To a large extent, I would rather not post about Buzzfeed’s Joseph Bernstein’s new piece titled Here's How Breitbart And Milo Smuggled Nazi and White Nationalist Ideas Into The Mainstream simply because the cache of documents and e-mails that Bernstein’s reporting uncovers shows that that the entire Breitbart operation, including Steve Bannon and former technology editor Milo Yiannopoulos reveals, well, that the Breitbart operation is little more and little less that a collection of drama queens and, therefore, they would probably love as many eyes on articles like this as possible.
I do feel that by posting this that I am giving them more publicity that they deserve.
However, these people are racist and, I believe, consciously and/or unconsciously genocidal.
And, according to Bernstein’s reporting, they conspired to make a British Jewish gay man that is apparently married to a man of color their willing lawn jockey spokesman.
The Breitbart employee closest to the alt-right was Milo Yiannopoulos, the site’s former tech editor known best for his outrageous public provocations, such as last year’s Dangerous Faggot speaking tour and September’s canceled Free Speech Week in Berkeley. For more than a year, Yiannopoulos led the site in a coy dance around the movement’s nastier edges, writing stories that minimized the role of neo-Nazis and white nationalists while giving its politer voices “a fair hearing.” In March, Breitbart editor Alex Marlow insisted “we’re not a hate site.” Breitbart’s media relations staff repeatedly threatened to sue outlets that described Yiannopoulos as racist. And after the violent white supremacist protest in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August, Breitbart published an article explaining that when Bannon said the site welcomed the alt-right, he was merely referring to “computer gamers and blue-collar voters who hated the GOP brand.”
These new emails and documents, however, clearly show that Breitbart does more than tolerate the most hate-filled, racist voices of the alt-right. It thrives on them, fueling and being fueled by some of the most toxic beliefs on the political spectrum — and clearing the way for them to enter the American mainstream.
And Milo was to be the movement’s face.
Yiannopoulos’s star rose throughout 2016 thanks to a succession of controversial public appearances, social media conflagrations, Breitbart radio spots, television hits, and magazine profiles. Bannon’s guidance, the Mercers’ patronage, and the creative energy of his young staff had come together at exactly the time Donald Trump turned offensive speech into a defining issue in American culture. And for thousands of people, Yiannopoulos, Breitbart’s poster child for offensive speech, became a secret champion.
Also included in this report is Milo and Bannon’s response to Hillary Clinton’s alt-right speech during the 2016 campaign, Milo’s jealousy that billionaire Peter Thiel and not himself was selected to address the Republican National Convention and even some sort of underground liberal admirers of the project (and to be completely fair, I don’t entirely disagree with some of the underlying points that Yiannopoulos has attempted to make for my own reasons, I highly disagree with the way he goes about it).
Buzzfeed’s story is very very long but well worth the read...it’s important to be appraised of the danger in one’s midst.