Despite having painful red blotches scaling up and down her skin, when Anna* went to her GP for help with her psoriasis, he offered little support. So, as many of us do, the 30-something turned to the internet for answers – and was sent her spiralling down a rabbit hole of radicalisation.
Netflix’s recent smash hit series Adolescence mirrored the many real-life stories of vulnerable young boys being manipulated after innocent searches led them down a pipeline of extremism. However, as Anna discovered, women are equally susceptible to harm.
Her regretful journey began after she read online that pursuing a meat-only diet would help with her psoriasis symptoms and she began documenting her new nutrtition plan on a carnivore-themed Instagram. Soon, Anna’s social media algorithms began serving up a glut of conservative and right-leaning content.
‘It had a real emphasis on being masculine and strong. I was seeing advertisements and posts by influencers such as Joe Rogan,’ Anna, who is going by a pseudonym for fear of judgement, tells Metro.
‘There was also a feeling among the online carnivore community that we were rallying against what they called “vegan propaganda.” There was a sense that if the left was wrong about not eating meat, what else could they be wrong about?
‘I took it with a pinch of salt, but ’ve always been a curious person so was interested in hearing more.’
Down the rabbit hole
As the days and weeks went on, Anna’s feeds became flooded with controversial influencers, such as Andrew Tate and Adin Ross, all sharing their idealogy on masculinity, fitness and the right wing. But it wasn’t just online communities that were pushing her in this direction, she explains – there were other factors too.
Having moved from her home country Poland to London in 2012, Anna had struggled with loneliness for nearly a decade. For years, she had prioritised her career in marketing, and now in her mid-thirties and ready to settle down, was having trouble navigating the London dating scene.
A lack of support from friends in real life didn’t help either, as Anna felt even more isolated after they became judgmental over her new diet and lifestyle. To make new friends, and as part of a wider fitness kick, she joined a local jiu-jitsu class – but stood out as the only woman.
‘Sexism was rife because I was a beginner and the only girl. I was often talked down to and dismissed,’ she recalls. ‘When we were being partnered up to practise in class, I would always be left last and told to “get in the kitchen and make tea”. I didn’t want to look like a “crazy feminist b***h” who couldn’t take a joke, so I laughed it off.’
Anna also started to worry that maybe she was the problem, rather than anyone else. ‘I come from a fairly traditional family in Poland – father at work, mother at home, and thought maybe I needed a partner who supported these traditional beliefs, and then I’d marry and settle down,’ she explains.
It was this perfect storm of factors – being served more right-wing content, the casual sexism she experienced in her hobbies and an ongoing sense of loneliness – which made Anna particularly vulnerable; something that was turbocharged further when lockdown hit in March 2020.
At that point, she was fresh out of a difficult relationship, living alone after her housemates left to be with family and forced to collect unemployment benefits after being let go from her role in a digital marketing company.
Alone, scared and vulnerable, Anna only had the internet for company – which allowed some of the more dangerous and outlandish right-wing views to ferment and calcify.
Dangerous conspiracy theories
She was encouraged by her new friends, offline and online, to reject mainstream media and get her news from YouTube videos and Reddit forums. But then her circle still deemed those ‘too mainstream’, and directed Anna to Rumble, an alternative video platform.
There, she was exposed to outwardly racist content, including so-called documentaries with titles such as ‘Hitler Was Right’. It was jarring, Anna admits, particularly as someone with ancestors who had lived under Nazi rule in Poland – but it still wasn’t enough to turn her away.
As conspiracy theories inundated her, Anna began to think the government had manufactured the pandemic to help pharmaceutical companies sell harmful products. She recalls reading in one thread that Bill Gates had created Covid and was pushing vaccines with microchips to control the population. The theory also led her to believe that reports of coronavirus deaths were greatly exaggerated. ‘There was so much uncertainty surrounding the pandemic and lockdown, that it just felt like it made sense and I started to believe it all,’ she remembers.
Anna also admits that being part of the Covid-sceptic community gave her a sense of power. ‘There’s this thought of “we know better than you”’, she explains. ‘It was enticing to be aligned with a group who had such a sense of certainty as no one seemed to know anything.’
When Anna, who trained as a journalist before moving to London, did question theories, she was told to cross-reference with papers and ‘experts’. ‘But the experts seemed to be just pundits on YouTube with no qualifications,’ Anna says. ‘They weren’t doctors. If you tried to question their beliefs, you were mocked or dismissed – and that was one of the same criticisms they levelled at the left.’
