@The Harbinger of Ferocity You are correct that classically white nationalist gangs have not used these recruiting tools in the past, but the modern day alt right is something of a different animal. I dont nessecarily disagree that people who become White nationalists might have been going down that road anyway, but the same can bes said about any fringe group, thats a nature vs nurture argument that im not sure either of us are qualified to have.
I believe, beyond what I know as fact, that with examples such as Charlottesville which included agitators in both factions there is a solid claim in knowing
who and
what the Alt-Right is, at least with the actual Far Right. This is throwing out the crisis actors, the shills, the Antifa jackboots, the Nazi larpers, and focusing on who made up the event at their core on the right. As we start to strip away these elements, we begin to notice an emergent pattern of who the groups are - I have spoken at extensive length on them here in this very topic twice before - but in this case it bears address again because of the distribution of how they formed.
The Neo-Nazi and white nationalist factions are not technically savvy, skilled or competent by and large. They lay claim to minimum influence and stay mostly within their confines on the internet, at times drifting out as anyone does and interacting elsewhere; there is no coordinated effort to infiltrate, twist, or indoctrinate new members. It goes against their method of operation and from what has been observed and what I can speak to on it, they have still changed very little and are slow to adapt. Next we have the nebulous Far Right or those who typically call themselves the Alt-Right unironically and cling to its tenants, but have less an extremist nature. This group, from numbers along, was indeed larger and more influential - speaking from what was noted about Charlottesville - namely from that aforementioned larger, younger crowd associated with the internet. Still not a significant number by themselves, they were visibly comfortable interacting with the more extreme factions because they had a common enemy and shared most of their values.
Now comes the largest component that is new to the image, the "Alt-Light", these are your internet subcultures that have tendrils in some of the above, yet are by and large distinct in that they are extremely organized and savvy in technology, proficient in organization, by the numbers younger members, and very active in their communities. These are your internet trolls incarnate, be them Kekistanis or Alt-Knights, either way, this was of the first times we saw them in person in any sort of number. This group is where you start seeing the recruitment and memetic action, especially the tenants of psychological operations. This is the realm that helped spawn Pepe and used him as a weapon against the Far Left and Left as a whole. Unquestionably these are your subtle instigators and doormen who can lead further to the right, the Far Right, but realistically
most people never arrive here to begin with; they just see the results of their action.
The outliers from here were the MAGA members, the III%'ers, and the Oathkeepers. In order, the first group dispersed when they saw the mobilization of the Neo-Nazi and white nationalist, largely because their organization is exceptional for them being not being an organization. This was done mostly through forums, Twitter, Discord and a few other means, but they large withdrew that morning before the events escalated. The other two factions are unassociated with the rest, again each member having tangential ties to others, but their apparent objective in these environments is to maintain order and dissuade use of deadly force.
What does this all mean?
The current cultural and political dynamic has brought more attention to the Far Right because of the execution of the term "Alt-Right" and how it has been made into the Left's boogeyman. Those who already had those biases were there to begin with, as they had a reason to seek them out, but some new members might have influxed from the other end's pressure acting on them as a motivating force. They became more "unified" in appearance because related groups, which were much more palatable, emerged around them and shared overlap with them as outside motivations pushed in. These groups regained breathing room after the fall of the Left and only reappear around one another when their opposition does.
There is little intelligence otherwise to suggest outside this.
