While individual iterations of the conspiracy theory vary on who is assigned blame, Jewish influence, people who hate whites, [29] and liberal political forces are commonly cited by white supremacists as being the main factors leading to a white genocide. [31] [32] [33] [34] This view is held by prominent figures such as David Duke , who cites Jews and "liberal political ideals" as the main causes. [35] [36] White nationalist Robert Whitaker, who coined the phrase "anti-racist is a code word for anti-white" in a widely circulated 2006 piece seeking to popularize the white genocide concept online, used "anti-White" to describe those he believed are responsible for the genocide of white people, and continued to view it as a Jewish conspiracy while emphasizing that others also supported the "anti-White" cause. [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] [43]

Discussion threads on the white nationalist Internet forum Stormfront often center around the theme of white people being subjected to genocidal policies by their governments. [26] The concept has also been popularized by the alt-right and alt-lite movements in the United States. [27] [28] The 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia referenced the conspiracy theory as tiki torch-wielding protestors yelled "You will not replace us!" and "Jews will not replace us!"

The conspiracy theory has continuously recurred among the far-right in a variety of forms, all centered around a core theme of white populations being replaced, removed, or simply killed.[3] People who have been described as endorsing or serving instrumental roles in spreading at least one iteration of the conspiracy theory include:

Canada

South Africa and Zimbabwe

White supremacists are described as being obsessed with the treatment of the formerly dominant white minorities in Zimbabwe and South Africa by the black majorities where "the diminished stature of whites is presented as an ongoing genocide that must be fought".[59] In particular, the story of Rhodesia as Zimbabwe was formerly known, which was ruled by a white supremacist government until 1980 holds a particular fascination for white supremacists.[59] Zimbabwe's disastrous economic collapse under the leadership of its first black president, Robert Mugabe, together with the Mugabe government's policies towards the white minority has been cited by white supremacists as evidence of both the inferiority of blacks and a case of genocide against whites.[59] In alt-right and white supremacist groups, there is much nostalgia for Rhodesia, which is seen as a state that fought valiantly for white supremacy in Africa in the 1960-1970s until it was betrayed.[60]

Even mainstream American conservatives who often championed the causes of Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa, seeing both regimes as having supposedly more enlightened policies towards black people than the policy of integration in the United States, embraced the variants of the white genocide theory as part of the defense of Rhodesia and South Africa.[61] In 2015, the Canadian journalist Jeet Heer wrote: "The idea that whites in America have a natural affinity with white colonialists in Africa did not spring from the neo-Nazi far-right, but rather the conservative movement that coalesced around National Review in the 1950s."[61] In 1957, the American journalist William F. Buckley wrote in The National Review in defense of white supremacy around the world: "The question, as far as the White community is concerned, is whether the claims of civilization supersede those of universal suffrage. The British believe they do, and acted accordingly, in Kenya, where the choice was dramatically one between civilization and barbarism, and elsewhere; the South, where the conflict is by no means dramatic, as in Kenya, nevertheless perceives important qualitative differences between its culture and the Negroes’, and intends to assert its own."[61] The "choice" that Britain faced "between civilization and barbarism" in Kenya that Buckley was referring to was the Kenya Emergency where the Kikuyu Land and Freedom Army, better known as the Mau Mau, fought for independence, and in the process the British security forces killed approximately 10,000-20,000 Kikuyu to put down the rebellion. The Mau Mau were depicted in the 1950s as savages who killed white British settlers, which justified British atrocities against the Kikuyu, and by linking the U.S. civil rights movement with the Mau Mau, Buckley was suggesting that civil rights for African-Americans would led to atrocities against white Americans.[61]

Heer wrote that Buckley's equation of whiteness with "civilization" and blackness with "barbarism" led him to support racist regimes in both South Africa and Rhodesia, to paint the possibility of majority rule in both places in the darkest of colors, and his writings on the subject from the 1950s to the 1990s show a strong emotional identification with the whites of Rhodesia and South Africa.[61] Buckley and other American conservatives consistently portrayed apartheid era South Africa in a favorable light, and warned that majority rule would cause a disaster for whites.[62] On 23 April 1960 in the aftermath of the Sharpville massacre of March 1960, The National Review ran an editorial stating "the whites are entitled, we believe, to pre-eminence in South Africa."[62] Russell Kirk in a column in The National Review on 9 March 1965 warned that letting African-Americans vote in the United States "will work mischief—much injuring, rather than fulfilling, the responsible democracy for which Tocqueville hoped", but in the case of South Africa "this degradation of the democratic dogma, if applied, would bring anarchy and the collapse of civilization."[62] Kirk stated apartheid was just because South African whites were racially superior and "Bantu political domination would be domination by witch doctors (still numerous and powerful) and reckless demagogues."[62] On 13 April 1979, Buckley in a column gave an account of South African history very sympathetic to Afrikaner nationalists, suggesting that their concerns about black rule were rational and "their fears are understandable."[62] In an editorial on 14 March 1986, The National Review asked "To what extent, is the vast majority of South African blacks intellectually and practically prepared to assume the social, economic, and political leadership in a highly industrialized country?"[62] In the July 1988 edition of Commentary, David Roberts, Jr compared Nelson Mandela to Pol Pot and the African National Congress to the Khmer Rouge, implying that the ANC would exterminate South African whites if it came to power.[62] Shortly before his death in 2005 Samuel T. Francis, the former editor of the conservative Washington Times, warned about the possibility of a "white genocide" in South Africa.[61]

