Dismantling "Stochastic Terrorism"

The First Amendment Protects the Speech We Hate From the State. Civil Society Must Reject It.

A version of this essay was published in White Rose Magazine.

The term “stochastic terrorism” has become fraught in public discourse, weaponized in partisan skirmishes to discredit speech by associating it with violent outcomes. Free speech advocate Greg Lukianoff recently disparaged the concept as a dangerous rhetorical device, while essayist Scott Alexander argued comprehensively against it in “Against Stochastic Terrorism” (Astral Codex Ten). The concern from civil libertarians is valid: allowing vague accusations of “incitement” to carry legal penalties risks establishing a powerful tool for state censorship, undermining the First Amendment.

Yet, that a term is misapplied in daily political warfare does not mean the underlying phenomenon should be dismissed. Alexander is correct that the term is conceptually broken when used to trace subjective lines of causality from mainstream debate to isolated crimes. But stripping away the flawed jargon reveals an objective threat: the public endorsement of violence and overt bigotry that veers into eliminationist rhetoric—the implication that a specific group has no right to safely exist. When individuals cross from sharp political critique into legitimizing or celebrating acts of terror, they are not merely engaging in provocative expression; they are constructing a permission structure for destruction.

In confronting this threat, we must draw a firm line between legal accountability and social consequences. As a constitutional absolutist, I believe the government cannot and should not restrict this speech, save for rare instances meeting the high judicial threshold for direct incitement (Brandenburg v. Ohio). But I do not extend that absolutism to the societal domain. A liberal society is under no obligation to grant equal standing to those who actively advocate for its violent dismantling. To discourage social ostracism against those who seek our destruction is to unilaterally disarm one of our most vital cultural defenses.

For too long, the dominant narrative promoted by free speech purists has been that the only remedy for toxic rhetoric is simply “more speech.” This optimism fails to recognize modern media echo chambers, often amplified by foreign adversaries, and the nature of ideological conflict entrepreneurs who deliberately inflame divisions for profit or clout. More critically, when civil libertarians reflexively treat every attempt to isolate dangerous rhetoric as a nascent free speech violation, they inadvertently demand cultural passivity. In doing so, they flatten the concept of liberty by forgetting that a right to speak free from governmental prosecution does not demand immunity from societal consequences, nor does it require civil society to pretend eliminationist rhetoric is benign.

We have understood this distinction before. When the Third Klan operated in the mid-20th century, civil society enforced an unyielding baseline: Klan members lost their jobs, standing, and became pariahs when unmasked. Critics might argue that comparing organized sheets and hoods to today’s decentralized radicalism is a false equivalence.

But the analogy holds precisely because of that structural shift. Today’s illiberal movements rely on disorganization and online anonymity to shield themselves from legal accountability. Movements like Antifa or the Proud Boys openly advocate violence, engage in targeted intimidation, and vandalize public spaces, using a lack of formal hierarchy as legal armor. Because we are no longer dealing with traditional groups defined by official rosters, formal membership status can no longer determine who deserves social consequences. We must look entirely at the individual: what they explicitly say, what they do, and whom they choose to associate with. A lack of a corporate charter should not protect individuals from social consequences. We didn’t defeat the Klan by debating them, and we do not need to mainstream modern extremists who explicitly promote the destruction of the liberal order.

This principled ostracism introduces moral accountability by association. If an individual closely associates with those who violate core taboos by encouraging violence and bigotry, they cannot remain neutral observers. Civil society must require them to explicitly condemn that behavior to retain their standing. They are not immediately or permanently exiled, but they must demonstrate that they are willing to hold the line.

Crucially, this burden applies with greater weight to elite cultural and academic institutions. The true danger of eliminationist rhetoric hardens when universities, corporate boards, and media outlets sanitize the endorsement of violence under the guise of institutional neutrality or selective academic freedom. When leadership structures refuse to enforce basic moral boundaries, they act as institutional conflict enablers, providing cover for behavior that should be socially radioactive and laundering extremism into acceptable discourse.

Because we cannot discern internal intent—whether driven by financial profit or a need for social belonging—we must focus strictly on external output. We should treat participants with uniform principles, but apply a graduated scale of consequences centered on grace, stopping short of tolerating our own destruction. Those who most egregiously violate universal taboos—and profit from doing so—must face the heaviest exile, becoming as toxic as David Duke was to polite society. Conversely, those merely going with the flow, yet sharing guilt in amplifying or sanitizing violence, should face probationary ostracism—offering a clear opportunity to soften their views, condemn the hate, and return to acceptable ground.

Predictably, critics will warn this opens the door to moral hyperinflation. We have seen how terms like “bigot” and “racist” were hollowed out through overapplication, and accusations of stochastic terrorism are frequently lobbed based on subjective interpretations of coded “dog whistles.” Civil society cannot adjudicate every perceived dog whistle without collapsing into an ideological witch hunt. Therefore, our adjudication must prioritize clear, indisputable behavioral evidence—literal threats or overt calls to violence—rather than subtext. Our focus must be strictly bound to eliminating explicit instances of eliminationist bigotry and the endorsement of violence.

What prevents this framework from devolving into “cancel culture” is the mandate of the open door. Unlike arbitrary cancellation, which demands permanent destruction, principled ostracism builds a bridge back to civil society. Every participant must be allowed a clear path to apologize, clarify their views, repair the harm, and be redeemed. Even when a violation is flagrant, the door remains unlocked. However, accountability dictates that the more harm caused, the more repair an individual must perform.

Enforcing these boundaries through social pressure rather than state power reinforces our invisible guardrails. It makes it mathematically and socially harder for conflict manufacturers to keep pushing cultural boundaries until they cease to exist. We don’t need the state to censor speech, but we must stop treating the endorsement of eliminationist bigotry and violence as just another point of view that we can dismiss or debate away. Freedom of speech is a limit on government power, not a mandate for cultural surrender.