Research

My academic research explored the radicalization of white women to organized white supremacy on reddit, Twitter, and YouTube. I focused my investigation on the ways content policies, trust & safety mechanisms, and recommendation algorithms facilitate the radicalization process. My resulting thesis was aptly titled Online Radicalization of White Women to Organized White Supremacy.

The study found white women were radicalized by engaging with posts and joining communities focusing on beauty, anti-feminism or “The Red Pill,” traditionalist gender values or #TradLives, and alt-right politics. White supremacist recruiters leveraged gendered topics and weaponized platform features – likes, sharing, comments, recommendation algorithms, etc. – to cultivate a sense of community. Through involvement with these communities, women were introduced to racialized perspectives on each topic, usually after a catalytic pop culture or newsworthy event, and slowly radicalized to organized white supremacy.