How 4chan Turned The Internet Right Wing (And Why That Might Change) - Videos for the 97.4%

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjX9PeUpx-w

This kind of stuff might be obvious to some of us who have been engaged in internet culture since the early 2010s, but I genuinely think it's totally new information for people who weren't in specific online circles around that time and would be wondering why so many young American men on the internet seemingly shifted overnight in their political disposition around this time.

Six stars out of ten, Gamerfrommars. You got a lot of things right (including rage from a lot of people crystalizing during Event-Which-Must-Not-Be-Named) or how Trump won his presidency by winning the Meme War, but at the same time didn't give your side enough credit for swaying people by way of ostracization. See me after class.

The most disturbing thing about this is the constant "But it is just a joke" that is the inevitable response to videos like this. Compare people defending stonetoss as just trollbait: Thought Slime takes on Stonetoss

"I wasn't going to be a Nazi but those SJWs forced my hand." That's what that boils down to. The alt-right pipeline is real.

Trump didn't win due to a "meme war". Anyone who believes this is following some script they came up with in their head. Trump won because he heavily catered to many members of the electoral college. He basically went to a lot of the 1% and said "im going to make the 1% even richer"; to which he's doing right now.

The meme-magic shit is just 4chan patting itself on the back as it always does.

Pretty much he's the rule, not some exceptional breaker of status quo.

Meme Magic didn't win him shit. Peddle this inauthentic crap all you want, the only people who believe are the people who've already drunk the same koolaid as you. Meme Magic didn't even play a role in reality. He heavily courted the rust belt states and the states where the EC votes mattered the most. He lost the popular vote by 3 fucking million. Did Meme Magic cause that? People react with hostility to this nonsense because of how unfounded it is, and how tired people are at repeating themselves when faced with someone who's total engagement in this discussion boils down to "Meme magic" and "The SJW's forced me to be a nazi".

I missed you, you know this? I missed you so much that I feel the need to explain my position here, not that it matters because it's going to fall on deaf ears. It's the experiance of a boyfriend of mine, a Canadian lower class ethnically Asian (who is also a heavier nationalist then I am, we have fun debates) as well as myself experienced, and I sincerely doubt we are alone. Actually scratch that, I know we are not alone because I used to talk to more right-leaning people. Now I'd just like to interject to say that this is still a small sample size, so Iunno maybe most of the evil right wingers who were originally average joes with no political knowledge until something youtube and facebook. Or they rose from the ground like amoebas and subverted the entire political landscape. Both of these theories are vaguely plausible, but I doubt neither are true. It's been said by people way, way smarter then me that the presidential race has been a popularity contest since Reagan. You know what, it still is. I'm not just talking internet memage here, I'm talking the spread of ideas and the like. MAGA caps and shit. However - no - you're still right, because it's a number of factors I could list that gave Trump the victory. Meme Magic is one of them. You listed another, so thanks for that.

Man you wrote like, 300 words, and said very little, very little. If it's a popularity contest, why did the candidate with "Meme Magic" actually lose the popular vote? Did Meme Magic win him it, if he lost the popularity contest part? Did Russian interference help? Did apathy from the voters help? Did the DNC meddling with it's own affairs help? Acting like Meme Magic had any relevancy is just giving yourself, and other channers, an excuse, however wrong, to pat yourselves on the back for changing the world. The problem is, that narrative is so flimsy it doesn't stand up to basic questioning. As evidenced by you saying 300 words, and only maybe 50 of them are a direct reply to my points. If you weren't as transparent as glass, I would have more desire to engage with you in an honest discussion, but I don't think you're interested in one, and my reasoning for that is reading your posts.

This guy is giving online forms way too much credit. The demographics of the people that won Trump the election does not at all fit the narrative OPs video is peddling.

That isn't how the electoral college works at all though lol, I don't know what you're talking about. You still have to win votes in the state, the electoral college just follows how the majority of the state voted. A lot of it comes down to him blameshifting America's problems on a big OTHER, simple solutions to complex problems. Blaming Mexicans, China, what have you on people desperate for answers. He said big words that made people feel America wasn't crumbling in its own fault and was full of empty rhetoric that felt good to hear to some people. It helped republicans managed to brand themselves as a working class party, funnily enough. You don't win over 40% of America by appealing soley to the 1%, even if that's ultimately who benefits the most from you. You have those people, and then you have the genuinely awful people who are white supremacists, anti-abortion, anti-LGBT, people already vindicated in having an other to hate and want a man who will punish those they see as wrong. As much shit as she got for the comment, Hillary's basket of deplorable comment was pretty on point.

I feel like this is downplaying the bigger role the GOP and Fox had in this, especially people like Newt Gingrich, and Mitch McConnell. Did internet memery have an effect here? Sure, but it's nowhere near the major contributing factor. It's something the GOP has been brewing for decades.

