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The Women of the Far Right: Social Media Influencers and Online Radicalization is written by Eviane Leidig, a Marie-Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow at Tilburg University, and C-REX affiliate. The book was published this year by Columbia University Press, and looks at the leading position women social media influencers occupy in the contemporary far right, with a particular focus on North America. Based on several years of immersive research into far-right influencers, Leidig shows that these women, operating at a critical intersection of social media and far-right politics, successfully mainstream far-right ideas and values, and radicalise their followers. In the following interview, Eviane Leidig elaborates on some of the key themes of her book.
Celestine Kunkeler: Women have always actively participated in far-right politics - what new dynamics are generated by the phenomenon of far-right women social media influencers specifically? Do they hold a more influential position in the far right compared to before Web 2.0?
Eviane Leidig: Contemporary far-right women are indeed continuing the legacy of previous, historical far-right movements and politics in terms of promoting an exclusionary ideology. However, I argue that what characterizes the activism of far-right women today is the visibility afforded to them on mainstream social media platforms, in which they enjoy a publicness that garners mass audiences. Compared to the past, far-right women have much greater exposure due to these platforms, in ways that we can consider them de facto leaders of the far right. Relatedly, they exploit these platforms to spread radicalizing and propagandizing narratives but do so in way that is often seen as subtle and apolitical, for example through genres of health and wellness content, or food blogging. By framing their messaging in terms of lifestyle content, this offers an opportunity to normalize and legitimize far-right ideas for mainstream audiences through interactive avenues.
In my book, I draw upon theories developed in media and communication studies to study influencer culture and microcelebrities (i.e., celebrities with niche audiences). I show how far-right women embody influencer and microcelebrity practices such as being relatable, accessible, authentic, and responsive as a means of appealing to their online followers. They use strategies to cultivate a perception of authenticity with viewers, a process that is conceptualized as networked intimacy. In the book, I demonstrate that influencer practices revolved around networked intimacy are weaponized by far-right women as effective recruitment, radicalization, and propaganda tactics to combine their political ideology with personal lifestyle. Ultimately, they are able to personalize far-right ideas by showcasing the banal snapshots of daily life to their followers on their social media accounts.
CK: You note the irony that far-right women influencers promote reactionary values which ultimately undermine their own agency. How should we understand women's empowerment in the far-right online sphere?
EL: Far-right women influencers claim that they find a sense of empowerment and agency by embracing their biological and “natural” feminine traits such as motherhood and homemaking. They argue that this brings a fulfillment and purpose to their lives which all women (read: female) should embrace as part of their reproductive duty to society. And yet, these same far-right women are involved in a movement that solely values women on the basis of their reproductive ability. Ironically, far-right women influencers partake in several activities such as media creation, publishing, monetization opportunities, and entrepreneurism, all of which are possible due to the long-standing gains of feminist and women’s rights movements. These influencers actively participate in social realms that theoretically would not be afforded to them in their imaginary of a far-right utopia.
CK: You state that 'the one element that unites far-right women (and tradwives) is antifeminism'. Where does anti-feminism fit into far-right ideology, alongside elements such as e.g. white supremacism?
EL: Anti-feminism is an entry point for several of the far-right women influencers that I profile in the book. While some were raised with a religious, conservative upbringing, many others previously held secular and progressive backgrounds and now self-identify as a “recovering feminist”. They view feminism within conspiratorial terms as a Cultural Marxist ideology that has dominated mainstream society and prevents men and women from exercising their “natural”, biological traits of masculinity and femininity. Feminism supposedly forces women into the public sphere of “liberal indoctrination” where they are coerced into employment and consequently feel depressed and deeply unhappy. Feminism has allegedly led to the breakdown of the nuclear family unit. In turn, far-right women argue that traditionalism is the antidote to feminism. If women are homemakers and men are the primary breadwinners within a nuclear family unit, they argue, this will lead to happiness and harmony at a societal level. It is believed that all social problems stem from family relationships, rather than structural or systemic factors.
However, this notion of a heteronormative nuclear family has strong overlap with white supremacism as it elevates gender and racial norms that are steeped within historical privilege. Since the women featured in the book are primarily from North America, the nostalgic image they portray of 1950s suburbia fails to account for the realities of mass racial segregation, repressed sexuality, domestic abuse, and limited opportunities for women and minorities which pervaded that period. When taken to the extreme, the far right’s vision of society is projected as white racial, patriarchal domination in which sexual and ethnic minorities are either subservient or excluded. Consequently, the far right’s positioning of gender and sexuality is integral to elements of racial order, white supremacism, and reproductive politics.
CK: The ideas of ‘natural’ femininity (and masculinity), compulsory motherhood, and biological essentialism you mention are recurring features in far-right women’s discourse then, with which they can evidently reach mainstream audiences through their seemingly apolitical exploitation of social media platforms. How do you think we can most effectively undo the far-right legitimisation of such exclusionary and supremacist ideas?
EL: When it comes to countering far-right activism and ideas, there are several approaches that can be taken both online and offline. With respect to the online sphere, platforms frequently resort to repressive measures of content moderation, which are a set of practices that rely on technical tools. The most common of these include what I describe as the ‘Four Ds’: deplatforming, demonetization, deranking, and detection. Deplatforming is the permanent removal of an account or user; demonetization refers to restricting the monetization opportunities of influencers such as crowdfunding, sponsorship, and advertising revenue; deranking means limiting the visibility of search results; and detection refers to using automated tools or human review to detect linguistic or visual signals, like coded language, which violate platforms’ community guidelines. These content moderation practices are important to consider within our countering efforts due to the algorithmic amplification of far-right content, and especially of far-right women influencers who often enjoy large audiences without facing punitive action.
A major gender blind spot with respect to content moderation is apparent when we compare the online activism of women and men. Several male far-right activists have been banned from mainstream platforms because their rhetoric is violent or incites violence. However, because far-right women frame their messages in palatable ways, they are not considered to have violated community guidelines, and remain on the platforms with large followings. And yet, these women believe in the same ideas, are members of offline groups, and have even been denied entry at country borders and faced legal prosecution. Thus, there is a reasonable means to consider their activism as no less ideologically driven than their male counterparts. But, due to the softer, gentler framing of their propaganda, they can continue posting on social media. This is an extremely effective strategy for far-right communications, recruitment, and radicalization.
Finally, an important offline approach to delegitimize far-right ideas builds on the concept of “generational amnesia”. This is a term commonly used by climate change scientists to refer to the baseline shifts in species extinction over generations. Take, for example, a species of fish that is in abundance over the course of one generation. The second generation then witnesses a slow decrease in fish supply, but not at an alarming rate. The third generation views the lower fish supply levels as the norm, and the cycle continues until the fish species eventually becomes extinct. Because this process happens over the course of several generations, each new generation accepts the lower baseline level of fish as normal. I apply the concept of generational amnesia to the framework of feminist, women’s, and LGBTQ+ rights over successive generations. While far-right women use the notion that “life was better back in the day”, they decontextualise and ignore the structural conditions that greatly curbed the rights of women, racial and sexual minorities—conditions that catalysed progressive social movements for change. Today many Gen Z and millennial women, the target demographic of far-right activists, take for granted the gains of feminist, women’s, and LGBTQ+ movements. Ironically, far-right women influencers have directly benefited from the legacy of these movements such as attending university, owning bank accounts to receive monetization, publishing books and editorials, and owning property. Thus, education and recognition of these progressive advances to counter the effects of generational amnesia is an important way to delegitimize far-right ideas rooted in exclusion and supremacy.
