Alt-right pipeline

The alt-right pipeline refers to the tendency of social media to promote fascist content creators with their algorithms, thereby exposing unwitting viewers to more and more of this content over time. Thus people are funneled through the pipeline with very few ways to get out of it. Most of the time, they don't even realize they are being exposed to these points of view, and, over time, start agreeing with them because the content is engineered to present the recruiter as a trustworthy, authoritative figure. Generally, the alt-right is differentiated from fascism as being located mostly in the United States. But, through imperialist policies, this culture is being exported and making its way into other countries.

The usual mechanism, taking YouTube as an example, is that the algorithm will suddenly recommend a video from a "palatable" alt-right figure such as Ben Shapiro or Jordan Peterson, i.e. crypto-fascists who dress up their actual views in socially acceptable arguments. As people open these seemingly innocuous videos (with "innocent" titles, if attention-grabbing, such as "Archaeological Expert Breaks Down The History of Jerusalem" posted on Ben Shapiro's YouTube channel on 14 May 2025), the algorithm starts recommending more and more alt-right content until it overtakes the user's entire feed and offers nothing but this kind of content.

For a long time, YouTube ignored the problem.

The defining feature of the pipeline is that it's not random chance or happenstance but a concerted effort to bring people to the end of it, with figures acting at all steps of the pipeline, to ultimately turn people into open fascists.

Ben Shapiro, for example, has argued against the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which ended segregation policies in the United States (followed by the 1956 Act). His argument is that the state was justified to stop segregation, but not to enforce the act on private businesses or individuals. This opinion is contradictory, and following it to its logical conclusion effectively means a repeal of the Civil Rights Act, a common alt-right talking point to bring back segregation of Black individuals and other non-white groups. If people can choose to segregate in the businesses they own, then that is effectively bringing back segregation and repealing the Act.