Oliver Bateman Does the WorkVerified account

In a media world with minuscule budgets for travel and research, and with freelancers needing to deliver 2-3 stories a day to stay afloat, this was a kind of golden age for bad, thumbsucking content

There are few subjects more willing to talk at length for the sake of a 2000-word profile than some alt-right thought leader who spends most of his day hanging out in mom's basement and firing off angry tweets

So would they just DM some random anonymous account that used racial slurs and had a pepe frog picture and that would be their story?

Yep. I wrote two such stories for VICE. I talked to Ricky Vaughn, the Twitter reactionary, on Twitter for many hours across several days. I quickly realized this was why I needed to get back to the world of 9 to 5 work ... I didn't want to hustle this kind of material

And yeah I don't blame you for not wanting to give those types a platform. I think you're spot on that some of the fluff pieces they get only encourage them

Yes, and some may be insignificant and not at all dangerous if left alone ... just odd, nerdy recluses. But if platformed, they can become a danger

So true. Their ideas are toxic and unfortunately, using the internet to radicalize young people, who really don't know much about anything

Meanwhile, there are 100s of stories - 100s! - written by freelancers "journeying to the heart of the alt right." What exactly was that? And where was it located? Mom's basement somewhere in the great plains?