I read your profile of the #DezNat Twitter group and find it intriguing and greatly disturbing. You insist that #DezNat is not yet akin to, say, the Proud Boys, yet this movement clearly is heading to that level of extremism.
We’ve seen many images and communities start radical but not threatening. The Thin Blue Line flag really was initially a symbol of solidarity with the police, but now it’s a radical right symbol supporting anti-Black policing. r/TheDonald was where Trump supporters congregated to express enthusiasm for Donald Trump, but TheDonald.win (the community’s successor) is where a lot of the planning for violence on Jan. 6 took place; calls for violence there continue today.
Incels went from (to simplify) a group of lonely young men to extremists attacking women.
#DezNat promotes an us-versus-them ideology, rewards uncompromising opinions, and has “nationalist” in its name. Resemble anything?
Movements like these can quickly turn rancid, and Jan. 6 showed Americans how dangerous domestic extremists are. I hope Twitter monitors the community carefully, along with law enforcement. And I hope that this movement disappears before it gets violent.
More likely, unfortunately, is Utah will be represented in Congress by #DezNat sympathizers, just like QAnon.
Curtis Miller, Arlington, Virginia
