This post will attempt to be a brief adaptation of the ideas found in Saul Alinsky’s seminal Rules for Radicals for the Alt-Right (Or any right wing populist-ish movement. Sorry NRx.)
Not sorry to this motherfucker.
This has been tried at least twice before: Rules for Radical Conservatives by David Kahane (Pseudonym for Mike Walsh), and Rules for Conservatives by Michael Charles Master. There are two reasons why I dismiss both of these efforts, despite never having read them. First, they’re books. People still read books when Alinsky wrote his. People no longer read books. So most people won’t read those books. But the second, more crucial, reason is that these people lost. They’re both doing the right thing (as anyone who has read Alinsky would) and accepting Trump, but Trump isn’t the conservatism either of them would ask for if given the choice.
Enough about that. Let’s get to the rules. Alinsky’s original 13 rules are available on Wikipedia. This will be my own list of rules for the Alt-Right, adapted from Alinsky’s list (outright ripped in many cases), with an explanation for each, and an example of one or more people who practice that rule particularly well.
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I’m putting this one first, because this is the rule that the “men in the trenches,” the average Joe on Twitter or in the world, most needs to understand. Breaking this rule is perhaps the easiest way to sabotage your own side. I won’t expand on the rule too much from what I wrote in the above linked essay, but as a quick guide:
Any time you feel like arguing with someone, or any time you find yourself arguing with someone, ask yourself two questions: “Is this person, generally, to the right of me politically?” and “In this argument, is this person’s position to the right of mine?” If the answer to both questions is “no,” argue away! If the answer to one or both of the questions is “yes,” think long and hard about whether your side of this argument will push the Overton Window to the Left.
Pro-Tip: It probably will, probably drop it.
If you don’t like the guy, mute him and move on. If you feel that he’s desperately wrong about his side, talk to him privately about it, so that only the two of you are affected.The only exception to this is if someone to the right of you is doing something MONUMENTALLY stupid. By that I mean something along the lines of posting “My name is [BLANK], and I just bought a gun so that I can shoot Hillary Clinton. Here are my detailed plans…” on a public forum. If someone does something along those lines, feel free to argue with them about the merits of doing that. Try to discourage the commissioning of crime.
People who excel at this:
I’ll go with Wrath of Gnon, to keep with someone everyone will agree with. -
“Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.”
According to Alinsky, power comes from people and money. Forget the money. The Media has no idea how many people are in the Alt-Right. Using bots to skew opinion polls (as long as you’re not caught) is a great way to make them think there are more of us than there are. So is brigading unwitting journalists on Twitter with hundreds of replies. It implies we are more numerous than we are, and that gives us power. If there were only twenty of us, do you think Hillary would feel the need to respond? No.
People who excel at this:
Microchip seems particularly good at making it seem like there are a lot of him, but this is more a group rule than an individual one.
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“Never go outside the expertise of your people.”
The Internet is our people’s expertise. There are some people on our side that are eloquent and charismatic enough that they might be able to get away with speaking publicly, but the natural habitat for most of us is anonymity on The Internet. An excellent example of this is when Paul Town and Jared Taylor Swift convinced Olivia Nuzzi that they were gay bodybuilders who engineered the Alt-Right and Pepe by themselves from New York. If they had given in-person interviews with her, she probably would have seen through that. But anything’s possible on The Internet.
People who excel at this:
Gotta commend Paul and Jared again on that one. Also all the guys doing podcasts. -
“Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy.”
This ties in with the previous rule: Journalists and the political class are bad at the internet. However, they have no idea how bad they are at the internet. Look at this interaction:
Yes prove it to me lol. Prove it to the cyberpunk gasmask man.
Do you not see the optics on your actions here? https://t.co/2EPZuFV3yE
— Matthew Gone (@MatthewGone) September 15, 2016
Matthew could have been right or wrong. It didn’t matter. The fact that he had a well-recognized member of the mainstream media arguing with an anonymous cyberpunk gasmask avatared Twitter user means that he won. With few exceptions, the act of our enemies replying to us is also the act of them losing to us.
People who excel at this:
John Rivers and Reactionary Ian seem to be good at getting people to respond when they shouldn’t.
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“Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.”
This one is simple. Attack from the left, agree and amplify. If Trump is racist for not wanting more Muslims in the country, then it is also racist to not want every single Muslim around the world to immediately move to the United States. If guns should be illegal, so should knives, spoons, and bits of plastic with sharp edges. If the minimum wage needs to be $15, why not $1000?
People who excel at this:
Godfrey Elfwick is particularly good at this, and ask Stone about the time he got a leftist to apologize for questioning whether Mike Cernovich was ACTUALLY a mass murderer.
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“Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.”
This is one that the Alt-Right understand implicitly. No one took Jeb seriously after Trump practically pantsed him at the debates. No one fears the things they can laugh at. Our enemy is ridiculous. They’re worldview is based on a mess of self-contradictory premises. Point these out. Mock mercilessly. The other side can either ignore the ridicule, which allows you to continue unabated, or respond to you, which brings us back to Rule 4. All they can do is block you, but how many do that before attempting to respond? Not many.