Simon Roche, an Afrikaner nationalist from South Africa and a spokesman for the survivialist group, the Suidlanders, that exists in his words "to prepare a Protestant Christian South African Minority for a coming violent revolution", visited the United States in 2017 to promote the thesis that the white minority in South Africa is faced with the threat of genocide.[63] Roche stated he went to the United States to “raise awareness of and support for the Caucasian Christian conservative volk of South Africa...There’s a natural affinity with conservative white Americans.”[60] Another South African proponent of the genocide theory, Willem Petzer, appeared on a guest on Gavin McInnes's podcast, accusing African National Congress government in South Africa of planning genocide.[63]

Steve Hofmeyr, a South African singer, songwriter, political activist, actor and TV presenter, supports and promotes the conspiracy theory.[12][64][65] The Conversation has credited Hofmeyr with popularizing the concept.[66] In January 2017, media reported that Hofmeyr was set to meet President-elect Donald Trump to discuss "white genocide" in South Africa.[67][68] Another Afrikaner group, AfriForum, had its chief executive Kallie Kriel and deputy executive Ernst Roets, visit the United States in May 2018 seeking support from the Trump administration.[60] Roets met with U.S. National Security Adviser, John Bolton, and according to him gave him a copy of his book, Kill the Boar, which claims the ANC government is behind the murders of Afrikaner farmers.[60]

In March 2018, several Australian tabloids owned by the News Corporation ran articles alleging that South African whites were faced with genocide and which led the Australian home affairs minister Peter Dutton to promise fast-track visas for any South African white wishing to emigrate to Australia.[63] Dutton is known for his anti-immigrant and anti-refugee stance, which led to questions about his willingness to accept South African whites into Australia as refugees, since he normally opposes Australia accepting refugees.[69] One News Corp columnist, Miranda Devine, wrote about the ties as she saw them between the Australian people and “our oppressed white, Christian, industrious, rugby and cricket-playing Commonwealth cousins" threatened by South African blacks whom she promised would integrate "seamlessly" into Australia as opposed to immigration from Third World countries.[70] Another Australian News Corporation columnist, Caroline Marcus, connected the alleged plight of South African whites to what she saw as a broader attack on whites across the world, writing “the truth is, there are versions of this anti-white, vengeance theme swirling in movements around the western world, from Black Lives Matter in the US to Invasion Day protests back home”.[70] The British journalist Jason Wilson noted that the News Corporation run by the Australian media magnate Rupert Murdoch also owns Fox News, which has aired stories portraying South African whites as a persecuted minority, leading him to accuse the News Corporation of promoting this narrative around the world.[63]

Much of the theory that South African whites are faced with the threat of "genocide" originates with internet rumors started by the government of Russia.[69] Vesti, a television channel owned by the Russian government, aired a segment in the summer of 2018 about Afrikaner farmers wanting to immigrate to Russia as "brothers in faith".[69] The present government in Russia led by Vladimir Putin often attacks the ideology of liberalism for putting the individual before the collective, and promotes "white genocide" stories both as a way of showing the failure of liberalism and to promote the thesis that group identities matter far more than individual identities.[69] The ideology of the Russian state is that the interests of the collective take precedence over the individual, and evidence of alleged failures of liberalism abroad are extensively covered by the Russian media.[69] The Australian historian Mark Edele stated:"There is definitely an attempt [by Russia] to support alt-right views and extreme right organisations outside of Russia...Russia supports groups that will undermine liberal views. That's the logic of sponsorship of alt-right groups by Russia...There is a longstanding anxiety among Russia's nationalists that Russians are dying out because of falling birth rates compared to non-Slavic peoples. It reverberates with white genocide fears"[69] The Canadian alt-right personality Lauren Southern had a sympathetic interview with the Russian Eurasianist thinker Aleksandr Dugin, who told her "liberalism denies the existence of any collective identities" and that "liberalism is based on the absence of any form of collective identity".[69] Dugin used the case of white South African farmers allegedly threatened with genocide as proof of the failure of liberalism, for putting the individual ahead of the collective.[69] After the end of apartheid in 1994, South Africa was presented as the "rainbow nation" where henceforward people, regardless of their skin color, would be judged only as individuals. From the viewpoint of the Russian state, presenting liberalism in South Africa as a blood-soaked disaster is a way of discrediting liberalism in general.[69]

United Kingdom

Katie Hopkins, an English media personality, has made a documentary supporting the conspiracy theory of an ongoing genocide against white farmers in South Africa.[71][72] She has also promoted the idea that both immigration and multiculturalism are intended to cause white genocide.[73] Yahoo! News reported that while traveling for the documentary, "her intention was to 'expose' the white genocide" happening to farmers in South Africa.[74][75]