It Came from Something Awful: How a Toxic Troll Army Accidentally Memed Donald Trump into Office

Written by Dale Beran

Narrated by Dale Beran

This program is read by the author.

An insider's history of the website at the end of the world, which burst into politics and memed Donald Trump into the White House.

The internet has transformed the ways we think and act, and by consequence, our politics. The most impactful recent political movements on the far left and right started with massive online collectives of teenagers. Strangely, both movements began on the same website: an anime imageboard called 4chan.org. It Came from Something Awful is the fascinating and bizarre story of 4chan and its profound effect on youth counterculture.

Dale Beran has observed the website's shifting activities and interests since the beginning. 4chan is a microcosm of the internet itself—simultaneously at the vanguard of contemporary culture, politics, comedy and language, and a new low for all of the above. It was the original meme machine, mostly frequented by socially awkward and disenfranchised young men in search of a place to be alone together.

During the recession of the late 2000’s, the memes became political. 4chan was the online hub of a leftist hacker collective known as Anonymous and a prominent supporter of the Occupy Wall Street movement. But within a few short years, the site’s ideology spun on its axis; it became the birthplace and breeding ground of the alt-right. In It Came from Something Awful, Beran uses his insider’s knowledge and natural storytelling ability to chronicle 4chan's strange journey from creating rage-comics to inciting riots to—according to some—memeing Donald Trump into the White House.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Audio
• Release date: Jul 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9781250233998

Dale Beran

DALE BERAN is a writer and artist whose work has been published in McSweeney’s, Quartz, The Huffington Post, The Daily Dot, The Nib, and The Baltimore City Paper. His recent article on Medium, "4chan: The Skeleton Key to the Rise of Trump", became a sensation that was shared and recommended by JK Rowling and Marc Maron, among many others. He has a BA in classics from Bard and a JD from Fordham. He lives in Baltimore.

Reviews for It Came from Something Awful

[Peter Lapp · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ties together so many themes (commodification of culture, depression and anxiety, the “end of history” malaise, techno-utopianism, and much more) in deeply fascinating ways. Too many books on the topic of internet culture and history simply spend their time reciting a chronological list of events and call it a day. This book actually attempts to delve deeper into what drove the attitudes and posture of early Chan culture, and how it eventually fed into the reactionary, anti-SJW culture we see today.

[Brian Carlberg · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amazing book. The philosophy that the author uses to parse the mindsets of young chan-goers reflects a lot of my experiences as an "online guy" throughout much of my formative years. 10/5 recommend to anybody that feels discomfort with current political climate in america

[Windhawk2019 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Yes, ignore the trolls (so we are told). But what power do we grant the dis-empowered? The author was once a 4 Chan guy who left 4 Chan. Good on him because his insights are excellent (his narration is even good!). He puts sunlight on things that prefer to lurk in shadows, to reveal contours and connections that I didn’t know the extent of: from lulz to Anonymous to Pepe the Frog memed into existence as a short-fingered vulgarian.

Special shout out to the Baltimore Convention Center, former home of Otakon!

Srsly, though. This book deserves to be read.