In this chapter we continue with somewhat marginalized young people with problematic connection to broader society – but with quite different focus and methods. If the previous chapter was based on ethnographic encounters with marginalized people, here we take a look at imageboards: anonymous online discussion forums that have spawned peculiar subcultures, resulting in memes and discourses which often cross over to the mainstream public sphere. They are popular particularly among young men with interests often considered ‘geeky/ nerdy’, such as games, computers and comics. Imageboards are also interesting because they have recently been associated with right- wing, antisemitic and misogynist politics, even though their roots are in more benign discussions about popular culture such as anime. Looking at online spaces such as these is crucial for understanding how society is done, not only by the traditionally politically active citizens or the upright civic heroes that keep the machinery of civil society humming. We must also see how these right- leaning nominally rule- free online environments contribute to creating the culture, and the cultural tools, shaping our political reality.

We focus on Ylilauta (‘Überboard’), the most prominent Finnish language imageboard, basing this chapter on a previous article about the politicization of Ylilauta (Ylä- Anttila et al 2020) as well as on continued participant observation and qualitative analysis. In our survey of youth aged 15–25 in the Finnish capital region, presented in Chapter 1, around 25 per cent of the respondents had visited Ylilauta, so it is a somewhat mainstream experience. Imageboards are discussion forums divided into tens of thematic ‘sub- boards’, in this case including the likes of ‘Anime’, ‘Vehicles’, ‘Relationships’, ‘Bodybuilding and Fitness’, ‘Politics’ and so on. A discussion thread on these sub- boards always starts by a user posting an image or video, and each reply may or may not also include one.

To browse Ylilauta as an outsider is a curious experience, to say the least. After large online casino ads, one browses most active topics on different sub- boards. There are several threads about female social media microcelebrities, where borderline harassment and hate- following mixes with genuine affection that comes from investing one's time into something. All these threads have hundreds of comments.