Riots on demand? Digital infrastructure, narrative laundering, and far-right mobilisation after Southport

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

This article examines far-right mobilisation following the July 2024 Southport attack through qualitative investigation of 5180 images and videos across Alt-Tech (Gab, Odysee, Rumble, Mastodon, and BitChute) and mainstream social media (X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube). Analysis reveals six analytically separate content strategies – organisational propaganda, AI-generated imagery, misinformation, appropriated mainstream media, authority figure content, and user-generated tactical material – exposing a sophisticated, layered infrastructure rather than a homogeneous body of extremist material. The study documents Gab’s function as an ecosystem hub aggregating content from mainstream broadsheets, political parties, academic commentators, civil liberties organisations, and Alt-Tech platforms into a single re-contextualisation infrastructure. Extending Social Learning Theory and Social Disorganisation Theory to digital contexts, the article proposes three concepts: algorithmic super peers, digitally disorganised communities, and bi-directional narrative laundering. Together, these concepts demonstrate that contemporary extremist networks exploit digital architecture structurally rather than through deliberate coordination, with urgent implications for platform governance and regulatory intervention.