In ‘Antisocial,’ How the Alt-Right Went Viral

Thanks for this review, and good luck to us all. You mention one "60-year-old “surly racist” with 25,000 subscribers on YouTube who, in another era, might have been relegated to muttering on his front porch." The "surly racist" scares me much less than the 25,000 subscribers. We get it that enough people felt disenfranchised in the 2016 election, enough so that they voted for Trump. What will prevent the same thing happening in 2020? Vote Blue.

An example of the power of stereotyping. Take a few and attribute their actions to a group. It’s this sign of intellectual dishonesty. It also goes by the name of racism.

The “elite” is comprised of both liberals and conservatives, a fact lost on many of the neckbeard boys. The folks who gained from alt-right’s traction care not one whit about its ideology. Politicians will smile and wave, but will be glad to gone from your presence. Trust the plan.

To me most of these people seem to be pawns of the Alt Right movement. They seem so lonely and unloved and disconnected. I almost think if we could get them leave their computers and join a circle of friends they'd be fine. I know a young man who started becoming very seduced by all the attention alt right groups provide ... until he met a real live African American woman and suddenly felt compelled to spend time with her... first to talk about and explain everything Alt Right but then talking led to other things, which led to (incredibly) marriage which led to real life worries about finances and navigating family ties and thinking of may be having a family of his own... he hardly has time for on-line stuff.

The US. is a huge country and therefore has a relatively large number of people on both ends of a distribution curve in political views. In the USA this curve is shifted to the right compared with continental Europe. Affordable health insurance and higher education are universally accepted in Europe and nobody would advocate teaching of Creationism. But there are also movements like Antifa in the US and one could write a book about those as well. He far left also has a tendency to deny facts over ideology. Humans are biological as well as intellectual beings and it is obvious that there are statistical differences between males females, and between different “races”. The aggressive accusations of racism and misogyny supports mostly the Alt.rt.

This is a central question: "do you also hold out hope that even a few of the people Marantz meets might be redeemed?" I believe that whether redemption is possible, or not, our Nation needs to acknowledge the danger that these people pose. We must contain them before attempting their redemption.

The "American Conversation" exists only in the minds of journalists, talk show hosts, and authors in need of a tagline to capture some interest from potential customers. When has there ever been "Conversation" in America? During the Civil War?, During the original Anti-Immigrant era?, The Depression? The Civil Rights Era? Viet Nam? There never has been, and there is now absolutely no chance of there ever having an "American Conversation" unless you are sitting in an echo chamber.

I strongly believe in freedom of speech and freedom to hold one’s own opinions. I do not believe, however, that people should enjoy a freedom to lie for profit. And I certainly believe that politicians who lie for their own or their patrons’ benefit should be seen as committing treason because they are undermining informed democracy.

Other countries have anti-war movements. In the USA, both parties ardently support the never ending Global War On Terror and, in Congress, always vote overwhelmingly for big increases in military spending. Other countries have strong labor movements with their own powerful Socialist political parties. In America,the labor movement has been almost destroyed, businessmen buy politicians as another business expense and Senator Warren, as much as President Trump proudly declars herself an ardent Capitalist . . . . In place of examining his own fascinating psychic reactions to these alienated alt right individuals, perhaps the author should have noticed the corporate hegemony political regime that drives these people down the rat hole of Fascism . . . .

"As disturbing as these specific stories are, what filled me with a creeping sense of dread were the parts of “Antisocial” that incisively describe how a Darwinian information environment has degraded to the point where it now selects for people who can command the most attention with the fewest scruples." And the winner is...drum roll...Donald Trump.

If Marantz sees what is happening in India, he would certainly hug these anti socials for being not too conservative, in comparison. Excellent coverage, NYT!

I find myself ever more a reluctant institutionalist. I certainly recognize the faults in institutions but those who attempt to topple institutions with a sledge hammer are careless people. We don't need a sledge hammer to improve institutions, we need scalpels to carefully remove the cancerous parts and let the rest of the body heal. We have clear evidence of what can happen, no matter our intentions. The Russian Revolution comes to mind but there are many more examples if we just study history. These online haters are scary and those who gladly follow are even scarier.

The Alt-right is not a very powerful movement. It is actually a very small loosely linked group of ridiculous ne'er do wells. Losers, like Dylan Roof, who have no scruples or accomplishments. It is the availability of high powered weapons that give them any power at all. Once used, their pathetic personal state quickly becomes apparent. Hatred and violence eat them from the inside out. One Alt-right leader was deliberately killed by his own son. Poetic justice for a toxic Father. Social media companies need to shut their internet-based gathering spaces. Spout stupid rantings all you want, but cross the line to support of mass shootings or worse, instructional support, and your site will be shut down. It is good to see that DHS and other police organizations finally taking action on domestic terrorists. These people want to make war on non-whites and support a lawless dictator as their leader, let them move to another country. Our Declaration of independence was written as a broadside against dictatorship.

