As part of research for a project I’m working on, I went on Tumblr this afternoon.

(I haven’t been on Tumblr in ages. Tumblr is an SJW wasteland.)

And in Tumblr, I searched “alt-right.”

The results came back as pretty much what I would have expected. Lots of BLM posts, “punch Nazi” cartoons, and long impassioned rants about feelings. There are a few nationalist and traditionalist blogs on there, intrepid souls, which was a bit surprising and very uplifting. I got lost in Wrath of Gnon for a while.

Not a lot of nuance, especially with those related search terms: nazis, racism, white nationalism.

It was interesting watching my own emotional reaction to things as I scrolled through the post. Most it skewed toward “SOMEONE IS WRONG ON THE INTERNET,” related to the lack of nuance.

I’m of the school of thought that the alt-right is a big umbrella, with sub-groups underneath; the white nationalists/Nazi larpers are just one cluster of thought. There are others: traditionalists/Western Civilizationalists, omni-nationalists, and if you squint, the New Right and Proud Boy types.

The New Right and Proud Boys work hard to distance themselves from the alt-right, but that is because the left — with its total lack of nuance or care — has defined the alt-right as entirely neo-Nazi. Or perhaps that is Richard Spencer’s huge ego eclipsing everything and trying to bend all media coverage to itself.

In my opinion, the Spencerites play right into the left’s hand by accepting the idea of “white” identity. There is no white identity. It is an artificial bucket created in opposition to the “black” identity. To give any legitimacy to that false construct is a huge mistake. It lets the left dictate the frame of the argument.

Not that the left cares. They’re delighted, I’m sure, to have ready-made villains for their political theater.

What I have to learn is this: that trying to earnestly explain to people that not all of the alt-right is like that is not a helpful thing to do, and in fact will disperse my voice into the noisy background of pixels and bits on the internet. There may be a time for a dialectical discussion, but some random project on the internet is not it.

I need to focus on rhetoric, and hone rhetorical strategies that will dovetail with Tumblr themes but also hone in on chinks in the SJW armor.

I’m being vague about my project for now, because it’s still in the beginning stages, but I look forward to debuting it when the time is right.

Let’s just say I rediscovered Hugo-nominated author Chuck Tingle today as well. Delightful.

Stay nimble, my friends.