Semester of Graduation
Spring 2026
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Masters of Arts in American Studies
Department
American Studies
Committee Chair/First Advisor
Sergio Figueredo
Second Advisor
Miriam Brown Spiers
Abstract
This thesis argues that post-ironic and meta-ironic humor acts as an affective gateway to far-right radicalization within online masculine subcultures. Examining incel forums and Groyper spaces, it traces how humor operates as the architecture through which extremist ideology is introduced, normalized, and internalized. Drawing on a synthesis of meme studies, digital rhetoric, and theories of irony and affect, and using digital ethnography and critical discourse analysis, the study examines recurring meme figures, especially the Wojak and its NPC variant, as portable diagnostic devices that sort participants into the "awake" and the unconscious regardless of ideological content. Case studies include incel forum discourse structured around blackpill hopelessness and Nick Fuentes's Groyper movement, whose ironic hedging allows explicitly nationalist and antisemitic rhetoric to circulate under cover of humor. Close analysis of Fuentes's public appearances, including his interview with Tucker Carlson and a Family Guy-themed meme video, demonstrates how post-irony smuggles sincere ideological commitment past a skeptical mainstream audience. The thesis closes by arguing, through Wallace's New Sincerity and theories of narrative identity, that only a culture of sincerity and vulnerability can interrupt a radicalization process built on humor's plausible deniability.