Stochastic Violence

Stochastic violence is a term which has been in the news lately. 

Dictionary.com has this to say about stochastic violence:

Stochastic terrorism is “the public demonization of a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable but whose specifics cannot be predicted.”

It is discussed by Juliette Kayyem, who is a former assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security and faculty chair of the homeland security program at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government, in an article in the Washington Post: (Opinion | Juliette Kayyem: There are no lone wolves - The Washington Post)

"Public speech that may incite violence, even without that specific intent, has been given a name: stochastic terrorism, for a pattern that can’t be predicted precisely but can be analyzed statistically. It is the demonization of groups through mass media and other propaganda that can result in a violent act because listeners interpret it as promoting targeted violence — terrorism. And the language is vague enough that it leaves room for plausible deniability and outraged, how-could-you-say-that attacks on critics of the rhetoric."

The latest example of stochastic violence is, of course, the attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of Nancy Pelosi.

And if the attack itself weren't enough, we had the tweet by new Twitter owner Elon Musk.

Charlie Sykes of the Bulwark had this to say An Attack, a Viral Lie, and Elon's Inferno (thebulwark.com) 

"For a brief moment, we wondered: how would Elon Musk react to the cataract of hate and defamation? Would he condemn it? Block it? Rethink his approach to content moderation?  Surely, you jest.The sh*tposting billionaire jumped into the sh*tposting himself, pushing the conspiracy theories to millions of his new customers.

“There’s a tiny possibility,” he wrote, “there is more to this story than meets the eye” — and linked to “an article that is a compilation of tweets from random Twitter users claiming that Paul Pelosi brought home a left wing male prostitute after the bars closed and that there's a conspiracy to cover it up.”

"Musk’s tweet was eventually removed (censored!?!!!!), but not before it was retweeted and liked tens of thousands of times."

"So, on his very first weekend of being Chief Twit, Musk helped launched a toxic conspiracy theory that will now take on a life of its own."