Friends would ridicule any doubts too. For instance, when Anna’s psoriasis flared up, she suggested to someone who’d become close to her that it might be a gluten intolerance. ‘She told me I was an idiot and it was a reaction to pesticides in genetically modified crops,’ Anna recalls. ‘She was so nasty about it.’
However, Anna was reluctant to fight back, as these people had become her entire community. The thought of being isolated once again was far more terrifying than the alternative.
How women are fallen victim to radicalisation
According to Lois Shearing, the author of Pink Pilled: Women and the Far Right, it’s not unusual for women who are being radicalised into extreme beliefs to accept and internalise misogynist beliefs and values, even if it’s to their detriment.
‘Extremist factions are often still male-dominated, despite more efforts being made to attract women,’ explains Shearing. ‘There’s a naivety among some women who believe that when they join extreme far-right groups – where men talk about limiting women’s rights to vote – they truly believe that wouldn’t affect them.
‘Stronger beliefs may also come into play; we see evangelical women supporting abortion bans because they genuinely believe it’s murder. We also see some women who support racist, nationalist agenda believe in limiting women’s rights to vote in favour of men protecting the borders from “foreign criminals.”’
There is also a disturbing rise in content being made that promotes ‘traditional gender roles’ as a beneficial lifestyle choice for women, Shearing adds.
Hugely popular influencers such as Hannah Neeleman of Ballerina Farm and Nara Smith have brought ‘tradwife’ content into the mainstream, promoting the notion of women cooking and raising children while men go to work, as an appealing alternative to the nine-to-five.
Then there’s the proliferation of content aimed at women to ‘seek out’ rich men, with advice on ‘looking pretty’ and ‘acting feminine’ now garnering millions of views online.
‘It’s understandable – women bore the brunt of a lot of the economic fallout post-Covid but were also expected to juggle work with homeschooling and housework more than men did,’ explains Sheering. ‘This idea that you can have a really simple, soft life of being at home, taking care of children and not having to work has really appealed to women in the last couple of years, and has entrenched this idea of very traditional gender roles that exist within these far-right movements.’
Talking about the deradicalisation process, Shearing says far more research needs to be done. ‘It’s almost not a case of debunking people when it gets to this stage,’ she says. ‘They have built entire media ecosystems just to justify their beliefs. Instead, we need to ‘prebunk’ harmful beliefs. In my research, a lot of people I spoke to insisted on good education around digital literacy, so people can see in advance whether what is being said may be manipulated.
‘But we need to understand how big a problem this sort of content is, and how widespread it can be. Anyone can be susceptible to radicalisation – not just men and boys.’
Escaping the dark side
The turning point for Anna came when she left London in 2021 and moved to a small seaside town. Making new friends and giving herself some distance from the online spheres, allowed her the opportunity to reflect on what had happened. ‘I realised the other side wasn’t all snowflakes or bogeymen,’ she admits.
There were just so many contradictory views. They all claimed to be anti-corporations and supporting small businesses – but they all love Donald Trump. Then there were the times they would declare that the left wing is always triggered and overemotional, but I saw a right-wing influencer go on a rant saying men who use the Stairmaster at gyms are gay. It’s all so pathetic.
‘A life beyond the internet helped me see just how insane some of my beliefs and thought processes had become. I look back at it and realise they act and behave like a cult.’
Anna cut herself off from her old friends and deleted her social media. ‘I got my brain back,’ she says. Since then, she’s yet to hear from her former community but thinks if they were to reach out they’d accuse her of being brainwashed.
Now 40 and living back in London, Anna is building a new life and working in marketing, but still feels guilt for believing some of the more outlandish conspiracies.
‘I considered myself a critical thinker, but you’re actually being manipulated into thinking something totally contrary to your normal beliefs. I feel bad because I thought I should have known better,’ she explains.
‘Social media needs to do more when it comes to moderating potentially harmful content, but we also need to welcome people who do row back on some of their beliefs, instead of making them feel ashamed. We should be more considerate of those who realise the error of their ways.
‘Not everyone who falls down these rabbit holes is inherently racist or full of hatred; so much of it stems from fear and loneliness being manipulated.
‘I’m lucky that I was able to get to a position where I could cut myself free of it, as we’ve seen what can happen to those who go further down rabbit hole.’