A new recruitment effort by a white supremacist group has recently raised alarm among some students at Murray State University.
Murray State Spokesperson Shawn Touney said Thursday that university police report an individual or out-of-town group left fliers on cars in parking lots on Sept. 21. The fliers called for those who are “proud to be white” to contact like-minded people, and prompted viewers to a QR code linked to their website. At least two students found these fliers on their cars.
“I saw the fliers on my car and several others in the stadium lot on Monday night when leaving with friends to go to Cookout,” said Cameron Kirksey, a freshman Occupational Safety and Health major. “I never saw anyone put the fliers out.”
Jaylon Taggart, a freshman and Musical Education major, said he saw the fliers after band practice.
This is not the first time white supremacist fliers have circulated in Murray. The Murray Police Department reported in 2016 that Ku Klux Klan recruitment fliers were being left on driveways in the city. Professor Sean Rife said a potential reason why the group may be using anonymous paper flyers is to avoid backlash from communicating their message through other means where they may be personally identified.
“For that kind of messaging, a lot of the normal avenues for broadcasting that message are not as easily used. In that sense, it’s a way of sort of bypassing those communication channels that are normally regulated,” Rife said.“Wanting to advance this cause without being subjected to social sanction is what’s probably going on.”
The Southern Poverty Law Center states the Creativity Movement is a self-styled religious organization with a reputation of rampant criminal violence among its members, that seeks to promote what it sees as the superiority and “creativity” of the white race. SPLC states the organization has few members in recent years.
