Is cruelty in vogue? Politics now functions like fashion: positions are worn, not held. Radicalism becomes an aesthetic—something that makes you feel bold without requiring responsibility. Tom Wolfe grasped this early, turning provocation into spectacle and spectacle into status.

Online figures like Nick Fuentes follow the same model, updated for the meme age. Extremism arrives as irony, humor, “just a joke,” pulling people through the alt-right pipeline without ever asking them to consciously consent. Cruelty signals fearlessness, and fearlessness is mistaken for truth.

This isn’t new. Yellow journalism, propaganda posters, shock radio—all turned outrage into entertainment. What’s new is speed. Memes flatten ideology into punchlines, spreading ideas without consequence. Belief matters less than attention. Politics becomes branding. And cruelty, once again, is in style.