Originally published August 15, 2023 9:25 am PDT
A survey recently released by the University of Chicago’s Chicago Project on Security & Threats (CPost) has brought to light a significant increase in the number of Americans advocating for political violence.
The numbers reveal a steeper rise among Democrats than Republicans, according to The Guardian.
The research indicates that about 18 million Americans overall, an increase of approximately 6 million in recent months, believe that force may be required to reinstate Donald Trump to the presidency.
Breaking this down, of these 18 million, a sizable 68% are convinced that the 2020 election was wrongly taken from Trump, while 62% perceive that the ongoing prosecutions aim to hinder his 2024 prospects.
Overall, this translates to about 7% of Americans who now see violence as a potential means to return Trump to office, a jump from 4.5%, or roughly 12 million individuals, as of April.
Contrastingly, the data shows that Democrat-leaning individuals have exhibited a pronounced inclination toward supporting political violence, albeit for different reasons.
Specifically, a disturbing 17% of Americans, which equates to an estimated 44 million people, by the end of June expressed that force might be necessary to compel Congress members to “do the right thing.”
This is a significant leap from just 9% in January.
Moreover, there’s also a noted increase in the number of Democrats supporting violence to reinstate federal abortion rights.
In essence, while 18 million Republican supporters believe in the potential need for violence to restore Trump to office, a staggering 44 million from the Democratic camp condone violence to push congressional actions or to defend abortion rights.
This difference underscores a considerable divergence in the beliefs of the two political groups, with a greater portion of Democrats advocating for violent means in their political activism.
A May 2020 peer-reviewed journal publication in Mankind Quarterly found that individuals with left-leaning political beliefs have more than double the rate of mental illness compared to conservatives.
“Within-study meta-analysis of all the results found that extreme liberals had a 150% increased rate of mental illness compared to moderates,” the study confirms.
Moreover, another peer-reviewed study published in May of this year in the journal Current Psychology attempted to explain the motivation behind politically left-leaning individuals participating in political violence.
The researchers, in their efforts, seem to have identified a phenomenon they refer to as the “dark-ego-vehicle principle,” that could explain why certain individuals, particularly those with narcissistic and psychopathic traits, are drawn to ideologies and forms of political activism, including those falling under the banner of left-wing authoritarianism (LWA).
