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Has anyone actually seen any examples of what is being talked about? I keep hearing about fascist infiltration or alt-right infiltration into spaces, including themotte, but no one seems to actually be showing examples. I doubt I'll get too many example here, but someone must surely have been shown or heard about these infiltrations.
The closest I think I've heard is the story of mlpol, a 4chan board that combined MLP and /pol into one, which may have converted some MLP fans into /pol-style bigots.
Sure. Were you around the last time our Jolly Benefactor made a play? He would drop a top-level monologue in the CW thread, then either ignore responses or performatively call them out as close-minded. A lot of people made cogent, careful arguments, but he never, ever, gave any ground. Repeat until the latest alt drew a ban.
For a more explicitly right-wing approach, I remember a post about British debt to India. See my responses for why I think it was poorly executed. The OP dropped this steaming turd of an article, loaded with anti-“woke” boo lights, copied the full text into a comment, then wandered off. Perhaps he was just shilling a blog? Or perhaps an account named after a notorious British-on-Indian massacre had ulterior motives?
Coming to this site, there’s definitely a couple users who just showed up to complain about Jews rather than actually engage. It’s pretty hard to get a ban for that, so the mod log may or may not help. But I think it’s a matter of “knowing it when you see it.”
Not sure who you're referring to, sorry.
Ah, I remember that post. I hadn't really thought of it that way, but you're right, there's something very culture-warry at the least when you do that sort of thing, though I wonder if that poster was British - it seems like they'd be more likely to defend colonization compared to American fascists or alt-righters. But I could be wrong about that.
Yeah, that's fair. But now I find myself wondering if this has happened in more progressive spaces that were open to debate. The accusation by people like the guy who made the Alt-Right Playbook seems to be that you'll have some space that has a mix of conservatives and liberals, then you get these "debaters" who are just trying to sow doubt and convert people by just arguing. That dude gave an example of someone in a fandom being a Nazi, but it feels like there's some specific example being given.
I'm not certain if I would say that about the SSC CW thread, it attracted people who were largely against social progressivism and was thus hostile to their views.
JB is referring to "Julius B ranson," or any of several other usernames for a guy with really, really strong feelings about child, uh, liberation. He showed up a few times and consistently proved unwilling to actually engage on a civil level with any of his many detractors. This included:
The aforementioned walls of text
"Just Asking Questions"
Sockpuppet accounts
Singleminded focus
A preference for Gish galloping
So, so much playing the victim
Blaming anyone who pointed out the above tactics for being irrational
Shilling how much cooler and freer his own site, Dark Rationality, was
Flouncing and/or suicide-by-mod
I can't overstate how much drivel this guy generated without ever so much as acknowledging counterarguments. He just baited Hlynka or Deiseach into getting annoyed so he could cry foul. Also, he thought he was a lot smarter/sneakier than he actually was.
Anyway...
I would guess the answer is yes, since I think countersignaling is appealing to a certain kind of user. In progressive spaces, that naturally suggests right-wing takes delivered with some subtlety. I ended up with a lot more to say about the subject here.
Ah, that guy. Yeah, he never came across as that convincing overall and seemed to raise the ire of just about everyone he interacted with. Like, he would get downvoted a lot, especially on the DarkRationality account because he was arrogant as hell.
They're not sending their best, it seems.
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{most famous Roman emperor} + {British transportation/record store billionaire}.
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As an original /co/mlp poster, trust me, they were already there before that April Fools prank.
That right? So, what, they just kept their /pol posting to a minimum until the prank?
Since everyone is anonymous by default on 4chan and sticks to only the topics of the board they’re on, there’s no way to tell who’s “from” /pol/ or not, though the site has always been joking-not-joking edgy. I don’t know if the Aryenne The Nazi Pony threads started before or after April Fools, but an ironic “unicorns are the master race” attitude emerged by the fourth episode of season 1.
Suffice it to say there emerged two cultures, the pony fans (“ponyfags”) with a machismo “Friendship is magic, bitches!” attitude, and the stereotype of the sissy bronies with a “love and tolerate” attitude - a phrase never uttered on the show. I got a sense the the brony side that stayed on 4chan (instead of migrating to ponychan and other sites) was ironic for a couple of years, but grew genuine after that.
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