Some notes on 'The internet looks right wing'

Last week, I published a short piece offering some initial thoughts about why young men swung right between the 2020 and 2024 elections, and what that can tell us about the online social spaces where those young men spend their time. My theory¹ was that the right wing developed an alternative media on platforms that were once viewed as less-than-mainstream (by which I’m mostly referring to video platforms like YouTube, and now, by extension, TikTok) concurrently with those platforms cementing their place in culture and style. This has granted the right a kind of home field advantage on platforms that are extraordinarily popular with young people.²

Now, behind the sub-wall, as a treat for the real Grevheads, I wanted to think out loud about some of the conversations that have followed (e.g. “we need to engineer a leftist Joe Rogan”) and link out to a few articles (and tweets) on similar subjects that I’ve found interesting and useful.

I don’t want to get too far away from the core competencies of this newsletter, so I’ll be back to covering more explicitly game-y and esports-y subjects in the next newsletter. In writing this piece, I also don’t want to imply that the subject of “men, aged 18-29” is synonymous with games and the internet. But if you’re a citizen of the internet, you’ve probably felt the pull of some of the trends brought to the fore by the 2024 election, so I’d like to discuss those here. As before, I’m just thinking out loud/working things out on the fly here.

So, to start: Can the left build its own Joe Rogan? The answer is obviously no.