Brette Steele has devoted much of her career to studying the root causes of violence.
Her work takes many forms. She’s served on federal anti-violence task forces, advised states on preventing violence in schools, and curated workshops and resource guides for educators and clinicians. She spent many years at the McCain Institute as senior director of preventing targeted violence — and currently serves as the president of the Eradicate Hate Global Summit.
As a result of all this, she keeps a close eye on the most innovative efforts to identify and prevent people and environments that are likely to foster violence. She recently studied the results of a program designed to identify the root causes of violence amongst high school and college students.
The participants in the program told facilitators that the thing that scares them most amongst their fellow students is misogyny — in particular, the so-called "incel" phenomenon: young men who consider themselves to be “involuntarily celibate,” and who tend to harbor feelings of hate and outrage towards women.
As a follow-up, student groups at Missouri State University and Arizona State University workshopped ways of counteracting these perceptions, trying to identify and connect with men who might, unwittingly, already be on a dangerous path.
Steele was intrigued by the project and joined The Show to talk about it.
Full conversation
BRETTE STEELE: At Missouri State University, they said, “We want to address the risk factors for violence well before there's any real risk of violent action,” and so those students developed a curriculum for third-, fourth- and fifth-grade students. At Arizona State University, they focused instead on high school students, and they said, “We want to identify the students who are alienated, who are disconnected, and we want to design a survey that will identify students on campus who don't feel connected to campus, don't feel like there are any clubs or faculty who speak to them and ask them what their interests are in a confidential manner,” so that the school could design the activities to reach some of the students that were previously unreachable.
SAM DINGMAN: Wow, that's fascinating.
STEELE: One of the things that research has shown us time and time again is when youth, and it often unfortunately is, young men turned to violence, oftentimes there is that alienation, that isolation, that sense of grievance and a real disconnectedness.
DINGMAN: Yeah. So what did the ASU students do for the moment, who did this outreach? What did they find that these sounds like primarily men that they were identifying, were interested in and what steps did they take?
STEELE: So in the pilot, they ran, I believe one of their findings was an interest in gaming and recognizing that gaming doesn't have to be antisocial. There are lots of ways that gaming can be prosocial. You can build communities around games and so they use the example of “How can we provide a positive space in a positive way to engage students who may be playing some of the same games?” and create a club around that.
In the high schools, several of the administrators they engaged with said they had not asked this question of students previously, and so they thought it was a novel concept that these university students came up with to go to the students themselves and say, “You know, are you feeling isolated? What interests you?”
DINGMAN: Wow, wow. I mean that that seems quietly profound, you know, this idea of like instead of treating this constituency of folks instead of just identifying them as the problem group, approaching them and saying, “What are you into? Like, we're interested in you.”
STEELE: Right? There's another, profound question that you can ask, which is, “Do you have a trusted adult?” One of the greatest protective factors, so something that makes violence less likely, is having an adult you trust, who you can go to. And unfortunately, in many cases, students don't feel like they have a trusted adult. And so, looking at ways to ask students if they have someone and encourage students to find someone and encouraging adults on campuses to want to serve that role and be willing to serve that role as well.
DINGMAN: Interesting. And so is the idea there that you want to kind of create a space where there's an adult in somebody's life who might not be there otherwise, to whom they could come if they're having strong feelings about something that might otherwise lead to violence. Instead, they feel like there's somebody they can talk to and say, “I'm upset about this thing,” or “I'm angry about this thing.”
STEELE: That may be the case. Another alternative example is if you're concerned about one of your friends and you don't know what to do about it. So whatever you're concerned about, or maybe you're really frustrated with your parents. You know, there can be any number of things that can cause genuine concern and angst in a student's mind and having someone they can turn to, having a trusted adult to be able to talk things through with, can really provide some grounding and a sense that you're not in it alone.
DINGMAN: Right, right. Well, Brette, in closing, you were asked, at the conclusion of last year's Eradicate Hate Summit, what your takeaway was. I'm curious why you said hope.
STEELE: The reason why I have hope. It is because these acts of hate-fueled violence are preventable. We've seen time and time again concrete examples of people recognizing warning signs and seeking help and getting help early enough that we could really change the outcome for these, often young, often men, who were at risk of committing acts of violence. It takes everyone to effectively prevent this type of violence. Everyone has a role to play, but it is preventable and we can all work together to make that happen.
