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Culture Warlords

My Journey into the Dark Web of White Supremacy

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About this listen

Talia Lavin is every fascist's worst nightmare: a loud and unapologetic young Jewish woman, with the online investigative know-how to expose the tactics and ideologies of online hatemongers. Outspoken and uncompromising, Lavin's debut uncovers the hidden corners of the web where extremists hang out, from white nationalists and incels to national socialists and Proud Boys.

In stories crammed with catfishing and gatecrashing, combined with extensive, gut-wrenching research, Lavin goes undercover as a blonde Nazi babe and a forlorn incel to infiltrate extremist communities online, including a whites-only dating site. She also discovers the network of disturbingly young extremists, including a white-supremacist YouTube channel run by a 14-year-old girl with nearly one million followers. Ultimately, she turns the lens of anti-Semitism, racism and white power back on itself in an attempt to dismantle and quash the online hate movement's schisms, recruiting tactics and the threat it represents to politics and beyond.

Shocking, provocative and humorous in equal measure, and with a take-no-prisoners attitude, Culture Warlords explores some of the vilest subcultures on the internet and how they're doing their best to infiltrate the mainstream. And then she shows us how we can fight back.

©2020 Talia Lavin (P)2020 Octopus Publishing Group Activists Art & Literature Journalists, Editors & Publishers Politics & Activism Racism & Discrimination Social Sciences Discrimination Witty Social justice Middle East Socialism

Critic reviews

"Lavin writes like her hands are on fire, forcing us to take a hard look at our ugliest truths." (Pamela Collof, The New York Times Magazine and ProPublica)

"Culture Warlords is a necessary and urgent read that could not have come at a much better time. Thoroughly researched and engaging, this debut demonstrates the work of a fearless reporter." (Morgan Jerkins, New York Times best-selling author of This Will Be My Undoing)
All stars
Most relevant
I've loved Talia's work for a while and her books are alarming journals warning of something truly nasty rising up while trying to remain out of sight. To add to the quality of her work her reading is spot on, both clear and engaging.

Prescient warnings

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I loved this book. Well read by Talia, with honest, fact-based reporting, and personal experience.
Recommended.

Great insight into the online right-wing world.

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V interesting book highly reccommend and will probs listen again. Talia Lavin is a brilliant writer, tells the story well, sets the scene and manages to get to the point quickly at the same time. I commend her for this in depth, accessible analysis of the culture wars, white supremacy and how scary it is.

Fab analysis of the horror of the culture wars

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Talia Lavin is doing great work and there was a lot of fascinating ground covered here, though there was a fair bit of repetition of names and groups throughout (I got the impression it was to reinforce certain names but it could come across as underestimating the listener's ability to concentrate). The production of the audiobook itself was poor in places, with the mixing seemingly off and levels changing mid sentence on more than occasion, going from softly spoken to forceful in ways that didn't make much sense in terms of emphasis, it just seemed poorly mixed. Almost more importantly though, the content was great and Talia Lavin is a valuable asset in the battle to understand the far right and what makes them tick.

Excellent content, poor audiobook

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This is an important work detailing the re-emergence of the far-right in the West, government inaction in the face of it and various NGOs moves taken to counter it.

An important book passionately narrated

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