"what filled me with a creeping sense of dread were the parts of “Antisocial” that incisively describe how a Darwinian information environment has degraded to the point where it now selects for people who can command the most attention with the fewest scruples." Mike Judge made a movie about that based on the 1950's Sci-Fi short story:" The Marching Morons." The film is" Idiocracy" - and we've arrived.

This is so sad and dispiriting. Anger is most often a defensive response to a threat to an individual's security. These people have so few resources. A resilient sense of self is built from healthy family engagement, education, a wide range of experience, adequate financial resources, the experience of the benefits of social capital, and a government that can be trusted. Absent these elements, insecurity plagues people and they respond with the angry, intolerant rants that echo in social media. I don't have the solution, but Trump is clearly exemplifying and exacerbating the problem.

"...a Darwinian information environment has degraded to the point where it now selects for people who can command the most attention with the fewest scruples." A society that worships celebrity should not be surprised that the ordinary and untalented should seek out shortcuts. Electronic media has eliminated any entry thresholds. Indeed, it appears to prize the simplicity of sheer loud and raucous noise, and anybody can do that. And at least we have encountered the answer to one pressing mystery: where do gamers and skateboarders gravitate after they get bored with their fast-food lives? The drab and dehumanizing emptiness of commercial popular culture can no longer be hidden in the shadows. Powerful weapons of destruction -- electronic, chemical, military -- are readily available to amuse those whose minds have been hollowed out. What could possibly go wrong? The best hope is that, in the longer term, the Darwinian forces will discover an absence of survival value in unfettered animal hedonism and natural selection will start becoming more selective. Some bright shiny toys will be rejected. Necessity dictates that at some future time a capacity for internal discipline will emerge. But things could get pretty ugly before that turning point is reached.

This book summary brings to my mind that what is lacking is a historical comparison with past rebels. My choice would be Maxmillian Robespierre and his friends in 1789. Robespierre et al. claimed they wanted to change society. They caused 10 years of misery. I personally find that these alt-right people have little to complain about, but perhaps I am not attuned to their alienation to present-day society. I suspect that Facebook and similar internet sites that allow them to vent their fury about perceived wrongs against them with the security that no one can trace their real names and addresses. Maybe Facebook and similar sites need to demand this information of their users. After all, as the saying goes, "if you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear".

“They are compulsively reactionary, defining themselves in opposition to liberalism — or, that is, to their caricature of it” THIS above all things...this worldview now represents mainstream “conservatism”...no interest in truth, just one false equivalency after another. At one time, responsible leaders in the GOP would shut it down, but, with Trump, the GOP has embraced nihilism in pursuit of power.

Over the last month, I have spent time in Ukraine, Moldova, and the UK. Previously this year, I have visited the US on numerous occasions and travelled around my adoptive country, Canada. No matter how diverse the countries are geographically speaking, I have found that toxicity is international and strikingly similar in tone and subject regardless of the clime. I’m glad that Mr Marantz has described his experiences because he’s done me the service of clarifying my own thoughts on the subject. Writing this book was probably cathartic for him, being able to record the incongruities of abject human nature for what they are and being able to read them back. In doing so, one finds a consistency in otherwise disparate personalities regardless of how objectionable they are. In the UK, for example, I was recently verbally assailed by a lawyer on his way to the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester when he found out that I was a Remainer in the Brexit debacle, he a staunch Johnsonite. It took 20 seconds from this discovery for him to slide into not so veiled insults and invective backed by ideological inanities defending the Leave movement. I asserted without much effect that, if Brexit was the correct course, he would have no cause to spit venom at me, leading me to conclude that most Brexiteers are venomous. In Moldova, I found citizens who hate Russia but love Putin. In Ukraine, there thrived a sentiment that Zelensky should be more like Trump. We’re likely doomed.

Since commenting (perhaps ironically) wasn't available on Marantz's Oct. 4th essay in the Times about the dangers of completely untrammeled free speech, I would like to make one here: it's about time. I'm sure I'm in the minority, but I found his essay both essential and courageous. "The cure for bad speech is more speech" sounds wonderful, but it's about as empirically false as a cliche can be... and in the age of bots and foreign disruptors operating at scale, it's just plain ridiculous. Germany learned its hard lesson after World War II. I hope we don't need similar experiences to learn it in America. Just as Marantz writes in his Times essay, in a democratic republic that seeks to be a civilized society, every right must be balanced against others. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/04/opinion/sunday/free-speech-social-media-violence.html

I am convinced that legislation is needed to balance rights on social media and other online venues. The prohibition on yelling "fire" in a theater needs much greater applicability. First-amendment absolutism is no more acceptable than second-amendment absolutism. Certainly, there is no right to "free speech" on private platforms; rather speech is governed by Terms of Service rules. I consider this to be an urgent issue. It merits a constitutional amendment if necessary, limiting the scope of the first amendment. The garbage flowing through social media badly distorts and even nullifies democracy.

