Hey, so it turns out when you start to probe the psychological identity of the "alt-right" with actual research it's a train wreck of vile and antisocial behavior.
[I]t’s the degree to which the alt-righters differed from the comparison sample that’s most striking — especially when it came to measures of dehumanization, support for collective white action, and admitting to harassing others online. That surprised even Forscher, the lead author and a professor at the University of Arkansas, who typically doesn’t find such large group difference in his work.
There was a time when psychologists feared that “social desirability bias” — people unwilling to admit they’re prejudiced, for fear of being shamed — would prevent people from answering such questions about prejudice truthfully. But this survey shows people will readily admit to believing all sorts of vile things. And researchers don’t need to use implicit or subliminal measures to suss it all out.
This actually makes perfect sense; the "alt-right" is a movement that revels in trolling for the sake of trolling, and in doubling down on racist, sexist and other behavior that most other human beings attempt to avoid while calling it edgy or truth-telling or a series of meme-laden brags that make little semantic sense to anyone not dedicated to socially contemptuous behavior for its own sake.
On average, alt-righters saw other groups as hunched-over proto-humans.
Yes, that is consistent with their own public statements. But it may not be instructive, because "alt-right" is a public demeanor, not a philosophical construct. They are just as likely to willfully troll the researchers as they are to be stating true inner views.
On average, [alt-right survey participants] rated Muslims at a 55.4 (again, out of 100), Democrats at 60.4, black people at 64.7, Mexicans at 67.7, journalists at 58.6, Jews at 73, and feminists at 57. These groups appear as subhumans to those taking the survey. And what about white people? They were scored at a noble 91.8.
So either these people are, in fact, the direct ideological descendants to Nazi Germany's eugenicists or they are dehumanizing the other groups for show. There is no way to deduce which.
The survey also asked participants to state how often they engaged in aggressive behaviors, like doxxing, the releasing of private information without a person’s permission. They also asked about how often respondents physically threatened another online, or made offensive statements just to get a rise out of people.
Here, too, the alt-righters were much more likely to admit to engaging in these behaviors.
Yes, but again; many of them are liars. While many of them no doubt do engage in such behaviors, most of the others are likely to respond that way because they want researchers to believe those terrible things about them. It's a movement premised on being human garbage to, well, everyone. It's a point of pride.
Alt-righters in the survey scored higher on social dominance orientation (the preference that society maintains social order), right-wing authoritarianism (a preference for strong rulers), and somewhat higher levels of the “dark triad” of personality traits (psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism.)
Yeah, go figure.
The glaring flaw of this study is that it was self-selecting; the researchers solicited responses from those that identified as "alt-right," and so the statistics reflect only that specific group motivated to identify with and speak for the group in an online poll. That’s especially of concern when dealing with a group whose leaders celebrate public toxic behaviors; what wee pipsqueak of the alt-right would want to ‘fess up to being a decent person in that environment?
To me, the more relevant question here is how the racist, sexist, oft-psychopathic and forever-media-trolling alt-right still manages to get the just folks treatment in the preternaturally gullible pages of the New York Times. The survey didn't have a question on what the alt-right's favorite Applebee's meal was, for example; for that, the Times remains our sole source.