It's not weird that he lost with 3 million votes, it's weird that he didn't lose with 30 million. The fact that he managed to get any young peoples votes whatsoever is the interesting thing and if it wasn't for "meme magic" or similar kind of bullshit he wouldn't even have made it to the primaries. You really think Trump is the only politician ready to line the pockets of corporations?

If meme magic is code for a rigged system that heavily favors republican candidates I guess meme magic won.

Substantiate this. Can you give me evidence the "youth" vote is what got Trump to the primaries? Trump had, count this, quadruple, the media coverage of any other candidate in the entire race. You can say "Meme Magic" but the media covered the guy way more than anyone even near him in the polls from the start. Can you show me where the "Meme magic" actually came in now? What a fucking stupid "GOTCHA" question. Is this all the "right" of any site I argue on have? Fucking terrible "GOTCHA" moments? 1) I never said Trump is the only politician willing to line the pockets of corporations. 2) He has effectively done nothing but line the pockets of corporations in his 2 years and 6 months of power.

Trump was a supremely shit candidate, which says a lot considering he was going up against Hillary, yet despite that he managed to get to the primaries and actually win with only 3 million votes lost in the popular vote. You say this is because of media coverage and I'm not denying that, although I haven't seen any proof of just how much more he was actually covered than other candidates. Why did the media focus so much on Trump then? Likely, because it gets views. Why does it get views? Because people find what he said interesting in some way, good or bad. Why do people find him interesting? Because it's things which other candidates had missed out on, a form of rhetoric which appealed to another form of voters. Young people might vote less, but they still vote and if you don't get a single young persons vote, then you're not gonna win. It's not only young people that are prone to this kind of rhetoric either, but it's absolutely the biggest. My point is that had Trump not known how to speak to those that felt disenfranchised by the normal political establishment (aka meme magic), then he would have lost substantially harder(he did try and fail miserably in 2012). Also that's not a "gotcha" moment. It seems like you were trying to say that Trump was more likely to do more tax break shit than others and I simply don't buy that. Also please don't put a political label on me just because I disagree.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/upshot/measuring-donald-trumps-mammoth-advantage-in-free-media.html This is a 2 year old story. This is common knowledge, or should be. Because he said crazy shit like "Mexicans are rapists" and other insane things people deserved to be informed about. The problem was rather than inform people, and move on, he became the "Topic dejour" and was on repeat on every network, all day long. It wasn't because people agreed with him, or hated him, it's because to the media he was "news" and they treated him like a story, and not a candidate. This resulted in billions worth of free news coverage. Here's a google image result that turned up with the exact same search terms as this article. https://files.facepunch.com/forum/upload/1894/2fadc3ea-7ac1-4c77-ac1c-24e87a8f4892/image.png Sorry for the apparently transparent background that colours this weirdly. What Trump was/is doing isn't new. It's not even "Meme magic". He's just repeating propaganda points from Bannon for most of the campaign, it's not new, it's just "new" to american politics. In 2016 you could in fact win without the Xoomers and Millenials on your side. The statistics support that Boomers would be able to "choose" the president if they co-ordinated. And I bet it didn't work on most people. The audience of sites like 4Chan are two things Small, and insular. That sounds absurd to someone who spends a lot of time on 4chan, but that's the reality of the situation. It's web presence is limited, it's mental share isn't as high as people who use the site assume it is, and it's by and large, not the "attack vector" for these kinds of things to spread. What we do see 4chan at the centre of currently is the Q-Anon bullshit, so meme magic? What's that? A word a couple of people came up with to try and take responsibility for shit they didn't do? What did TRUMP do that was "meme magic"? Are you saying "courting the disillusioned" is "meme magic" now? Way to move the goalposts. That's actually a standard political operation tactic, and Obama did it to great effect in 2012, and 2008. His run in 2012 and his run in 2016 are different discussions entirely. His run in 2016 has the chance of not even having been intended for victory, and was supposed to be the launching point of "Trump TV". It's very much one. You'd have to be dishonest, or interpretting my words without any context of the point I was making to draw that conclusion. Hence, why I think it's a "Gotcha" questions. It's an intentional misreading of an argument re-framed to attack the person who made the point originally by mischaracterizing the argument. I never even remotely said fuck all about Trump being the only one to enrich the rich. You created that line of questioning out of nowhere.

I suppose I am saying that "courting the disillusioned" is "meme magic" in this context then yea?

The disillusioned being people in the late 30's, to mid 50's having lost coal jobs? that's who meme magic targetted? No. "Meme Magic" was aimed at the "youth" as it was from the "youth". What appealed to the disillusioned about Trump was his straight up lies that he would "bring back coal" or "bring back jobs" in various different forms. That's what worked. That's why he won, because he did that in states where the EC outcome was important and it helped secure his win. Nowhere in this formula are the "meme magic" of 4chans bullshit. Why? Because they didn't really matter.

