"In the twenty-tens, when I reported on the online subcultures that were then known as the alt-right, I met dozens of atomized young men..."

"... who had stumbled onto the trail that led from libertarian anarcho-capitalism to just-asking-questions hypernationalism to full-blown white separatism, male supremacy, and anti-Semitism; they didn’t all travel the whole distance, but the path in front of them was clear and well worn. A few years ago, whatever else could be said about Kanye West’s search history, at least it was idiosyncratic. These days, his serial fixations might as well be scripted by a mediocre satirist or an unsophisticated A.I. A decade or two ago, an ascendant Kanye West would have been too proud, too self-conscious, to be caught wearing a mid-tier outfit or using a played-out sample. The newly stagnant West, both as an artist and as a propagandist, keeps reaching for clichés."

From "Kanye West’s Parler Games/A stream of offensive statements from Ye and the announcement that he will buy a fringe social network have reignited debates about free speech. But maybe that’s not the best place to start" by Andrew Marantz (The New Yorker).