Protest Violence Defeats Purpose Per Stanford Research

PALO ALTO, CA -- Violence can backfire. In divisive, troubling times, protesters need to know they may not be helping their cause when they turn violent toward the opposition, the Stanford News Service reported on new research.

Moreover, their aggression may increase public support for the people they're protesting against -- in some cases, for the opposition's previous violent acts.

Human nature, with new research confirming, is such that people expect violent groups to be out in force on the street to show their might. Counter demonstrators operating under the guise of peace are expected to behave. But when they don't, their viewed even less favorably than the group their protesting against.

It's like when a mother tells an older sibling that she expects more heightened tact from the elder and expects the younger child to act out.

The research was inspired by recent confrontations between white nationalist protesters and anti-racist counter protestors in Charlottesville, Va., and in Berkeley.

A double standard in the research showed that when white supremacists turned violent people's opinion of them didn't change because the public already viewed them "as extremely unreasonable," Robb Willer wrote in his paper published recently in Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World. Brent Simpson of the University of South Carolina and Matthew Feinberg of the University of Toronto were co-authors of the paper.

"Our central finding is that even protesters who otherwise enjoy high levels of public support -- anti-racist activists counter-protesting a gathering of white nationalists -- can lose support from the general public if they use violence," Willer said.

When this happens, the white nationalists can even pick up more support.

The research used news reports in which counter protesters turned violent, then participants were asked how they perceived the incidents.

--Image via Shutterstock