Yea, but any republican could and would have done so, so why Trump? How did he even get to that stage of popularity to begin with? Because the media propped him up? But why would you vote for someone just because they're being talked about, if they're being painted out as an imbecile as well? When he said that Mexicans are rapists, perhaps there now was a group responding positively to that sort of rhetoric, which wasn't there before?

Because Trump has been a brand name since the mid 80's. He's literally the person who was "famous for being rich" from that time period. Out of 16 Republicans, Trump won. Why? Name. Recognition. See above. He also ran a game show for 10 years(the only profitable thing he ever really did) that made him even more famous, and gave him the perception of being adept at business. Yes. You're literally saying the alternative to the media propping him up is "MEME MAGIC" as an explanation. This is the absurd. Because awareness is well over half the battle unfortunately. Because a lot of americans see Trump, and they see themselves. They're fucking wrong to see things this way, but that's how they saw it, and that's how media like Fox was portraying it. Donald Trump has daily calls with Rupert Murdoch, the owner of Fox News. Meme Magic had nothing to do with any of this. Yeah. The massive group of racists who has, and always has existed in America. Nope, they have always been there. You're swedish, you may not know this, but America has always been a racist country, and has never stopped. Are all Americans racist? Fuck no. Most of them aren't. But there are groups of them that are well oiled, well maintained and well organized and they are racist, and they vote, they use political action and other tools when available, meme magic could be considered a tool of theirs in this case. However, the point I feel you're making is that "meme Magic" was effective, and drove results. I do not believe anything shows this to be the case over the much more realistic options I have laid out for you here.

Trump lied a lot in the leadup to the election in the way that made him look more moderate https://youtu.be/XQFItVBKlAU Where's that universal healthcare you motherfucker

Yea, this is where I think you're wrong then. I think it's an incredibly negative view of humanity as a whole(one which I'm convinced is wrong) to think that he got chosen simply because people had heard his name before and that he was covered the most. He said things which created controversy, the media knew that's what sells, but there were also people now that agreed with those things and I don't believe that it's the same kind of people who did so that you think it is.

Demonstrate this then. You haven't. You just keep saying "NOPE.". Do you see how much more work goes into my arguments than you just standing here smugly saying "NOPE" with fuck all to support that idea? Well that's too fucking bad then, you're going to have a bad fucking time going forward. Donald Trump LIED. He held a LGBT flag. He said he would cut taxes for the poor. he said he would drain the swamp. he said he would do a thousand things to fix the system for the little guy. HE FUCKING LIED AND THAT WORKED. Scrounging for a fucking explanation that puts the "blame" of this on 4chan and "meme magic" is basically an act of ideological masturbation. He said a thousand things, and the media covered all of it. Ted Cruz said things, and the media covered none of it. He said things just as stupid. But he didn't get coverage? So, why then? Do you have any ideas here? They sure do. Like Trump saying "FREE HEALTHCARE" and "DRAIN THE SWAMP" and other fabrications that PEOPLE BELIEVED. So fucking what? Demonstrate to me something about how your argument isn't bullshit besides just saying "NO" to reasonable explanations of events you barely seem to have a coherent time line of.

It sure is interesting how the right, despite constantly badgering on about wanting to just have a free-wheeling conversation in the marketplace of ideas, is actually really fucking bad at engaging with people. He makes one post, gets utterly blown the fuck out, and then just dips into the thread to rate people who make him mad. It's a consistent trend from right wing posters that extends even to the Knockout discord and I can't fathom why someone would even bother maintaining a forum account or dipping their toes into political discourse if their ideas are that fucking fragile.

This is the first time in this debate where I've actively rejected what you said, so how the fuck am I smugly saying "NOPE". The problem with your points is that I can never really tell where they're leading to. I'm not interested in proving you wrong or making you look dumb, which is what you seem to think this is about. The fact that he lied and that people believed it isn't really relevant to what I said. What I mean is that I believe that human beings can be expected to do rational decisions. Seeing through lies is not always a given in that. If I understand you correctly, then you think that Donald Trump got to the primary election because of his name and because of the coverage, where he would spout lies that he never ended up fulfilling. The media covered him more than others because he said a lot of controversial things, but now you claim that Ted Cruz also said controversial things, but wasn't covered as much? He then won the primary election by appealing to working class who worked with coal mining etc in smaller states? Is this correct?

I feel like you make a lot more enemies than you do friends discussing like this. Calm down man, lol You really believe that this guy is gonna come around when you're literally bolding your words as if you're screaming into your own head as you type the words out

I don’t intend on changing his mind. I don’t believe most people are willing to change their minds.