By Ryan England, one of the main Alt Left theorists. From one of the main Alt Left groups on Facebook:
I’ve come up with colloquial expressions of subtypes I’ve noticed in my short time with this movement. Note that these are not hard fast rules or mutually exclusive categories, but rather descriptions of what seem to be motivating passions. Some perhaps approximate the Alt-Leftist ideal better than others:
“The Left Wing of the Alt Right.” Rabbit uses this phrase quite explicitly. They are most open to race realism, most opposed to mass immigration and most opposed to Islamism, but are also inclined towards some kind of economic socialism or social democracy and are otherwise put off the Alt-Right somehow or another. “Strasserites” might be a more explicitly national socialist variant of this, “National Bolsheviks” would be even more out there still.
“GamerGate Leftists” – Named from an article I read a while back claiming that most gamergaters were left-leaning, are another type. These types need not be big on GamerGate per se, but being anti-feminist and anti-SJW is huge with them as is civil and cultural libertarianism. I found a number of these posting on anti-SJW pages. They come to the Alt-Left either because of a belief in Leftist economics, though they are usually not that far Left.
Guys who believe in some regulation and a social safety net. Think YouTubers like Sargon of Akkad or the Amazing Atheist, though they don’t use the term Alt-Left to describe themselves. These kinds are defecting less from Richard Spencer and more from Milo Yiannopoluous. I used GamerGate’s colors in the design of my page’s logo and banner, in an attempt to attract these types.
“Red Enlightenment” I refer to as those most passionate about rationalism, skepticism, empiricism and in some cases, transhumanism and futurism. Generally a scientifically minded and technocratic sort of socialist or social democrat.
“True Liberals” Anti-racist and feminist supporters who think the whole thing has gotten out of hand and are concerned for the SJW’s lifestyle puritanism and opposition to free speech. They are more pro-feminist and pro-social liberal than the gamergaters though. “The Democratic Party of the 1990s” someone once remarked to me, to which I replied, “There were no liberals or leftists in the 1990’s except myself.”
“Brocialists” Socialists or social democrats with a penchant for men’s rights and anti-misandry. I seem to have drawn a number of these to my page, and a few of my moderators fall into this category. Hillary Clinton supporters have accused Bernie Sanders of using these as his base of support.
“Red Templars” Especially and specifically anti-Islamic. Get a lot of these from Sam Harris and Bill Maher’s followings. Unlike the left wing of the Alt Right types, these sorts are more standard liberals otherwise.
“The New Old Left” Would dispense with race, culture and identity all together, if they could and make Leftism mostly about economic Leftism. The Realist Left page and the blog Social Democracy for the 21st Century are like this. Farther left you’d find /leftypol/ on 8chan and some Marxist/Anarchist groups that reject IdPol.
I would say that I fall into a number of those categories. Brocialist for sure. I am not sure who exactly these Brocialists even are, but anything like the original Men’s Liberation groups that arose alongside Women’s Liberation might be ok for me.
True Liberals, absolutely. It’s not that I am against the Cultural Left but more that I want to swing it back to the Cultural Left of the 1990’s, which is about when I got off the Cultural Left train because it was going badly off-course down the wrong track. I had supported the Cultural Left since the mid-1970’s. But they’re gone too far. I signed up for liberation, not insanity.
I am also Left wing of the Alt Right, but I only support race realism and not White nationalism. I am not a Strasserite, a National Bolshevik or any sort of fash honestly. Leftists keep calling me fash, but if that’s true, why do I hate fash so much? Every fash webpage I go to, I want to smash the screen. It doesn’t have to be a choice between the fash and the SJW’s you know. It’s quite possible that they both suck.
Gamergate guys are too misogynistic and anti-feminist for me. I am also not as culturally Libertarian as these types are. But honestly I do not know where they stand. I lot of these MRA anti-feminist types leave a bad taste in my mouth because as awful as feminists are, the anti-feminists seem to be even worse than the feminists! I think they’re both insane honestly. There is a good feminism that we on the Alt Left can work with, and these anti-feminist bros just can’t see that. In particular, we should make alliance with sex-positive feminists.
Red Englightenment types are ok, but I support religion and believe in some stuff they call woo. These people do not even do science anymore. They do scientism. And their hatred for religion really turns me off.
Red Templars are ok, but I am not obsessive about the problems of Islam, and I am more conservative than they are on social stuff.
New Old Left is ok, but the folks on leftypol call me racist and fascist. I am not sure I am going to get along with these folks. They say they are getting rid of IdPol, ok, so what’s with all the name-calling?
