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The Paths of the Alt-Right Pipeline

by Camila

The sinister thing about the internet alt-right pipeline is how subtle it starts to indoctrinate you. There are infinite ways you can accidentally stumble upon the path, but once you do, you can very rapidly descend into believing the most horrible, discriminatory, hateful rhetoric possible. Alt right movements have led to radicalize people to the point of murdering others, of committing hate crimes, and of the fateful January 7th insurrection. What is important is to stay vigilant about what you are consuming, but even that can be difficult sometimes.

You need to really look out if you happen to fall upon a video claiming that the user is a ‘starseed’. This is a popular term in the new-age spirituality community, but many people are not aware of the horrendous history of this term. The concept is that some people who feel like they are different from others – like they are not from earth – are actually spiritually connected to alien groups beyond in the cosmos. The issue is that there is this idea that they are ‘spiritually superior’, and that starseeds aliens are a part of a superior race of humanoids; do you see where this is going? No surprise, this idea is rooted in white supremacy and neo-nazism. All the imagery associated with the ‘starseed aliens’ depict them as, in all practicality, serene Aryan archetypes, and the current leader of the ‘Starseed Academy’ is also widely known as a Qanon supporter.

The history also backs this up. It started among the UFO crazes in the 1980’s but found its roots in Theosophy, a religious movement inspired by Darwinism in the 1860’s and ‘70’s. It was created by Madame Helena Blavatsky, who interpreted evolution in terms of spirituality, with there existing “root-races” that were tiered in superiority. Blavatsky was not necessarily a white supremacist, but did believe the Aryan race to be superior to other races and believed some races, due to their inferiority were destined to go through, essentially, a wipe-out via natural selection. This idea did end up being adopted by German white supremacists though, and it was a popular notion among Nazis, most notably Hitler himself. Many of the people involved in the direct ‘starseed’ movement declared themselves as Nazi fascists and supported eugenics and getting rid of “bastard hybrid” races. One leader, William Dudley Pelley, even tried to overthrow the American government, leading to his arrest in 1942. This seemingly innocuous, if not far-fetched, spiritual belief can lead you down a path of seriously hateful rhetoric. Spirituality should be used to foster empathy and be more selfless, not the other way around.

Another awful way to stumble on the road to the alt-right is falling too far into the realm of 4Chan. 4Chan is a discussion site, similar to Reddit, however with a more overt reputation of housing the far right, especially on their ‘Politically Incorrect’ board. This is not to say that the phenomenon is exclusive to 4Chan - in fact many forum websites are well known for being just as bad - but this is one of the most well-known and easily accessible. It starts off by roping in socially ostracized young people with things like ‘edgy’ memes and supposed ‘self-help’ information. It appeals to especially young men who feel lonely and unwanted, giving them validation through the idea that they are superior, intelligent, and cool, and that society as a whole is out to get them. They get a taste of rebellion, but at the expense of their morals. That is how you get communities like incels, ‘red-pills’, alpha males, and looksmaxxing, which has become especially prevalent nowadays. There are some genuinely harmless memes that have come from 4Chan, and ‘looksmaxxing’ memes have often almost divorced themselves from the serious nature of their original creators. Unfortunately, though, those who feel mentally vulnerable can very easily come to sincerely believe this rhetoric. There are a myriad of genuine accounts feeding into obviously hateful rhetoric, be it an ‘alpha male’ on a podcast claiming that women are all selfish vultures or a ‘red piller’ talking about how POC pop culture has deteriorated the integrity of the country through a ‘wojak’ meme or perhaps a ‘looksmaxxer’ talking about how looks are all that matters in the world and how Europeans and European traits are visually superior to all other races.

These communities are known for their fascist, ultra-conservative undertones. They repackage things like sexism, racism, and queerphobia as ‘jokes’ and ‘self-improvement’, and often many people can fall down this rabbit hole and never get out, becoming the most extreme examples of alt-right hate possible. The most well known of these is ‘incel king’ Elliot Rodger, who killed 6 people and injured 14 others in a drive-by shooting at UC Santa Barbara, later leading to his suicide. He first started off involving himself heavily in online forum spaces that encouraged sexist and racist ideals, which radicalized him and deteriorated his already concerning mental health. Obviously this is not to say that he is blameless for anything, as he had a long history of being a morally despicable person, but these communities aggregated his mindset leading him to murder. With people with mental issues, these forums can quickly make them a danger to themselves and others. The same was true with Brian Cohee Jr., who murdered and decapitated a 69 year old homeless man. He had a history of being on these kinds of online spaces and indulging heavily in ‘edgy memes’, which helped incite a murderous tendency inside of him.

The issue with these spaces is the very real societal danger associated with the alt-right. This ideological footing prides itself in being as hateful and violent as possible, and it is based in a lot of misinformation. They know the smartest way to indoctrinate the future generation is through more generally acceptable ideas and going from there. As such, we must always stay vigilant to anything we learn online. Stay skeptical and always remember to value empathy over everything else.

Sources

https://aminoapps.com/c/desired/page/blog/starseeds-the-alt-right/p3pa_qLuQuEDzQbmVn2 W7ZrEoaEZ8lEXBG

https://julesevans.medium.com/the-weird-history-of-starseeds-7df5127be9c3

https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2021/03/29/qanon-new-age-spirituality/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliot_Rodger

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Isla_Vista_killings

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-021-00732-x

https://www.rottenmangopodcast.com/allepisodes/73ljn5j95wblmy6 https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/10108/7920

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