Was/is the Klan a domestic Christian terrorist group?

[Igel]

29. The Klan was like Hamas.

It's a terrorist group and was.

At the same time, it was a response to outsiders and perceived injustices committed against its constituency ... and committed many injustices on its own.

At the same time, it was also charitable group ... that was at times to outsiders very uncharitable, if not anti-charitable.

At the same time, it was a social, political, and religious organization ... that denied and would deny social, political, and religious rights and privileges to others.

Things like the Klan, things with a 140 year history that spread over tens of thousands of square miles tend to have a lot of different aspects to them. We outsiders focus on just a few aspects as primary and of interest to us and make a point of ignoring or denying that any others could have existed; others are equally justified in doing the same thing, but may disagree which aspects are "primary" or "of interest." The tendency is to make the opposing group as mean and evil as possible and make your own group as pure as possible. Even with nasty organizations it pays to remember this is a universal trait and draw a distinction between what the group is and the little bits we want to represent the entire group, to humanize them.

These days the primary purpose of every Klan group I've heard of is anti-something, as the needs it met at various points have been met. Still, not every Klan group is terrorist and engages in violence. Most groups and members just engage in some form of hate speech and bravado. And like many other movements and organizations, they may spew rhetoric of hate and contempt, but as soon as somebody's influenced by them they deny that they ever intended any actual harm.