How to Tell if Your Alt-Right Relative Is Trying to Redpill You at Thanksgiving

http://www.vice.com/read/how-to-tel...tive-is-trying-to-redpill-you-at-thanksgiving

As you're no doubt aware, literal Nazis who call themselves the "alt-right" (but to be clear: they are Nazis) have carved out a niche for themselves in the political discussion this year. Richard Spencer, the white supremacist who essentially founded the alt-right, praised the election of Donald Trump in a convention speech on Saturday. But he also said Trump is not the Aryan messiah who will bring about the white supremacist fantasy he calls the "new normal," but merely "a step towards this new normal."

So anyone spoiling for a fight with their proverbial racist uncle on this unusually tense Thanksgiving could be in for some unusually heavy artillery on the opposing side. American racism just received an injection of young blood, and your racist uncle might suddenly have an ally in that cousin of yours who always posts Breitbart articles on Facebook.

And things will really take a turn if that guy decides he wants to redpill you after you pass him the gravy.

"Redpill," for the blissfully unaware, is a slang term in certain alt-right-adjacent internet communities like the men's rights crew. It refers to that famous Matrix scene where Neo takes the red pill and sees things as they really are. When alt-right dudes use it, they generally mean "convince other white people that we're better than others," and many of them are not shy about trying to redpill their friends and families.

"It's a new label for an old idea," said Ryan Lenz, who gathers information on hate groups for the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, and edits their Hatewatch blog. Trump's presidential win has been a big validating moment for the alt-right, he told me, and, "once it feels validated, it seeks to take on adherents, and what better place to start than with those around you: your family and friends?"

So this Thanksgiving, if you hear some ideas that sound a little to the right of President-elect Donald Trump, it might be your redpilled cousin trying to bring you into the fold. Here are some tactics he might use:

A "both candidates sucked" warm-up round
Jonathan Tracy, a 33-year-old Trump supporter from Connecticut, told me he spends a lot of time reading politics on 4chan and Reddit, and that they "definitely helped shape some of my views this election" (Though he assured me that they hadn't converted him to white supremacy). Tracy told me he knows how to find common ground with his hippie mother: by trashing both candidates.

"My whole argument over the Thanksgiving table boils down to the fact that while Trump is a terrible person, his flaws are superficial," Tracy told me in an email. Then he'll transition into making Clinton sound like corrupt DC business as usual. "Hillary's flaws symbolize a much deeper rooted break in the system," he said.

Trump "kind of sucks as [a] candidate to be leader of the free world," but he also represents "at least the chance of change, and that's what I voted for," Tracy added.

Propaganda Videos
Last week, a Redditor named WhiteTideRising put a call out to the alt-right Subreddit for "Strategies to RedPill Your Family Over The Holidays." Thanks to Trump's election victory, the post says, "the ice has been broken, [and] it's time to get more bold with our families."

In the post, WhiteTideRising appears to have a mental block imagines showing his unsuspecting family a few videos, in the hope that as everyone sits down to some post-feast TV, he'll be able to bargain for a chance to show off his taste in programming. "We watched your 42 minute Liberal TV show, now watch this 15 min video of mine!" he predicts he will say.

I won't link you to the content that gets tossed around in that thread, or in other, similar threads, but most of it is pretty intense. For instance, there's a six-hour documentary about the life of Adolf Hitler, framing him has a misunderstood hero. Then there's a shorter video with animation in it that works as a kind of informercial for bringing back segregation. If you've never had the pleasure of going down a white supremacist propaganda YouTube rabbit hole, you may not have been exposed to these videos, but they've been there for years, and their presence on YouTube gives them an air of legitimacy that they maybe don't deserve.

Still it would be pretty uncomfortable trying to fit one of these in while the Steelers-Colts game is at halftime.

Shouting Matches
Another Redditor named Sputumbolus claims that he tried to win his family over, but warns other users to "be prepared to find out your liberal environmentalist sibling has more tolerance for a transgender criminal illegal alien than for someone with alt right views." A re-formatted excerpt from the dialogue Sputumbolus describes went like this:

Sibling: I'm worried trump's going to take away people's rights!
Sputumbolus: Wha?? Whose rights?!
Sibling: Transgenders.
Sputumbolus: Wha?? They're mentally ill!
Sibling: He'll take away the rights of illegal immigrants who have a baby born in the US.
Sputumbolus: Wha? Laws already exist that should be followed! Trump should enforce them.

