A better way forward starts with hard questions
Some cursory thoughts about the path ahead for those who seek to counter hate, extremism, and misinformation in a second Trump era
I’ve long thought Donald Trump could win again, and would regularly say as much to my friends and family when we’d talk about politics. My thoughts often came with a disclaimer: “I sincerely hope I am wrong.”
As Election Day got closer, those suspicions materialized into dread. It was becoming clear that Americans were, in fact, willing to elect Trump again and many of them were excited to do it, even as the candidate talked about jailing his opponents, promoted outlandish racist lies, and promised state-sponsored violence against immigrants. The country knew exactly who Trump was and what he stands for. They elected him for it, not in spite of it.
Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign was “good” if you measure things like a political consultant does, but it was a failure where it counted: the ballot box. Hundreds of reasons can be given for the loss, and many of them are likely to be at least somewhat true. At the end of the day, it was ultimately the Democratic Party’s job to defeat Trump, and it failed to do so. I’m not sure Democrats ever had a real chance at victory, but I did hope they could put up a harder fight than they did.
The moment demands self-criticism and reflection, not scapegoating. There are many uncomfortable, but necessary, reconciliations that need to be had. In this spirit, I will share some cursory and half-baked reflections from my near-decade of work in the fight against disinformation, hate, and extremism. I will likely have more to say about these ideas in the coming days and weeks.
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For all the work being poured into combating hate and extremism, nothing has shaken the tide of authoritarianism creeping over the American psyche. No amount of fact-checking, counter-messaging, or prevention programming has dented this decades-long national trend, even if it has managed to slow some of its most-violent outbursts. While the symptoms are receiving care, the underlaying sickness still ravages our body politic.
All the while, the work has been undermined by hyper-partisans and capitalists who are supportive or indifferent to the suffering that authoritarians seek to impose on their constituents. Political interests have bullied researchers into silence and self-censorship, news outlets have struggled to improve their coverage of extremist movements, and many legacy anti-hate nonprofits are not meeting the moment. Hell, one of the oldest and largest “anti-hate” organizations congratulated Trump on his victory this morning.
In 2022, I wrote a piece about the modern shortcomings of fighting extremism online after a white supremacist murdered ten people in Buffalo, New York. Namely, I faulted current approaches for over-focusing on violence — a symptom, not a cause — and believing there were more allies in the fight than existed. I still think those core issues persist.
To be clear: there is nothing that I, or any researcher, can publish that will fix these systemic problems. No article will change the world. No report will repair our social disorders.
But I do have a few initial ideas for a better path forward:
We need to audit assumptions made about these topics. Too much research and reporting today has premised itself on assumptions about misinformation, hate, and extremism that deserve reconsideration. There is a general hesitancy among researchers against rocking the boat with their peers out of a sense of solidarity. This is counterproductive in the long-run. Some arguments are worth the turbulence.
We need more imagination and curiosity among research groups. The field is well-saturated with research organizations today, but many groups are focused on the same sets of topics and approaching them from nearly identical angles. The internet is like the bottom of the ocean: we barely understand its depths. Researchers should take on the role of cartographers, and develop this understanding in deeper ways.
We need new anti-hate investigative groups. They need to be well-funded, well-lawyered, and willing to pick uncomfortable fights with powerful people. The number of organizations that consistently meet all three conditions has dwindled to a near-zero today, even if there are occasional exceptions. Middle-tier news publications used to fill this slot well enough, but most have disappeared or are actively bleeding out.
This article was penned in my personal capacity as a writer and it does not reflect the views of my employer. ISD does not review or approve of my newsletters prior to publication and provides no input to their contents.
All typos were on purpose, probably.
I wonder if we need a way to reach ordinary people who don't think as deeply about this stuff, who struggle to see what's happening unless it's an acute terror incident, and who aren't able to follow chains of causation past one or two links, especially when they lead through obscure subcultural neighborhoods. I hear myself speak, or I read pieces like yours, and it makes sense to me, but I think maybe to people outside the domain it feels too abstracted. This is not a critique of your piece, it's just something I've been thinking about.