Workshop | Using Credible Messengers to Interrupt the Drift into Extremism

The violence that besieged the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021 did not emerge in a vacuum. It was the result of more and more disaffected individuals falling into the funnel of right-wing extremism. This workshop explores the mainstreaming of extremist racist anti-government ideologies, the current threat they pose, and the evolving scholarship on how to prevent radicalization from tipping over into violence. What if the January 6th insurgents had individuals, credible to them, talk them off the ledge of violence? The idea of the contagion effect of violence is applicable to racial bullying, hate crimes, and domestic extremism. An innovative, federally-funded project to put these ideas into practice will be reviewed and participants will learn how to put the credible messenger approach to work in their communities.

Currently working on a federally funded grant to reduce extremist violence, Randall Blazak’s scholarship on hate crimes and hate groups has made him a regular commentator in media outlets from NPR and CNN to BBC and Al Jazeera. Blazak earned his PhD at Emory University in 1995 after completing an extensive field study of racist skinheads that included undercover observations and interviews across the world. He became a tenured sociology professor at Portland State University and teaches criminology and sociology classes at the University of Oregon. His work has taken him from classrooms to criminal trials. His research has been published in academic journals, books and in the mainstream press. His co-authored book, Teenage Renegades, Suburban Outlaws Wadsworth, 2001) and his edited volume, Hate Offenders (Praeger, 2009) have been widely adopted. Since 2002, he has been the chair of the Coalition Against Hate Crimes. He has worked with the National Institute of Justice and the Southern Poverty Law Center on hate crime research issues. Blazak regularly speaks at conferences, consults on criminal cases, and leads workshops on the topics of hate and bias.

He is currently the vice-chair of the steering committee in charge of implementing Oregon’s new bias crime law.

Read more about Randall and his work at www.randyblazak.com