Abstract
Social media have proved a congenial environment for an ideological ‘family’, which this chapter calls ‘Reactionary Digital Politics’. The chapter argues that on digital platforms, political ethos is best understood as an effect of the interactive, participatory relationship between speaker and audience as constituted by platform affordances. It is an ‘entanglement’ easily attuned to the reactionary repertoire. Reflecting on theories of rhetorical personae, it is suggested that we can see the emergence of a ‘fifth persona’, a certain ethos of participation and involvement to which online actors must conform, and which, when articulated in or as Reactionary Digital Politics, manifests as the acceptance of an invitation to go on a ‘hero’s journey’-participating in reactionary resistance without end. This is illustrated through two case studies drawn from QAnon (the conspiracy theory movement that believes that members of elite groups are trafficking children). These show how identification with the ethos of heroic participation is embedded within the very procedures for the creation and circulation of such material online and in what ways they are constitutive of Reactionary Digital Politics.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Ethos, Technology and AI in Contemporary Society |
| Subtitle of host publication | The Character in the Machine |
| Editors | Aaron Hess, Jens E. Kjeldsen |
| Publisher | Routledge |
| Chapter | 9 |
| Number of pages | 24 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 9781032688503 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781032688510 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2024 |