On Wednesday, Vanity Fair ran a long piece by columnist Tina Nguyen about the supposed seduction of Kanye West into the “far right.” The evidence for this contention: Kanye retweeted Ali Akhbar and Candace Owens. But West also is a “fan of Jordan Peterson,” whom she describes as a sort of pied piper and “gateway drug” for the “far right.” This, in and of itself, should have let Nguyen know that she was barking up the wrong tree — Peterson is an outspoken opponent of identity politics and the alt-right, and is hardly a “far right” conservative. But never let facts get in the way of a good story.
Nguyen writes that “The red-pilling of Kanye West marks a turning point for the conservative-media universe, which has undergone a revolution in the months and years since Trumpism took over American politics.” Using the term “red-pilling” to describe West is deliberate; it’s a term frequently used by the alt-right, and meant to suggest such associations. And indeed, Nguyen then draws associations between characters and movements that have no such association. She writes:
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