social media, algorithms, and right-wing propaganda

[USAFRetired_Liberal]

social media, algorithms, and right-wing propaganda are pulling young men—especially Black and Hispanic men—into MAGA spaces. I’ve seen this shift firsthand, and it’s disturbing.

Let me give some context. Last week, I was watching old Bone Thugs-n-Harmony videos—my favorite group from the ‘90s. Then YouTube suggested a video of five Gen Z Black men reacting to listening to “Thuggish Ruggish Bone” for the first time. I clicked out of curiosity and feeling old as I could not believe they hadn’t heard that song before—and I was hooked. These young brothers were funny, insightful, and their room was decked out with pro-Black, hip-hop vibes, even a BLM flag. They dressed and talked like everyday Black youth—cool, smart, culturally grounded.

At first, their content was pure reaction to classic music and good vibes. But over time, things shifted. The language changed. They started using buzzwords like “woke” in a mocking way. Then political commentary crept in. Eventually, they stopped reacting to music altogether and began pushing right-wing talking points, sharing MAGA-aligned clips, and parroting conservative media narratives.

Now they’re fully MAGA. And here’s the kicker—they went from 20,000 subscribers to over a million. I don’t believe this was organic. I think they started off genuine, but then were funded by right-wing donors like Musk hungry for Black male faces to front their ideology and present it to other black men. It was a grift: say what they want to hear, and suddenly you’re rewarded with money, reach, sponsorships, and platforms.

I think this is done a lot. You get wannabe social media influencers who want to be rich and famous. Then young men who are looking for identity and belonging are being funneled into this ideological trap through algorithmic manipulation.

[Celerity]

1. Great OP 👍

[Silent Type]

2. I don't know how they got there/here, but it's definitely worth being "concerned" about. Enjoyed reading.

[Blue Owl]

3. Fuckerburg has turned FB into a love letter to Leon

Every third fucking post is an ass kissing barf bucket of musky adoration — like an entire notebook filled with thousands of hearts and “MZ + LM” and “Marky Musk” crammed onto every page and repeated over and over…..

[MadameButterfly]

9. What would it take for an alternative to FAcebook

to appear? Like BlueSky so we can ditch Twitter. I know this would be more difficult and would take a long time to grow, but I feel trapped into supporting Zuckerberg and his algorithms because of resources I need financially and for my health. It's not just enertainment for me--that I could just let go. We are millions of people helping Facebook indocrinate Nazis. I wish we could do to Facebook what people are doing to Tesla.

[tulipsandroses]

4. I posted about this around the election last year. I suck at searching on this site, but anyhoo, I posted a video

of a brief interview with a young black man interviewed by Don Lemon. He was talking about this very thing, how many young men get sucked into the bro culture/MAGA If I recall it started out as a discussion about misogyny and black men and how it may hurt Kamala. The young man mentioned how he had been sucked into " the bro culture" where misogyny is prevalent. He said it did not start out that way. Young men get sucked in through various interests - typically working out, making money and get sucked into these algorithms by these online hucksters/influencers. Starts out innocently like you said, then it gets ugly and they are being " red pilled"
The good news is that I saw that interview posted on a hip hop forum popular with young black men. Some of the responses gave me hope. There were several responses that rejected the bro/manosphere culture after seeing the hate and misogyny. They recognized that not all "skinfolk are not kinfolk".

I agree with you that some of these folks are being paid. It has been rumored that Tariq Nasheed was paid by Steve Bannon and/or by Russians.
He went from Anti Trump to Pro Trump.
Like Candace Owens, these clowns have figured out that it pays to sell your soul and be the black face of RW propaganda.


ETA: Love Bone Thugs - Notorious thugs with Biggie is my jam.

[markodochartaigh]

6. To me it seems like a very sophisticated variation

on what has gone on since time immemorial. You toe the party line, agree with and repeat what your boss says, and you move up in social status or in the company. But if you disagree, well, the nail that sticks up gets pounded down.
Most of us were suckers for this before, now that sophisticated psychology and algorithms are being used it is very worrying indeed.

[Figarosmom]

7. I noticed in one of

The dog comedy dog shorts series I like it suddenly started sounding right wing . In one of the skits they indicated that they didn't need any DEI hires or something. I don't remember the exact "joke". But it wasmaking fun of DEI so I stopped watching their shorts and unsubscribed.

[Sympthsical]

8. It's simpler than that. It's audience capture.

Say you have a channel about some tv show. Let's call it Pasta Warriors. You begin by reviewing episodes, making videos about world lore, theorizing about what future episodes may do, post some reaction videos each episode. One day you wake up and find you have 10,000 subscribers.

Now, maybe something happens in the show. Maybe they hire a a minority actor who ends up playing a terrible character, or the story lines start feeling contrived to make contemporary political points (Captain Linguini thinks Lt. Angelhair has an eating disorder, who knows). Whatever the case may be. A subset of viewers hate whatever's going on. If you, as a content creator, also dislike it - maybe even for completely valid reasons, maybe the story really is terrible and it's ruining a show you love - you find you got 15% more views for that video. You said you hated this, other people also hated it, boom. Validation of opinion.

So you go back and review as normal. Things aren't bad. You post positive or neutral reviews. Well, those videos don't do as well. You get fewer viewers. Fewer viewers is less money. So you start bashing the show a little. Your views uptick. You see in the comments people are calling things woke or DEI. So you, as a creator, now know if you also call things woke and DEI, you're going to get more eyeballs.

Next thing you know, you have 100,000 subscribers and most of your content is about how bad the show is because of wokeness.

Many creators - particularly young male ones - will go where the eyeballs guide them. And right now in some quarters of social media, there are a lot of young men highly engaged in spaces like Reddit, YouTube, and TikTok who will reward other young men who come aboard. It's incentivized. And once you give in to that, the algorithm tucks you away into that pocket universe to draw more young men in. And if your channel is popular enough to be one of the biggest destinations for the algorithm, you can grow exponentially.

Now here's the thing. What if you're not really "anti-woke"? What if you're just doing that because there's money in it. Well, you've just become part of the grifter class. And there are a lot of grifters on social media. People who say whatever gets the eyeballs, immaterial to whether or not it's their actual opinion. And with that call and response relationship between creator and viewer, it intensifies over time because they're just bouncing off each other in an endless pattern. Viewer to feel validation, creator for the cash.

I've seen it happen so. many. times.

[Cosmocat]

10. Republicans have been doing this for a LONG time

The NRA was a legit, respectable organization focused on gun safety and even reasonable gun control until the right wing hijacked it in the mid 70s. It became one of the primary drivers of the Republican party's ascension into semi dominant power starting in the early 90s.

Just as they took over the evangelical churches, the Chamber of Commerce, AM radio ...

They are the Borg.