Angry Enough to Riot: An Analysis of In-Group Membership, Misinformation, and Violent Rhetoric on TheDonald.win Between Election Day and Inauguration

Abstract

This study was a mixed-method quantitative and qualitative analysis that analyzed content posted to TheDonald.win, a web forum popular with extreme supporters of Donald Trump. The purpose of this study was to expand knowledge of the dynamics of radicalized online spaces, especially the role that shifting In-Group and Out-Group membership plays in fomenting increased levels of observably radicalized language. The study examined the top-20 posts on the website every day between when the 2020 US presidential election was called and the presidential inauguration in January 2021. The study found that In-Group membership was maintained only by expressing open, public support of Trump’s claims of election fraud, that misinformation was rampant on the site but was often vague in its linguistic form, and that posters to TheDonald.win saw their own In-Group as the victims of violence more often than they used violent rhetoric against members of the Out-Group.