on individuals’ attitudes and motivations – hiding its collective dimension and its systemic goals such as the safeguarding of white supremacy (Abu-Bakare, 2020).

The overall depiction of far-right terrorism as ‘ideologically motivated’ ²⁶ also contrasts with the discursive irrationalization of non-white Others through their depiction as ‘barbarous’, ²⁷ ‘evil and despicable’, ²⁸ ‘global evil’ ²⁹ ; the discursive references to their ‘evil’, ³⁰ ‘bloodthirsty ideology’ ³¹ ; and their ‘dastardly’, ³² ‘despicable’, ³³ and ‘irrational acts’. ³⁴ Discussing the far-right as ‘politically motivated violent extremism and terrorism’ ³⁵ or referring to the ‘growing threat [emanating] from politically motivated violent extremism and terrorism, such as far-right and far-left violent extremism’ ³⁶ does not return an irrational, Othering construction of this violence. The mentions of political positions – i.e. left and right – place it at a domestic level, hiding its international dimension. The association with (national) political positions somewhat rationalizes this violence, linking it to political, ideological postures but silencing its systemic goals linked to the safeguarding of white privilege and whiteness.

Moreover, defining this violence as ‘racially and ethnically motivated terrorism’ ³⁷ further racializes its targets as the discourse interprets them as ‘religious minorities and racialized communities’. ³⁸ Here, the discourse constructs ‘racialized subjects’ while leaving whiteness as a race categorization as ‘unspoken’, as the (white) goals of the far-right’s violence perpetrated against these communities are never discussed (Corbin, 2017: 456). The functioning of whiteness can also be observed in the only statement acknowledging race and religion. The Foreign Minister of Canada stated that

in the wake of acts of terrorism carried out by Muslim extremists, Western countries often call upon Muslim countries and Muslim leaders to condemn those attacks in the name of their people and their faith. It should follow that, as the Foreign Minister of a majority white and majority Christian country, I feel a specific and personal responsibility to denounce white-supremacist attacks. ³⁹

This statement contributes to the processes of racialization of counter-terrorism. The mention of ‘white-supremacist attacks’ ⁴⁰ constructs a rather vague and abstract threat, above all, if compared with the more specific identification of the threat coming from individuals constructed as ‘Muslim extremists’. ⁴¹ Reproducing a division between (white) Western vs Islamic countries and leaders, the statement contributes to the identification – and construction – of a Muslim world, community, and religion responsible for condemning non-white violence. Contrastingly, the condemnation of white violence is reduced to a ‘personal responsibility’ ⁴² – thus not identifying any (white) racial or religious community – or organization – that could be linked to violence.

Overall, this statement is representative of two important racializing processes: the Islamization of terrorism – the construction of religion as a source violence – and the construction of Muslim suspect communities and their securitization. While the only reference to Christianity above does not link religion and violence, the Islamization of terrorism took place through claims condemning terrorists for ‘exploiting a world religion for their own evil aims’ ⁴³ despite the fact that ‘Islam is not a religion of extremism’. ⁴⁴ Muslim countries, such as Malaysia, also linked the two, arguing that ‘as Muslims [. . .] there is a critical need for us to address the exploitation of Islam by terrorist groups [. . .] Al-Qaida, the Taliban, the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Shabaab, Boko Haram and Da’esh. They all have one thing in common – they rely on Islam’. ⁴⁵ Similarly, Mali considered that ‘promoting a moderate and authentic Islam is a tangible response to extremism’. ⁴⁶

The Islamization of the threat resulted in the securitization of Muslim communities. ‘Muslim communities’ ⁴⁷ were interpreted as the ‘communities most vulnerable to recruitment by extremists or to self-radicalization’ ⁴⁸ also because of the ‘increased recruitment by terrorist organizations of young people from Muslim minorities in Western countries’, ⁴⁹ as Egypt argued. Warnings such as ‘be careful not to place whole communities under suspicion [. . .] because of acts committed by some of their members’ ⁵⁰ and the concern that some security measures could ‘achieve the precise opposite of the desired effect by driving more members of the targeted groups to resort to violence’ ⁵¹ securitized these groups by discursively linking them with a potential threat inside them – and thus, writing the whole community as a possible security threat (Breen-Smyth, 2020). Reproducing the non-white spoken and white unspoken security construction, none of these processes takes place in the case of far-right terrorism as no religion is discussed in relation to it and no (white) community identified as a space in which to implement counter-terrorism – a silence that safeguards whiteness and reproduces the white privilege of not becoming security suspects (Breen-Smyth, 2020).

