Alt-right memes and microspectropolitics: posthumanising and queering Schild & Vrienden's memetic activism

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dc.check.date2027-04-30
dc.contributor.authorGeerts, Evelien
dc.contributor.editorLykke, Nina
dc.contributor.editorRadomska, Marietta
dc.contributor.editorMehrabi, Tara
dc.date.accessioned2026-01-20T13:15:01Z
dc.date.available2026-01-20T13:15:01Z
dc.date.issued2025-10-30
dc.description.abstractSketched out against the backdrop of the far-right’s response to the Anthropocenic COVID-19 pandemic, this essay analyses Schild & Vrienden’s [Shield & Friends’] memetic activism. Part of the global far right, Schild & Vrienden (or S&V) positions itself as a Belgian Flemish alt-right youth movement out to culturally – or metapolitically – alter society (Pano 2018; Maly 2019). Digital meme-making is one of S&V’s most notorious metapolitical strategies. Arguing that digital memes that are spread and reworked by social media users have ‘making live and letting die’-powers (Lykke 2019) and are thus an important part of the far right and the alt-right’s investment in a dehumanising bio-/necropolitics, this chapter investigates S&V’s memetic activism before, during, and after the  pandemic. This is done to gain a better understanding of their white supremacist and anti-LGBTQIA politics. The research presented in this essay furthermore contributes to memetic theory, Queer Death Studies (Radomska et al. 2019, 2020; MacCormack et al. 2021), and critical theory by zooming in on the affective hauntings of the ‘Kongo’ memetic assemblage, alt-right memes’ microspectropolitics, and memes’ queer(ing) potential via the posthumanising post-representational perspectives of Baradian (2007, 2010) agential realism and Deleuzoguattarian (2005) micropolitics. en
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dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.authororcidGeerts, Evelien§0000-0002-7826-1775
dc.identifier.authororcidLykke, Nina
dc.identifier.authororcidRadomska, Marietta
dc.identifier.authororcidMehrabi, Tara
dc.identifier.citationGeerts, E 2025, Alt-right memes and microspectropolitics : posthumanising and queering Schild & Vrienden's memetic activism. in N Lykke, M Radomska & T Mehrabi (eds), Routledge International Handbook of Queer Death Studies. Routledge, pp. 214-225. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003398486-20
dc.identifier.doi10.4324/9781003398486-20
dc.identifier.endpage225
dc.identifier.isbn9781032504384
dc.identifier.isbn9781003398486
dc.identifier.startpage214
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/18417
dc.language.isoen
dc.publisherRoutledge
dc.relation.ispartofRoutledge International Handbook of Queer Death Studies
dc.relation.urihttps://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/105024178988
dc.rights© 2025, the Author.
dc.rights.accessrightsembargoed access
dc.statusPeer reviewed
dc.subjectCritical theory
dc.subjectPolitical philosophy
dc.subjectFeminist philosophy
dc.subjectNew materialisms
dc.subjectPosthumanist philosophy
dc.subjectDeleuzoguattarian philosophy
dc.subjectMemes
dc.subjectAlt-right politics
dc.subjectMicrospectropolitics
dc.subjectHauntology
dc.subjectPhilosophy of memes
dc.subjectMemetic activism
dc.subjectMemetic politics
dc.subjectQueer death studies
dc.subjectQueer theory
dc.subject[SocietyPoliticsEthics]
dc.titleAlt-right memes and microspectropolitics: posthumanising and queering Schild & Vrienden's memetic activismen
dc.typeBook chapter
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