Scrolling through these internet histories, what’s remarkable isn’t the roiling hatred — tragically, that’s become almost commonplace online. But what’s truly alarming is how familiar the digital trail left behind by these dark extremists feels. The violent errata left by these domestic terrorists aren’t inaccessible, hundred-page, hand-scrawled manifestos or garages filled with red string and corkboards; instead, they’re Facebook posts and tweets and enthusiastic online trolling, the likes of which many of us come in contact with on a daily basis. And it’s that familiarity — just one turn of the screw more extreme than a normal shitpost — that makes a tour of their digital pasts so upsetting.
Connecting the online footprints to tragedies in the physical world also reveals an undeniable truth: that the dichotomy between an online world and “real life” is (and has always been) a false one. The hatred, trolling, harassment, and conspiracy theorizing of the internet’s underbelly cannot be dismissed as empty, nihilistic performance. It may be a game, but it’s a game with consequences. And it’s spilling into the physical world with greater, more alarming frequency.
Arguably, nothing better demonstrates the permeability of the online/IRL membrane better than the mail bombing suspect’s white van, which was discovered Friday afternoon after the suspect’s arrest.
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