Branding the white nation: Platform capitalism and the semiotics of far-right organizing

Abstract

This article focuses on the branding of Patriotic Alternative (PA), a British fFascist organization and business, in three analytic steps: first(i), branding as circulating ideologies as commodities; second,(ii) branding as creating—and selling—community, and third,(iii) branding as regimenting meaning. Building on work on the communicability of evil and language, nationalism, and political economy, we explore how PA uses the affordances of platform capitalism in a project that goes beyond ideological normalization: not just rebranding a message as acceptable but selling a product which builds a community aligned with this ideology. Looking at both brand and political websites, YouTube, as well as Telegram channels, we show how PA’s branding functions to invest a wide range of mundane practices with racist meaning; they are imagined to forestall the great replacement. Rebranding racism as white community, every cup of tea sold brings back the world of your grandma, each bar of soap protects white skin