People who excel at this:
Counter-Signal Memes for Fashy Goys is absolutely perfect at this.
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“A good tactic is one your people enjoy.”
This is another one that the Alt-Right understands well. We’re fun. It’s fun to do what we do. Other people see the fun, and want to join in. It’s no longer fun to be a leftist, if it ever actually was. They Shake.
People who excel at this:
I can’t single any one person out for this. Listen to some Alt-Right podcasts or something, I dunno. -
“A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag.”
Keep switching tactics. Hit the other side from new angles constantly. Mike Cernovich, though not a member of the Alt-Right, is good at keeping the hashtags being pushed fresh. Don’t depend on Mike, emulate Mike!
People who excel at this:
Mike, of course. And Donald Bateman, who changes his brand the second he thinks it might be stale, or he finds a better one.
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“Keep the pressure on. Never let up.”
This goes back to Rule 2. There are enough of us that we can keep attacks coming from different directions at all times.
People who excel at this:
Kevin MacTrump and James Bateman get massive credit for their constant high energy.
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“The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.”
No one on the Alt-Right has actually done anything violent, as far as I’m aware. But leftists are far more afraid of us than they are of actual Muslim terrorists. Committing violence at this point would turn us from a boogeyman into an enemy that needs to be stomped out. Continue to be the boogeyman.
People who excel at this:
Not sure about this one. Sam Hyde maybe? For bringing the threat to their livingrooms? -
“The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.”
Make them worried, make them scared, make them make mistakes. Hillary felt threatened by the Alt-Right, which made her put out a press release accusing a cartoon frog of anti-Semitism. I don’t give a shit if she IS right. Saying “This cartoon frog is a racist” makes it sound like she has brain damage. The same thing happened when Trump put the pressure on Marco Rubio. He got desperate, and started making “crude” jokes. The change made him look bad.
People who excel at this:
All of the people with anime posters that harassed Rick Wilson into talking about them on national television. -
“If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive.”
“Racist” no longer means anything. Being called racist is now a badge of honour on the Alt-Right. Absolutely every argument or insult that the other side can throw at us can be turned into a badge of honour or a hilarious Bingo win. Every time the other side attacks us, they look ridiculous. Every time BLM lashes out at the evil racists, all most people see is violent thugs. Remind everyone, all the time, how stupid every attack the other side uses against us is.
People who excel at this:
Anyone that currently has “Deplorable” in their name. -
“The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.”
Always have an answer ready in case the other side gives in. If a journalist says “You’re right, there really is only one religion committing terrorism in this day and age. But what can we do about it?” Have an answer ready.
People who excel at this:
NRx and Rx seem to be better at this than the Alt-Right, but let’s just say Trump and call it a day. -
“Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
Blame people. Find people who are responsible for problems, and blame them. Publicly. Don’t just say “The CIA did…” Who cares what the CIA did? The CIA is a nebulous organization. Figure out the lowest ranking guy who you know would have had something to do with what went wrong, and blame him. Turn him into a pariah, make everyone that defends him look bad simply for defending him. Don’t say “The media is biased,” say “Jake Tapper has a long record of pro-Clinton bias. When will you fire him?” Organizations can pass the buck around, a person cannot.
People who excel at this:
Pax Dickinson and the Wesearchr team are good at this.
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This is another one I’ve written about before. Basically, you have two “versions” of any argument or position. Let’s use “what’s the Alt-Right’s position on Jews?” as our example. The first, the one that you want to spend most time using, is the Bailey. That’s your good argument, that you can use to get lots of people on your side, and affect policy decisions. “Read Culture of Critique. Read Alexandr Solzhenitsyn. Read about the German Revolution of 1918. Now you know.” Use that argument as often as possible. When someone corners you, and is actually able to articulate proper arguments against that position that you are unable to counter, retreat to your Motte. That’s the argument you have that isn’t helpful at all, but is absolutely indestructible. “We were just joking around, criticizing Jews is the best way to get people upset! What are you, some kind of old person who can’t take a joke? HAHA, look at this unfunny square!” To that person, you’re being disingenuous and frustrating. To everyone else, they look like an idiot for attacking you Bailey when you have CLEARLY only ever been in your Motte. When that person gives up and leaves, go back to quoting Kevin MacDonald.
People who excel at this:
Honestly I think Milo may be the person who uses this the best, and I’m not even certain if he’s doing it purposely. Anyone who has ever posted a neo-Nazi Pepe, then laughed about Hillary calling Pepe a symbol for neo-Nazism has done this one though.
So there you have it. Those are the rules. Use them wisely. Any questions, or rules you think should be included, post them below.
And, when in doubt, always blame the An-Caps:
Northern Reaction 
Great distillation.
I read books (sometimes).
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I read books all the time (Including Alinsky) but this war will be fought on the Internet . Stop the #ICANN turnover
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