Whitepill: The Online Right and the Making of Trump’s America
By Scott Greer
Passage, 300 pages, $34.95
There was a time, not too long ago, when the great threat to the right came from its left flank. The conservative movement was filled with people who eagerly canceled their own for transgressing liberal pieties. We all remember the number of prominent conservatives who willingly bent the knee during the BLM hysteria.
Ten years into the Trump era, it is no longer necessary to argue against David French-ism. The kids are far too based for that. Today, the task is to argue against Tucker Carlson-ism, Nick Fuentes-ism, Candace Owens-ism, and other forms of conspiratorial thinking that make it hard to love and believe in America.
The kids, however, should not be berated by humorless scolds and told to read Hayek and Kirk. Mainstream conservatism bores them and moral indignation doesn’t work when being transgressive is part of the point. I doubt Fuentes knows much about Soviet communism, but it was clear how much he enjoyed telling Tucker he was a fan of Joseph Stalin.
If the Millennials and Zoomers are to be rescued from the lunacy of much of the online right, it must be done by someone who appreciates its contributions but also recognizes its limitations. In Whitepill: The Online Right and the Making of Trump’s America, Scott Greer offers a friendly and at times compelling critique of the online right. Greer’s credibility comes from the fact that he hails from this world: He was canceled in 2018 after The Atlantic revealed he had edited and written for Richard Spencer’s racialist journal Radix. Greer has said that his writings from that time no longer reflect his views, and he tracks the evolution of his thinking in his new book.