Mike Cernovich

Michael Cernovich (born November 17, 1977) is an American right-wing social media personality, political commentator, and conspiracy theorist.

Though he initially called himself alt-right, he dissociated from the movement after Richard Spencer became its public face.

Cernovich describes himself as part of the new right and some have described him as part of the alt-lite.

Cernovich was born on November 17, 1977, in the farming town of Kewanee, Illinois.

His family was poor, and his parents were both devout Christians.

Cernovich became a blogger in the 2000s, focusing on anti-feminist themes.

He gained notice within the manosphere, and made a number of inflammatory comments about dating and sexual assault, including the claim that date rape is "liberal fiction".

Cernovich graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy from the University of Illinois at Springfield in 2001.

He graduated with a Juris Doctor from Pepperdine University School of Law in 2004.

In 2004, Cernovich started a legal blog entitled Crime & Federalism, where he wrote about law from a libertarian perspective.

He created a website, Danger and Play, in 2011; it was first known for his postings about men's rights and mindset techniques.

Shortly after his divorce in 2011, he created the blog Danger & Play, where he wrote about men's rights, fitness, and self-help topics.

The title of Danger & Play came from a quote by Friedrich Nietzsche: "The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything."

In 2014, Cernovich became a prominent figure in the Gamergate harassment campaign against several women in the video game industry, and through this built a following among the alt-right.

In 2015, Cernovich self-published Gorilla Mindset: How to Control Your Thoughts and Emotions, Improve Your Health and Fitness, Make More Money and Live Life on Your Terms, which became a bestseller in the motivational self-help category on Amazon.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, he adapted his website to a political blog.

He was an early supporter of Republican candidate Donald Trump, and promoted conspiracy theories about Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

In an October 2016 blog post, Cernovich wrote that date rape is "liberal fiction" that is "harmful ... for men and women" and leads to false rape accusations, claiming that: "Lying about being in love to sleep with someone isn't rape [...] Getting played isn't rape. Regret isn't rape. Thinking, 'I might have been date raped,' means you weren't raped."

His comments received sustained criticism.

In 2016, Cernovich published Danger & Play: Essays on Embracing Masculinity.

In October 2016, he published MAGA Mindset: Making YOU and America Great Again through Castalia House, a Finnish publishing house founded by Vox Day which primarily publishes science fiction and fantasy.

In 2016, Cernovich was an associate producer for Cassie Jaye's documentary The Red Pill, which discusses the men's rights movement, and issues like male suicide, child custody, and educational inequality.

Cernovich's writings turned political after Trump announced his candidacy for the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

He became notable for his trolling; his maxims were "conflict is attention", and "attention is influence".

He identified himself as alt-right, and joined forces with provocateurs like Milo Yiannopoulos.

Early on, the alt-right was a "big-tent" that included "any conservative or reactionary who was [...] too belligerently antiestablishment to feel at home in the Republican Party".

In November 2016, white nationalist Richard B. Spencer, who also self-identified as alt-right, became its "indelible face" after a video of him giving a Nazi salute provoked universal outrage.

This led to a rift in the alt-right movement between white nationalists and civic nationalists, with the former branding the latter "cuckservatives" and "alt-lite".

Following the schism, Cernovich disassociated himself from alt-right, saying: "The first order of business is getting that Nazi shit way the fuck away from me".

He adopted the label "new right", and has also described himself as an economic nationalist.

Since 2018, he has become increasingly critical of Trump, and now opposes him in the 2024 election.

Cernovich is known for his promotion of fake news, conspiracy theories, and smear campaigns.

He helped spread the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which falsely claimed that John Podesta and other high-ranking Democratic Party officials were involved in a child-sex ring.

Cernovich has frequently made false accusations about political opponents of being pedophiles.

He unearthed old tweets by Sam Seder and James Gunn joking about pedophilia, and initially succeeded in pressuring to get them fired, but both were reinstated after public outcry.

In 2018, Cernovich produced a documentary called Hoaxed: Everything They Told You Is a Lie, with associate producers Scooter Downey and Jon Du Toit.

The Hollywood Reporter described it as "a right-wing take on corporate malfeasance and media bias".

The movie interviewed a wide range of conservative figures, including Anthony Scaramucci, Jordan Peterson, Scott Adams, James O'Keefe, and Alex Jones.

Hoaxed was also made into a book of the same name.

The documentary was listed on the Amazon platform before being removed without comment in 2020.