in 2018 that “while YouTube has cracked down on pro-ISIS [Daesh] material, the video giant leaves neo-Nazi propaganda online for months and sometimes years at a time.”The New York-based Anti-Defamation League in January said domestic extremists killed at least 50 people in the US in 2018, up from 37 in 2017, noting that "white supremacists were responsible for the great majority of the killings, which is typically the case".
Both data and the many experts who track violent extremists point to white nationalism as a rising threat in the US and abroad. White supremacist propaganda efforts nearly tripled last year from 2017, the Anti-Defamation League said. A still image taken from video circulated on social media, apparently taken by a gunman and posted online live as the attack unfolded, shows him entering a mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, on March 15, 2019. The Christchurch attacks illustrate how white supremacist rhetoric has changed. Tarrant’s 74-page manifesto is thick with memes that sought to throw off individuals lesser versed in ‘dark web’ parlance. Racism is harder to identify when sheathed in memes.
Modern white supremacist culture has roots in popular memes - rhetoric is ultimately more shareable that way. Popular memes with no political sentiment have also been co-opted by the alt-right to suit their narratives. Pepe the Frog, once a Matt Furie cartoon character, is now a favouriteOr take the phrase “subscribe to pewdiepie”, a call to action to subscribe to the most popular channel on Youtube run by Felix Kjellberg.