The Turner Legacy: The Storied Origins and Enduring Impact of White Nationalism’s Deadly Bible

Abstract

The Turner Diaries, the infamous racist dystopian novel by neo-Nazi William Luther Pierce, has inspired more than 200 murders since its publication in 1978, including the single deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history, the Oklahoma City bombing. The book is arguably the most important single work of white nationalist propaganda in the English language, but it is not a singular artifact. The Turner Diaries is part of a genre of racist dystopian propaganda dating back to the U.S. Civil War. This paper will document the books that directly and indirectly inspired Turner and examine the extensive violence that the novel has inspired. By comparing and contrasting The Turner Diaries to its less-remembered predecessors, this paper analyses the reasons for the novel's lasting impact, including its focus on rational choices over identity choices, its simplification of white nationalist ideology, its repeated calls to action, and the powerfully persuasive nature of dystopian narratives, which can be understood as a secular analogue for religious apocalyptic texts.

A Paler Shade of White: Identity & In-group Critique in James Mason’s Siege

“…One of the few then-living Movement leaders that Mason seems to respect at all is William Luther Pierce, leader of the neo-Nazi National Alliance and author of The Turner Diaries, a White nationalist dystopian novel that has had an outsized impact on the Movement as Mason defines it. 51 The Turner Diaries was first published shortly before Mason began work on Siege, and likely influenced its content. Mason knew Pierce and directly cites The Turner Diaries multiple times in Siege, extolling its merits.…”

Racially/Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremist (Rmve) Attack 28 Planning and United States Federal Response, 2014-2019

“…50 In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the cornerstones for the militia strand of RMVE were already being set, especially through RACIALLY/ETHNICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENT EXTREMIST (RMVE) ATTACK PLANNING AND UNITED STATES FEDERAL RESPONSE, 2014-2019 the release of highly influential propaganda such as William Luther Pierce's The Turner Diaries. 51 The infamous 1978 novel depicts a successful, fictitious insurrection by white nationalists against the U.S. government that leads to ethnic and racial cleansing and nuclear war. 52 The results of white supremacist and white nationalist inroads into the militia movement, and their increased promotion of militant separatism within RMVE groups, quickly came to fruition in the early 1980s.…”

Telling stories of terrorism: a framework for applying narrative approaches to the study of militant's self-accounts

“…4 Imagination also raises questions about individuals' capacity and willingness to not only embrace narratives but, further, to immerse themselves within them and the alternative realities they constitute. Whilst this paper has primarily focused on terrorists as producers of literature, it is also important to recognise these individuals are also consumers of narrative texts (Glazzard, 2017 see also Berger, 2016;Holbrook, 2017). Holbrook found in his study of the media consumption of a number of convicted terrorists in the UK that stories, fables and biographical accounts conveyed as heroic narratives were especially prevalent (2017, p. 28).…”