Adrian Chiles (Opinion, 4 June) has actually simply found words edgelord– a term that was brand-new to me also– and currently he sees it almost everywhere. He’s not incorrect: it’s raging on social networks, in podcasts and in YouTube remarks. Yet exactly how did he ignore the edgelord-in-chief himself?
Donald Trump is the stereotypical edgelord: constantly intriguing, persistantly on-line, adverse fact and addicted to the interest his outrage produces. He really did not simply meddle edgelordery for clicks– he developed his very own social networks loudspeaker to relay it. It’s as if Fact Social had actually been handed the nuclear codes.
Chiles covers edgelords with bemused detachment. Yet Trump reveals what takes place when trolling ends up being statecraft, and ethical vacuity poses as “informing it like it is”. This isn’t simply an on-line character– it’s a regulating design with international effects.
Following time Adrian places an edgelord, he may look throughout the Atlantic and become aware that we’re all still coping with the outcomes.
Anthony Lawton
Church Langton, Leicestershire
