Culture Warlords: My Journey Into the Dark Web of White Supremacy

Written by Talia Lavin

Narrated by Talia Lavin

One reporter takes an immersive dive into white supremacy's explosive online presence, exploring the undercurrents of propaganda, racism, misogyny, and history that led us to where we are now.

Talia Lavin is every skinhead's worst nightmare: a loud and unapologetic Jewish woman, acerbic, smart, and profoundly antiracist, with the investigative chops to expose the tactics and ideologies of online hatemongers.

Culture Warlords is the story of how Lavin, a frequent target of extremist trolls (including those at Fox News), dove into a byzantine online culture of hate and learned the intricacies of how white supremacy proliferates online. Within these pages, she reveals the extremists hiding in plain sight online: Incels. White nationalists. White supremacists. National Socialists. Proud Boys. Christian extremists. In order to showcase them in their natural habitat, Talia assumes a range of identities, going undercover as a blonde Nazi babe, a forlorn incel, and a violent Aryan femme fatale. Along the way, she discovers a whites-only dating site geared toward racists looking for love, a disturbing extremist YouTube channel run by a fourteen-year-old girl with over 800,000 followers, the everyday heroes of the antifascist movement, and much more. By combining compelling stories chock-full of catfishing and gate-crashing with her own in-depth, gut-wrenching research, she also turns the lens of anti-Semitism, racism, and white power back on itself in an attempt to dismantle and decimate the online hate movement from within.

Shocking, humorous, and merciless in equal measure, Culture Warlords explores some of the vilest subcultures on the Web-and shows us how we can fight back.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hachette Audio
• Release date: Oct 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781549127830

Talia Lavin

Talia Lavin is a freelance writer who has had bylines in the New Yorker, the New Republic, the New York Times Book Review, the Washington Post, the Village Voice, and more. Profoundly anti-racist and a nifty digital native, Lavin possess the online skills needed to go behind the scenes of the digital white supremacist movement (even if that does mean becoming the frequent target of extremist trolls and Fox News staff). She lives in New York City.

Reviews for Culture Warlords

[nogomu · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This feels like essential reading. What a book!

[thewestwing-864351 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book when paired with Laura Bate’s book ‘Men who hate women’ gives a good overview of the extremist nature of online hate that is seeping into real life.

[bodagirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A female Jewish journalist's informative memoir/expose of her journey into the bowels of the online world that has encouraged the proliferation of far right anti-Semitist, antifeminist white nationalism. At times horrifying, the experiences she faces with hate speech and threats of violence bely any rhetoric the right leaning media spin about white terrorism.

[JuanGeKal · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

3.5/5 ⭐️

A good (but not nice) walk through the cesspools of the internet. (Translated from Spanish)

[devil_llama · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The author writes a well researched book with just enough of her own experiences to make it real without crossing the line into narcissism. She spent a year on alt-right websites, pretending she was not Jewish, and often pretending she was not female. She collected information and used it to expose some of the key players in the alt-right hate machine. She writes well (one would expect no less from a journalist) and either has a good editor or knows how to edit; there are no clunky commas or weird punctuation making it difficult to read, though I did find a couple of clunky sentences and at least one misplaced modifier. In the modern market, that makes this book close to perfect, I'm afraid. In the end, the book was solid, readable, and depressing. The main flaw is her acceptance of Antifa, which is too unquestioning and reminds me in part of the left's acceptance of Stalin and other left wing figures. While she is right that the level of violence committed by Antifa is small, especially compared to the alt-right, it is a group that is risky enough to keep one's distance. Overall, a recommended read.

[kencf0618 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A chilling descent.

[pomo58 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Culture Warlords: My Journey Into the Dark Web of White Supremacy by Talia Lavin is a disturbing and eye-opening book that everyone needs to read. I don't care where you are on the political spectrum, you need to know what is bubbling under the surface and then make an informed decision about where you stand.

The majority of the book presents Lavin's research and interactions, undercover, on many of the sites where these people congregate to spew their filth. Early in the book you'll read about how she witnessed a chat room expressing vile and violent opinions about her and what they would do to her. Think about how that would feel. They don't know you're there and they are talking about doing you physical harm. And that is just the beginning.

Much of the book is difficult to read if you're a person who values human life and diversity. But that is exactly why you need to read it. If, like me, you already know you find these people and their ideas to be lower than, well, I won't go there, but you know what I mean, you will be surprised at just how deep and how wide this underground sewage line runs. If you hold some racist views but don't think you are really a racist or a white supremacist, especially if you voted for and may again vote for Trump, you need to read this so you know exactly what kinds of people are being empowered by the rhetoric that spews from Trump's disgusting mouth. Then, if you are as surprised at it then maybe you'll reconsider your vote. If you like what these people are, well, at least you'll no longer be able to claim to be voting for Trump because of anything except your inbred bigotry and racism. You know, self enlightenment.

I found her discussion of antifa to be particularly spot on. Lavin not only gives a nice overview of who and what they are but she also explains why you may have a warped opinion of them based on “official” reports funneled from a white supremacist police force through a press corps that seeks not facts but easily distributed copy. Maybe you'll keep your opinion after reading this, but if you don't read this then you have no ground on which to claim an educated opinion, which means it will stink to high heaven.

As I said, I highly recommend this book and truly do believe everyone should read it. We should all be more aware of what is happening out of our sight.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.