The hegemonic focus on non-white subjects as terrorist Others was reinforced by the phrasing of the various condemnations of ‘terrorism in all its forms and manifestations’, ⁵² ‘including’ ⁵³ those perpetrated by the far-right. Here, in response to the Christchurch attacks, Iraq commended ‘New Zealand for its wise measures against terrorism in all its forms and whatever its source’. ⁵⁴ The claims about the Council’s need to focus also on ‘that particular form of terrorism [right-wing extremism]’, ⁵⁵ as the USA argued, returned the idea of this violence as the exception. Nonetheless, it was also argued that ‘the fight against terrorism’ had to remain centered on ‘defeating Da’esh, the Al-Nusra Front and other Al-Qaida-affiliated groups militarily’. ⁵⁶ This discursive pattern reconciled the mentions of white violence with the formation’s focus on non-white terrorism, thus reproducing the white privilege of not being securitized and rendered a global threat. This violence’s exceptionality was also reproduced by the focus on Christchurch.

The 2019 Christchurch attacks and the rise of the far-right

In the first meeting after the 2019 Christchurch attacks, some countries such as South Africa extended their ‘condolences to the people of New Zealand for the horrendous attack’ ⁵⁷ and paid homage to ‘all victims of terrorism, in particular the victims of the recent attacks on two mosques in Christchurch’. ⁵⁸ The ‘terrorist attacks in New Zealand’ ⁵⁹ had been perpetrated ‘to everyone’s disbelief’, ⁶⁰ as Morocco put it, and Saudi Arabia claimed that the ‘terrorist attacks committed [. . .] in New Zealand have shaken the world’s conscience’. ⁶¹ The 2019 Christchurch attacks represent the moment the Council started expressing its concerns about ‘the growing number of far-right attacks’. ⁶² Members such as South Africa and the UK expressed their concern about respectively ‘the rise of violent right-wing extremist terrorism’, ⁶³ and the ‘increase in the number of terrorist attacks motivated by extreme right-wing ideologies’. ⁶⁴ Similarly, Indonesia discussed ‘the rise of another form of terrorism, which is racially or ethnically motivated’ ⁶⁵ and India focused on ‘the proliferation of violent nationalism [. . .] as well as other forms of racially and ethnically motivated violence’. ⁶⁶

The understanding of a ‘proliferation of extreme right-wing’ ⁶⁷ terrorists works together with the narrow focus on Christchurch and discursively constructs white violence as a new phenomenon on the rise. This discursive pattern silences the existence of white violence before Christchurch and, more generally, silences its historical manifestations throughout the centuries (Ali, 2020). In other words, the construction as a phenomenon emerging in 2019 silences the continuities of racial violence embedded in the genealogical process of formation of a racialized hierarchical international community and the historical exercise of racial violence. Furthermore, delinking it from its historical manifestations also silences its link with the safeguarding of white supremacy, the overall goal of this violence – and thus it leaves whiteness untouched and unquestioned.

The only two mentions of previous far-right attacks did not challenge the silencing of this violent history. In 2019, Canada stated that ‘two years ago, a terrorist killed six people in a Quebec City mosque’, ⁶⁸ and, in 2021, Norway declared that ‘this year marks 10 years since [. . .] a right-wing extremist took the lives of 77 people in Norway [. . .] and in 2019 a young man attacked a mosque, seeking to frighten and kill Muslims’. ⁶⁹ Delivered in 2019 in condemnation of the Christchurch attacks, and not at the time of the perpetration of the attacks mentioned, these statements reify Christchurch as a pivotal event in the discussion of white violence – and, as such, further silence its previous manifestations. Moreover, these declarations silence the systemic and organizational dimension behind this violence, by focusing on the individuals committing the attacks and depicting their objectives as individual goals. As such, they further silence white supremacy as collective and systemic. This dynamic is observable, for example, in the identification of the goals pursued as the frightening and killing of Muslims, while white violence’s defense of white privilege remains silenced.

The silencing of the far-right’s roots in historical manifestations of white violence can also be observed in Canada’s mentions of ‘Neo-Nazis’ ⁷⁰ or India’s reference to ‘neo-fascist groups’. ⁷¹ The prefix ‘neo’ conveys the idea of a new kind of far-right violence with new ideologies and attitudes. It accentuates its contemporary dimension, while somewhat silencing the possible historical continuities with Fascism and Nazism (Graef, 2022). Together with the narrow focus on Christchurch, these silencing patterns write white terrorism as an individualized and new violence – thus somewhat obfuscating its possible links to historical racialized processes of the (re)production of white supremacy. The discursive individualization and ahistoricization mutually constitute the understanding that the far-right manifests itself almost solely in the cybersphere described hereunder.

The white (cyber) lone wolf

The Council focused specifically on ‘preventing the use of the Internet for terrorist purposes’. ⁷² It was argued that ‘as the Christchurch attack demonstrated, much remains to be done to more effectively prevent the spread of terrorist propaganda and support the development of positive counterarguments’. ⁷³ The Council aimed to avoid the ‘Internet becom[ing] a sanctuary for, or tool used by, terrorist groups’, ⁷⁴ referring to all kind of terrorism. Nonetheless, the measures to fight non-white violence were mostly focused on countering ISIL and Al-Qaeda’s ‘sophisticated manipulation and brain-washing techniques’ ⁷⁵ for ‘the spread of radicalism’ ⁷⁶ to ‘vulnerable individuals in vulnerable communities’. ⁷⁷ In 2017, the UNSC’s Comprehensive International Framework to Counter Terrorist Narratives ⁷⁸ specifically ‘recommended guidelines and good practices to effectively counter the ways that ISIL (Da’esh), Al Qaida and associated [. . .] entities use their narratives to encourage, motivate, and recruit others to commit terrorist acts’. ⁷⁹ The Council thus focused on the organizations’ radicalization strategies – thus discursively constructing an online and offline collective nature of the threat.

