I left “the movement” in 1995 while studying at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. At that point, we didn’t have the internet as it exists today, and Life After Hate wasn’t even an idea yet. Newspapers and TV shows had reach, but only so far. As technology continues to evolve, it becomes more difficult to explain how isolating that time was, both socially and informationally, even though academics and research at university surrounded me. Maybe I didn’t look hard enough, or perhaps I should have been more imaginative when I did look, but finding narratives of others with similar experiences was nearly impossible, as was seeing anyone else writing about it. A few notable exceptions were The Racist Mind, by Raphael S. Ezekiel, Not by the Sword: How the Love of a Cantor and His Family Transformed a Klansman, by Katheryn Watterson, and Fuhrer-Ex: Memoirs of a Former Neo-Nazi, by Ingo Hasselbach.
Will I be able to create a new life and fully be myself in the shadow
of such a past?
So, leaving at that time felt like a walk in the wilderness, with a few signposts but not much else to go on. We – myself and the people who helped me – had to create the path as we went, and that included using what few terms we knew, basing our understanding of the process on the limited descriptors available. I was an “ex-Nazi” or “former white supremacist” who had “left” or “defected from” “the racist movement.”
These terms weighed heavily, and I spent many therapy sessions unpacking their meaning and exploring urgent questions like: Who am I now if I was once a neo-Nazi? Will I be able to create a new life and fully be myself in the shadow of such a past?
Over time, I found some answers, and the urgency of such questions decreased…that is until I sat down with the Saturday paper roughly 15 years after my “defection” and read about “former extremists” who were once white supremacists. It took me a minute to grasp that if they were “former extremists,” then so was I. My decision to leave and adopt a kinder worldview meant I had “deradicalized,” which was also news to me.
It may seem impossible to understand now, but I had no concept of being an “extremist” until that moment, and in that moment, my worldviews, both past and present, tilted on their sides. It’s ironic, I suppose that after being part of a movement that spends a lot of its time applying harmful and inaccurate language, concepts, and unwanted identities to people we didn’t know, I was having my identity accurately defined by people I’d never met. It was both humbling and disquieting. I wondered if these extremist labels were all I’d ever be, and I felt somewhat defeated as if my past would forever outweigh the good I can do today.
On The Daily Former podcast, season 2, episode 12, I was fascinated to hear participants talk about deciding not to adopt labels like “former” or choosing to drop labels after a certain length of time. They also discuss the revolutionary concept of “NeverMores,” where formers have built enough of a new life over an extended period that we can drop other labels. The idea that I had a choice in terms I applied to myself was extraordinary. However, whether we accept these identifiers, they still set the parameters we must consider, a lens to decide what we focus on.
The beautiful thing about language is that it’s ever-evolving. This growth can make space for new concepts, but it can also, unfortunately, cause terms to lose the focus and force they once possessed. We are seeing that today with terms like “racist extremism,” which don’t hold the same gravitas when the ideologies described are increasingly embedded in the mainstream.
New terms can also create confusion or cause us to drift farther away from the core concepts we are trying to identify. I recently came across the phrase “salad-bar extremism” to describe people who pick and choose elements of multiple ideologies during the radicalization process. While it’s an interesting attempt to explain a growing phenomenon, some people will deliberately misunderstand terms and labels for their benefit in uncertain times when public discourse is loud and fast.
Regardless of what terms are in vogue or what labels we choose to accept for ourselves, it’s empowering to realize that we do have the agency to shape the concepts that are at play in public discourse. By choosing what we connect with, we can help guide discussions towards a more accurate representation of what we experienced. While extremist activity continues its upward trajectory, it’s imperative that those of us who have lived experiences be part of those conversations.
As I speak and think about these issues more, I’m growing to understand that not only will language and labels continue to evolve, but that we can lean into who we are now instead of living life defined by the worst decisions of our past. This gives me space to come into myself more fully, which is a relief. Whether we consider ourselves ex-Nazis, formers, NeverMores, or something else entirely, I’m learning that we are more than the weight or the shame of our labels, and I am grateful.