“We know now that in the early years of the twentieth century this world was being watched closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own. We know now that as human beings busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacence people went to and fro over the earth about their little affairs, serene in the assurance of their dominion over this small spinning fragment of solar driftwood which by chance or design man has inherited out of the dark mystery of Time and Space. Yet across an immense ethereal gulf, minds that to our minds as ours are to the beasts in the jungle, intellects vast, cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. In the thirty-ninth year of the twentieth century came the great disillusionment. It was near the end of October. Business was better. The war scare was over. More men were back at work. Sales were picking up. On this particular evening, October 30, the Crosley service estimated that thirty-two million people were listening in on radios.” --- ORSON WELLES, Opening words of the “War of the Worlds” radio broadcast, 10/30/1938 Eighty-one years later and Trump’s supporters are still expecting the Martians and believing in every lie and piece of fake news he tells them.

Does anyone remember what it means to be revolutionary, or are we all condemned to a reactionary future on both sides?

"Most of Marantz’s subjects are enraged, resentful and — when it comes to the non-internet parts of their lives — profoundly mediocre." That's exactly it. If they were employable and productive they wouldn't have time for all of this.

These two sentences describe the alt-right perfectly (to me): "Most of Marantz’s subjects are enraged, resentful and — when it comes to the non-internet parts of their lives — profoundly mediocre. Their appetite for attention is so desperate that it’s both repugnant and poignant." It's all a cry for attention, and they way to get noticed is to be despised.

We will always have the ignorant among us. Is it still true that certain school systems insist on teaching Creationism side by side with Evolution? I have not heard otherwise.

I'm not sure how valuable it is to know sociopaths, overt racists, human failures who seek attention by appealing through extremism to other human failures ("there will be no need to feel ashamed for being a failure when there is no society to pronounce us one") up close and personal. It doesn't take much imagination to know how little they have to say and when you've heard it once it is just boring in its different iterations. What would be of value is to understand exactly how influential they are in the world and precisely and to what degree the internet, twitter and Facebook have allowed the borderline an inroad in their efforts to undermine social order. That is something I really don't know, but then maybe if I did I'd wish I didn't.

To quote this article: Most of Marantz’s subjects are enraged, resentful and — when it comes to the non-internet parts of their lives — profoundly mediocre. I suspect this description describes about 98% of the population of the United States, not just the neckbeards who lurk in the halls of 8chan and Reddit.

The "smug conformity" has exposed criminal presidents, lying Viet Nam commanders, institutional racism and sexism, abuse of immigrants, CIA and FBI failures, criminal governors, mayors and other elected officials, and a myriad of other societal wrongs and wrong-doers. To paraphrase an old saying, American journalism is the worst form of journalism in the world, except for all the rest.

Every person viewing this by phone or laptop is being tracked, for their emotional response, their IQ, they use the camera and the audio, the location, anything and everything. During this run up to 2020, when Trump's give a speech, FB, Instagram Twitter, emails, chats, phone calls, all give an algorythm a chance to SHAPE their emotions, their actions and discourage or encourage. That solid 40% voting block, which contain angry alt right? why do you think it never waivers?

The problem any sane person has with the alt-right media is that if you ignore them, you stand a good chance of being defenseless when they attack, while if you inform yourself about their hate and insanity, you pollute your own mind.

This review and its subject are devoid of compassion and human understanding. As a liberal Democrat I find this self righteousness repugnant. Referring to people as "deplorables", or "lizard brain" shows a degree of contempt that they feel in their very bones. Rather than vilifying those who negatively react to being called inferior, perhaps trying to understand their genuine plight and offering a solution will help to stop their exploitation by the corporate elite.

All these people will eventually be forced back into the holes from which they crawled out along with their primitive and misogynistic beliefs. They seem to believe that they can blame all of their grievances on someone else instead of taking responsibility for their own lives.

Does Mr. Marantz have a sense of irony: he is making a few bucks off the mob just as the mb is making a few bucks off scaring the pants off people like....well, like Mr. Marantz, who is scaring the pants off... And so it goes.

Great interview with the author on this week's longform podcast, longform.org

Ah. Gets to a point that you just don’t know what to do. Between the destruction of our environment to the destruction of a civil democracy (and the destruction of some minds), it at times feels like the tide of stupidity and hate is washing over us all. Are the Dark Ages returning?

All this hate, just for being asked to share a bit.