Sputumbolus signs off with "Good luck—please do better than i did!!" So it doesn't sound like the combative approach worked very well.

Appeals to your ethnic pride
While videos and hostile argumentation don't sound like the winningest approach in the world, a sneakier way to turn you into a white supremacist might be to point out how much of a bummer immigrants are, as a way of attempting to make you see how gosh-darned terrific white people are. "Say '65 million migrants since 1965,' and then point out which COUNTRIES/REGIONS those migrants have come from," a Redditor named Shitlibboleth wrote. "Do not say what race or what IQ they are. That is too much for the Normie mind," Shitlibboleth added.

Another Redditor named AutoModeratorLoL tried to explain how to keep this strategy moving forward. Most people "naturally" hate undocumented immigrants, according to AutoModeratorLoL, and the topic can be used "as a springboard to transition into talking about the dangers of the Muslim religion." More broadly, AutoModeratorLoL continues, "find an area where you and your family members agree and start there," so that they'll be "more likely to stick with you when you start trying to get them to swallow the bigger redpills."

From there, according to another Redditor named Maldici, the seeds of racism can be planted. White people, Maldici wrote, "simply need to be convinced of the existence of group interests, that they themselves hold them as invested members of a society, and that diversity is contrary to their group interests."

This kind of white supremacist indoctrination in between bites of pumpkin pie may sound downright dystopian, but while it might not happen at Thanksgiving, according to Lenz, Americans may start to see it more and more. "This is a reality," he told me. "They no longer feel like they are ostracized or that they're pariahs either in their family, or in our culture."

 

Great to know.

Sun Tzu says "if you know yourself and you know your enemy you will win every time"

 

So basically all the same bullshit beat you over the head type tactics that anyone with any type of extremist leanings (racial,gender, religious, sex orientation) have been using all across the internet for years.

 

Times like these, I'm glad that my family is firmly in the non-Trump category.

 

This.

 

I handled this sort of shit long ago. I don't involve such people in events. If somehow it comes up anyway, I have no problem leaving or ending the event.

 

If you have any trump supporters in your social media circle, I'm sure you've seen and heard every example listed in that article. I fight every single post/comment that I see. Silence is acceptance and I refuse to let potentially impressionable people read that nonsense and soak it in without also hearing the other side. This election has brought out the worst in this country and I think it's our duty as Americans to actively show that this country is BETTER than who's been elected president. When racist/sexist/discriminatory remarks are made today, the voices of disagreement (*especially from white people*) should be louder than ever. This is truly a teaching moment for our children who are old enough to understand. We've used this election in our house to really highlight how to appropriately respond to bullying and discrimination. We don't just sit back and watch it unfold. We stand up and protect those who are being hurt. That is how we can help unify this country.

I knew this thanksgiving was going to be tough, coming face to face with all my family who voted for him. My family is not racist, but they are absolutely racially insensitive, based mainly (imo) on the fact that they're naive to the reality of racism in this country. For my children though, I sucked it up Thursday and prayed my family would at least have the decency to not open this can of worms on the day I'm supposed to remember how thankful I am for them lol. Of course, no such luck. Trump was brought up, they questioned my reasoning for voting how I did, they whined about being labeled "racist"...and I shut the conversation down at every turn. I didn't take the bait (so unlike me!). My mom actually stepped in to help me shut the men up. I'll never understand how these people can love and cater to my children like they do...but turn around and support a candidate like trump. My mom and my daughter are best friends, literally, and I can't help but feel such resentment towards her for voting against my child's (children's) safety and equality in this country. I cut out the ugly, white supremecist family members long ago, but it seems like the rest of my family is stuck between willfully ignorant and ignorantly racially insensitive. I'm frustrated, angry, HURT and embarrassed by their willingness to look the other way when it comes to injustices that don't affect them personally.

I'm right with you on nipping the ugliness in the bud, but so many of my family are a gray area imo, that it doesn't seem that easy. I know they're not racist, they truly (almost naively) don't see color. They love the children I carried, they equally love my child through marriage, they love my husband and they still thoroughly love and maintain a relationship with my ex husband. They're just incredibly ignorant to how ugly this world actually is towards every minority group. I feel like it's my responsibility to continue to try and open their eyes to how non-white/straight/christian human beings are treated here. I feel like at least there's hope in my efforts lol.

