Packs of Lone Wolves

On the 15th of March 2019 at 1:40 pm, an armed individual entered the Al Noor Mosque in Christchurch New Zealand. Over the course of the next hour and across two locations, this individual opened fire upon Muslims at Friday prayer, killing 51 people and injuring 89. The attacker, with no apparent links to any larger terror group and appearing to act alone was widely labelled as a 'Lone wolf' by global news organisations. Several other far-right murderers have similarly been labelled as lone wolves in the media, such as Anders Breivik, the man who killed 69 people, mostly children in 2011. However, it is clear now that this term is not useful or even accurate as it widely misses the main point of attackers such as the Christchurch shooter. While these individuals may appear to act alone on the surface, it is quite clear that through various online methods, such as social media and messaging boards, so-called lone wolves share grievances with other people and groups, supporting and befriending like-minded individuals. I wish to investigate these two individuals, their manifestoes and associated artifacts, to attempt to derive points of confluence between the two manifestos. These themes can then be used to investigate the online environments where radicalisation takes place, particularly on telegram. I focused on Telegram for this purpose, to investigate how prolific the ideas shared in the manifestoes are online. My investigation found several consistent themes across the manifestos, such as a focus on the Great Replacement myth, a hatred of Muslims, suspicions of progressive politics, and a view of leftists as traitors. I found these themes to be mostly consistent throughout my investigation of far-right groups on Telegram, although one can see a widening of the goalposts where necessary, expanding hatred beyond just Muslims to anyone non-white, and an increased focus on LGBTQ+. I reflect that my research has implications for understanding the contemporary far-right, and demonstrates the malleability of far-right discourse, as it appears able to bend and move to suit the local environment where it is applied.