Contrastingly, the discussions of the cybersphere in relation to white violence centred very narrowly on individuals’ consumption of online material – silencing its collective dimension. Moreover, the Council overwhelmingly focused on the cyberspace when debating far-right terrorism. Discussed only in recent meetings (2020–2021), most of the speakers linked white violence solely to the cybersphere. For example, eight out of 14 speakers (57%) mentioning far-right terrorism in the Council’s 48th meeting (2021) referred solely to its virtual dimension. This discursive pattern constructs it as a very abstract, intangible, and undefinable threat, existing almost solely in a virtual shape. Furthermore, this strict focus on the cybersphere somewhat reinforces racialization as it suggests that white terrorists are more sophisticated than non-white terrorists. ⁸⁰

On this, Canada argued that ‘hatred, unfortunately, is eternal, but the ways in which it spreads, change. Today, hatred is increasingly spread through the Internet – in online forums and on social media’. ⁸¹ Similarly, Norway noted ‘the continued references to the 2011 terrorist attack in Norway in online forums. Sadly, it has also been a motivation for terrorist actors in other countries, including the attack in Christchurch, New Zealand’. ⁸² Here, identifying hatred as a very vague motivation behind this violence silences its specific political goals – the safeguarding of white supremacy. Moreover, through this narrow focus, the Council constructed far-right propaganda as circulating solely in a virtual, intangible cybersphere. Here, the focus on ‘actors’ and the lack of references to any organizations or specific community, as in the case of Jihadism, silenced the collective dimension of white radicalization and its white goals – thus shielding it from a process of securitization.

Shaped by whiteness, the statements above also individualize far-right extremism and silence its – contemporary and historical – collective dimension. The narrow focus on individuals is visible in the understanding that counter-terrorism ‘requires efforts to curb the hate that fuels the spread of extremist ideologies to individuals, such as the terrorist in New Zealand’. ⁸³ This individualization of the threat reproduces a narrow focus on the individual and silences the broader, structured collective dimension at the systemic roots and historical continuities of this racial violence.

These silencing dynamics return the image of the ‘white-supremacist terrorist’ ⁸⁴ that invents his/her own ideology (Gentry, 2020: 109). They construct far-right attacks as ‘one-offs’ (Corbin, 2017: 455) and their perpetrators as exceptions to the norm. All in all, this silencing process reproduces white privilege; white individuals and communities have the privilege of not becoming the target of counter-terrorism measures (Breen-Smyth, 2020; Dixit and Miller, 2022), and far-right organizations the privilege of not becoming the focus of security measures. More deeply, the discourse silences the link to white supremacy and the maintenance of white privilege, erasing both this violence’s racist nature and its connections to an international colonial past, a process observable also in the last pattern identified.

Writing white supremacy as the Other

The last silencing pattern identified is the writing of white supremacy as Other, observable, for example, in the claim that ‘addressing the evolving threat from politically motivated violent extremism and terrorism, especially the growing number of far-right attacks, is part of [the international community’s] responsibility too’. ⁸⁵ Similarly detaching the international community from white supremacy, it was argued that ‘the international community is witnessing increasing instances of ideologically motivated violent extremism [. . .] They are a threat to our democratic institutions and values’. ⁸⁶ Similarly, the United States declared that ‘last year, for the first time, the State Department designated a white supremacist group as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist’, ⁸⁷ without mentioning the name of the group, and the Foreign Minister of Canada, as seen above, asserted that ‘as the Foreign Minister of a majority white and majority Christian country, I feel a specific and personal responsibility to denounce white-supremacist attacks in the same way’. ⁸⁸

Here, various silencing dynamics work together to safeguard whiteness as these declarations construct white supremacy as the Other. Shome describes how whiteness may preserve itself through ‘different strategies of self-naming’ where ‘instead of positioning itself as the “norm”, it begins to mark itself as the “other”, as “different”’ (Shome, 2000: 368). In line with Shome’s argument, in these quotes, whiteness identifies and writes a part of white supremacy as the Other. By doing so, however, it silences the international community’s whiteness and its structural racialized power hierarchies. Identifying and securitizing a small part of white supremacy, whiteness silences and hides white privilege and its structural racialized roots; the political goals and racialized hierarchies behind this violence are not problematized. Moreover, whiteness also reifies and legitimizes itself through the (self-)assignation of exceptional powers to counter these specific manifestations of whiteness, thus, still reproducing white privilege.