 

If a person can be so easily lead into the alt-right, chances are they were headed in that direction anyways.

 

I've decided to take the easy way out and just hide the fuck out of the more vocal Trump supporters on my FB page. They may not be sexist or racist but they have absolutely no problem with voting for a candidate who is. I'm really having to go back and re-evaluate what I think about people.

 

Exactly

 

Anyone notice how quiet Bliss and Bookie have been? Interesting.

I'll say this people who think that way can not be reasoned with do not waste your time. If these dumb fucks put their weight behind a billionaire who's history is riddled with fraud against people like them there is no hope for them. A man who has offshored a shit ton of jobs is going to be inclined to bring jobs back? Honestly the selfish self interest where they don't care about the vulnerable people that are going to be oppressed doesn't even bother me anymore, most people are selfish and rotten to the core no getting around that, but voting against your own future and the future of your kids is mind boggling. He's already filled his cabinet with very kind of people they were voting against. A host of elites who are going to actively strip the public of everything they're worth. The shit is so openly corrupt only a blind deaf fool can't see what's going to happen. Guess they really shook up government smh

 

You have to for your own mental health fam

 

I've been quiet because I've taken a step back from social media in general.

I've been seeing people a lot differently since November 9th and I'm now wondering if being on social media at all is even worth it.

 

Welcome back

 

Really how so?
I agree though just cancelled FB today. I think this election might kill fb, I'm sure their other investments in Instagram and What's App will pick up the slack but its no longer fun or remotely healthy.

 

Oh, I think this election will make FB more active than ever. I've already been added to several anti-Trump groups over that past few weeks lol. Facebook will never die.

It's all in how you handle it. Most of my posts are about sports but for the most part, even the really pro-Trump people have been pretty quiet lately. This will probably change around inauguration day, though.

 

Agreed.

I haven't given up on Facebook just yet, but it's getting pretty close. Political posts were, understandably, pretty frequent before the election. But, now, the people who said nothing political on Facebook are posting political stuff now. So, the political posts have doubled since the election. I've also unliked (that's a word, right? LOL) several pages that became nothing but political posts.

I think this election season may kill Facebook.

 

It's too toxic even well meaning people posting doomsday posts hourly or just telling us how they're fighting is a tad overwhelming. One thing that came out of this is I know without a shadow of a doubt who my real friends are and my activist game is on level 10,000. This year everyone in my life is getting two gifts, a donation to Standing Rock in their name and movie tickets to watch Hidden Figures. There are more important things in this world than trinkets.

 

Too many sour winners have destroyed the experience for me fam. Everyday its some dumb shit, my entire focus is on Standing Rock as of now and dedicating one day a monthat domestic shelters. Social media is teaching me its not what you post but what you do that matters. Too much disgusting hate out there and I don't see what I gain fromseeing it hourly.

 

I've been seeing the opposite. The people that I know supported Trump have been fairly quiet since the election, save for 1 very vocal supporter, for whom Trump can do no wrong. This guy even thinks Patraeus should be the Secretary of State over the other rumored picks. When I pointed out to the guy that you can't give shit to Hillary for her private email server but give Patraeus a pass without being a huge hypocrite, his response was, "it was only one time and it wasn't a big deal". Others also tried to explain to the guy but he wouldn't listen. None of us thinks Patraeus should ever hold another government position but this guy thinks very differently. I know that the SoS position has to be approved by at least the Senate, and I highly doubt anyone would approve Patraeus's appointment, but to think that some Trump supporters think this rumor has merit and WANTS it to happen is mind-boggling to me.

The people I know who supported/voted for Hillary have been even more vocal since the election. And some of the people who didn't post any anti-Trump or Pro-Hillary stuff before the election are now posting anti-Trump stuff and pro-Hillary stuff with a lot of frequency.

Between all of the political posts (which most on my feed are anti-Trump, pro-recount and pro-elimination of the electoral college) and the few people who post the depressing stuff that's happening in ND, it's become quite a depressing place to peruse.

This Standing Rock stuff...good God. I can't believe it's happening in America and no one in the government is doing anything about it.

You can only scroll past just so much before it starts affecting you on a personal level. And right now, the majority of my Facebook feed is scroll-worthy.