Alienation Nation

There are few times we’re more vulnerable than when we’re in pain. Aisles you’d usually skip in your local pharmacy become shelves of treatments that suddenly seem worth a shot. Imagine if the people promoting those cures were also members of your online community, a friend group that really cared about you but that also shared some beyond-the-fringe beliefs. This is a story about alternate news sites that spread political nonsense that is beyond extreme. And it’s a story about how many of those sites combine these falsehoods with a lot of backwards and dangerous health information. But it’s also about something else that we too often ignore; a sense of belonging offered to the alienated. The politics are hogwash. The cures are a scam. But the community is real. The excellent Eli Saslow in the NYT (Gift Article): Racked by Pain and Enraptured by a Right-Wing Miracle Cure. “Michael Chesebro awoke to the same reality as he did each morning, with pain radiating up his spine and into his shoulders before he opened his eyes. He remained still for a moment, summoning the courage to reach from his bed to his night stand. He rolled onto his back, which was fused together with metal after almost 20 years as a paratrooper in the military. He extended his arm, which he had broken several times while wrangling bulls and horses on his ranch outside Cheyenne, Wyo. Finally, his hand found his cellphone, and he logged on to the online universe where he spent most of his days … On the other end of his phone were hundreds of people in a live voice chat for Patriot Party News, one of about a dozen far-right media platforms that has grown in both size and influence over the past few years, not only by creating an ecosystem of disinformation but also by providing an authentic sense of community.”