What do domestic extremists have in common?
Learn more about political extremism and violence with the free PIRUS app by START from the Department of Homeland Security.
The Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the U.S. (PIRUS) contains information on the backgrounds, attributes, and radicalization processes of over 3,200 extremists in the U.S. from 1948-2021. PIRUS helps you understand domestic radicalization with a free easy to use dashboard. It answers questions such as:
What drives an individual or a group turn to terrorism?
How are people radicalized? How can they be de-radicalized?
What actions can be taken to counter the threat of terrorism?
How has terrorist activity evolved over time? Across geographies?
How can resilience to attacks of political extremism be enhanced?
How to profile domestic extremists with PIRUS
Get the facts about political extremism
The PIRUS app is an amazing resource. This online tutorial created with ScribeHow explains how to use PIRUS in 10 steps. A PDF version of the guide is attached below. It shows how you can pick a category(Extreme Right) to see the number of such individuals (without any personal details). It shows their characteristics such as age radicalized, gender, group affiliation and education level. Click on a state to see how individuals with that profile are in a state.
Significant mental health issues
"There have been so many crimes linked to QAnon that the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at the University of Maryland has set up a QAnon crime map to keep tabs on the problem. Not surprisingly, the center found that at least 60 percent of the QAnon criminal defendants had significant mental health issues, particularly the ones who were involved in murders. By September 2021, the group had identified 101 QAnon followers who have committed ideologically motivated crimes, including two who were involved in the QAnon precursor, Pizzagate." - Mother Jones
Connections between January 6th defendants and extremist groups
START’s Radicalization and Disengagement team has launched an interactive data tool illustrating connections between Jan. 6, 2021, defendants and their links to extremist networks. As of January 2023, more than 300 defendants who have been criminally charged for participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the United States Capitol have been identified as having connections to over 50 contemporary extremist groups and movements, including the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, Three Percenters, and the QAnon conspiracy theory.
The January 6th defendants collectively form more than 900 links to these groups and each other. The Capitol insurrection network map displays these relationships, helping users identify the ideologies and networks that played a central role in the attack. START researchers have also created interactive infographics that highlight key characteristics of the defendant population. - START
START studies terrorism
The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) was established in 2005 as a U.S. Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence, tasked with utilizing state-of-the-art theories, methods, and data from the social and behavioral sciences to improve the understanding of the origins, dynamics, and social and psychological impacts of terrorism. START is a DHS funded project to research terrorist group formation and recruitment, terrorist group persistence and dynamics, and societal responses to terrorist threats and attacks. - START
TakeAway: Understand how people are radicalized into political extremists.
Deepak
DemLabs
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