I’d add a bit to that – in that many older millennial white guys, also encountered things like workplaces/governments that overtly said “We can’t hire you because you aren’t a member of an equity employment group” (eg. a woman, a non-white person, a lgbtq+ person, or a FN person). I personally heard that from the fed govt and a couple potential employers around 2005. We encountered that sort of systemic racism in our lifetimes, something that most other demos have had legal protections against for generations now. People we grew up with, went through the whole education system with, didn’t face those hurdles even though they had functionally the same background - or, in many cases, more privileged backgrounds as many asians/non-whites have a good bit of wealth that’s transferred in to the country. Those people then often preached to us about our privilege, and how we should accept our diminished role, let everyone else speak first, etc etc… Universities are one area where this sort of thing shows up in spades, where the liberal arts basically ostracized white guys / shoved them to the fringe.
There are news stories about FN people who’ve quite literally stabbed/killed a white-guy stranger in an elevator, fleeing the scene after… and the FN person gets off with no jail time because of “historic wrongs done to the FN peoples”, basically we have a race-based justice system which is absolutely not blind/impartial. And that racist system was established/re-enforced by our first FN AG, Jodie Wilson-Raybould, who also triggered the revolving door of our prisons with her bail reforms – which were enacted, essentially, to try and get racial equity in terms of who’s locked up, objective concepts of justice be damned. And there are lesser examples, more mundane but equally racist in scope, of things like FN status holders getting discounted rates at things like FN gas stations – white people had ‘systemic privilege’ in the past, but FN people get to pay $0.15 less at the pump due to how systems are setup today. Or we see cases like the Cowichan band’s toxic dump situation, where the FN put out this ‘image’ of being some sort of noble custodians of nature, demanding that the evil white colonial system give them power / authority… but when one of their own people sets up an illegal toxic dump site on Cowichan lands, it’s on the public tax payers to clean it up.
It’s fairly easy / common to see these sorts of stories, where white guys/people are expected to accept poor treatment as individuals, because of a justification that ‘white people did bad stuff’ historically. Ignoring/ridiculing the real/tangible ‘personal’ life experiences of today’s white middle-aged people, is basically a gateway to radicalization for that demo and younger white guys. Expressing/commenting on those sorts of experiences in mixed company/public, generally just gets you even more scorn. White nationalists are more willing to listen to those sorts of grievances, and then declare extreme actions the only way to effect change. In some ways, it’s structured very similar to social movements from more militant/aggressive minority groups historically – like the FLQ in Quebec, not getting heard by the Govt, turning to violence during Trudeau Sr’s term. Or even less violent, but equally ignored groups who also had legitimate, but neglected, issues – like the women’s rights movements. If we turn a blind eye to the potentially legitimate concerns of a demo, it isn’t too surprising that they become increasingly radicalized.
I’d add a bit to that – in that many older millennial white guys, also encountered things like workplaces/governments that overtly said “We can’t hire you because you aren’t a member of an equity employment group” (eg. a woman, a non-white person, a lgbtq+ person, or a FN person). I personally heard that from the fed govt and a couple potential employers around 2005. We encountered that sort of systemic racism in our lifetimes, something that most other demos have had legal protections against for generations now. People we grew up with, went through the whole education system with, didn’t face those hurdles even though they had functionally the same background - or, in many cases, more privileged backgrounds as many asians/non-whites have a good bit of wealth that’s transferred in to the country. Those people then often preached to us about our privilege, and how we should accept our diminished role, let everyone else speak first, etc etc… Universities are one area where this sort of thing shows up in spades, where the liberal arts basically ostracized white guys / shoved them to the fringe.
There are news stories about FN people who’ve quite literally stabbed/killed a white-guy stranger in an elevator, fleeing the scene after… and the FN person gets off with no jail time because of “historic wrongs done to the FN peoples”, basically we have a race-based justice system which is absolutely not blind/impartial. And that racist system was established/re-enforced by our first FN AG, Jodie Wilson-Raybould, who also triggered the revolving door of our prisons with her bail reforms – which were enacted, essentially, to try and get racial equity in terms of who’s locked up, objective concepts of justice be damned. And there are lesser examples, more mundane but equally racist in scope, of things like FN status holders getting discounted rates at things like FN gas stations – white people had ‘systemic privilege’ in the past, but FN people get to pay $0.15 less at the pump due to how systems are setup today. Or we see cases like the Cowichan band’s toxic dump situation, where the FN put out this ‘image’ of being some sort of noble custodians of nature, demanding that the evil white colonial system give them power / authority… but when one of their own people sets up an illegal toxic dump site on Cowichan lands, it’s on the public tax payers to clean it up.
It’s fairly easy / common to see these sorts of stories, where white guys/people are expected to accept poor treatment as individuals, because of a justification that ‘white people did bad stuff’ historically. Ignoring/ridiculing the real/tangible ‘personal’ life experiences of today’s white middle-aged people, is basically a gateway to radicalization for that demo and younger white guys. Expressing/commenting on those sorts of experiences in mixed company/public, generally just gets you even more scorn. White nationalists are more willing to listen to those sorts of grievances, and then declare extreme actions the only way to effect change. In some ways, it’s structured very similar to social movements from more militant/aggressive minority groups historically – like the FLQ in Quebec, not getting heard by the Govt, turning to violence during Trudeau Sr’s term. Or even less violent, but equally ignored groups who also had legitimate, but neglected, issues – like the women’s rights movements. If we turn a blind eye to the potentially legitimate concerns of a demo, it isn’t too surprising that they become increasingly radicalized.