I scan read (it's quite long, sorry) - I didn't see much evidence for white nationalists. Sure, there was some "edgy" emails for sure, but nothing that seemed to indicate white nationalism. Maybe I missed it though, please feel free to point it out to me.
To be clear, Wikipedia's definition is:
> White nationalism is a type of nationalism or pan-
> nationalism which espouses the belief that white people
> are a race and seeks to develop and maintain a white
> racial and national identity.
Also the words "alt-right", "right-wing", "far-right" and "alt-lite" are used so interchangeably and often incorrectly, I've given up taking them seriously. They're often used as stand-ins for "not-left".
I highly suspect you'll downvote my reply or simply ignore it - I hope you give me the time of day that I'm giving you.
> Being “edgy” is just a way Of being a bully or bigot under
> the pretense of a joke.
The term "edgy" is to be on the edge of what could be generally called socially acceptable through some kind of content (such as a joke or opinion).
The reason it is a joke and not just a statement of opinion is because there is some mutual understanding that the intention is to be funny and the setup subverts your expectations in some way.
For example, the joke (chosen for being simple and controversial): "How do you make a postman cry? [Person thinks] Kill his family". The joke is funny not because you or I have some deep unsettled hatred for postman, it's funny because it subverted your expectations for how the joke should have ended. In information theory this would be "maximizing expected information gain" - or simply things are interesting. Postman might not find the joke funny, especially if they so happened to be on the receiving end of violence for example - but that not every joke is funny to everybody.
The point is, if you find a comedian unfunny, stop paying for a ticket to go see their shows. If you dislike Breitbart's authors, don't read their content and bump up their ad revenue. This circles back to the benefits of capitalism - reward what you want to see more of, your money is your vote.
> It’s not a new thing, just a new term for “dog whistles”.
I'm not entirely sold on the term "dog whistle". Every joke is tailored for a specific audience and you may or may not be the target demographic. I wouldn't call jokes intended for children to be "dog whistles to children".
If you mean that they are "secretly not meant to be jokes" - then why wouldn't they just outright say it? Why go to the effort of dressing it up as a joke? Especially in somewhere like America where their freedoms are protected up until the point of calls to violence.
If anything, to me the term "dog whistle" exists only to write somebody off completely without having to think critically about the actual meaning behind what they have said. Saying something like "they are all nazis" allows somebody to write off a large group of people and their opinions in the same way a racist might against a race of people they don't want to debate with (which I can't give a good faith example of because this platform has it's own biases).
The real political divide in many Countries is growing because people have become intellectually lazy. Platforms like Facebook are rewarded with return visits if they keep feeding you exactly the content you want to see, not the content you need to see. Perhaps Facebook and other social media platforms have realized that they do need to show you the other side of the argument, even if they risk driving user retention down.
I’m assuming your response is in good faith, but this isn’t about plain old crude jokes. I shouldn’t have referred to being edgy as just being dog whistles because it’s often not though many times it does follow the same patterns when it comes to race and politics. I understand what being edgy is, but people making racist remarks on social media and in the comments section on YouTube often times isn’t being edgy until they get called out.
Can you say that you’ve never experienced or said something yourself where it was cruel and when confronted there was an attempt to walk it back as it being a joke?
That it’s meant to be funny is somewhat irrelevant. I remember when hearing “black jokes” was much more common, but black people didn’t find them funny and they often played to very harmful and racist stereotypes.
Capitalism alone as a solution does nothing to help the minorities being denigrated by the majority. In fact, it likely means it will continue to perpetuate.
I don’t have the expertise to definitively say why someone would choose to use coded language rather than be overt, but I suspect that “We want to keep our country white”, doesn’t play quite the same as “we’re trying to preserve our traditions and way of life”, even if the policies behind both statements are identical.
I suggest looking into the history of the use of dog-whistles in politics. People often repeat things without knowing their origin or truthfulness and that’s why I think it’s important to seek understanding and take things in context.
To be clear, Wikipedia's definition is:
> White nationalism is a type of nationalism or pan-
> nationalism which espouses the belief that white people
> are a race and seeks to develop and maintain a white
> racial and national identity.
Also the words "alt-right", "right-wing", "far-right" and "alt-lite" are used so interchangeably and often incorrectly, I've given up taking them seriously. They're often used as stand-ins for "not-left".