2026-04-12 –, Salon Language: English
This talk examines far-right communicative fascism through the concept of Really Fake, where truth and fiction blur across synthetic media and platformed virality. Through case studies of Trump and Meloni, it explores conspiracy theories and their alternative realities as deliberate tools of far-right world-making, then repurposing conspiring as a collective and subversive practice of resistance.
This talk explores the rise of far-right communicative fascism through the lens of Really Fake (Shah et al., 2021), a contemporary condition in which truth, fiction, and simulation blur across digital platforms and synthetic media.
While their mission is commonly said to be “connecting people,” social media are, by design, atomizing infrastructures driven by virality (and chaos). Through case studies such as Donald Trump’s Truth Social and Giorgia Meloni’s personal storytelling, the talk will examine the mythopoetic role of conspiracy theories and their alternative realities as participatory tools for far-right world-making. But rather than opposing fake with truth, the talk recovers conspiring as a subversion strategy. From its Latin root conspirare, meaning “to breathe together,” conspiring can become a collective methodology of resistance, grounded in proximity, embodiment, and care.
Drawing from thinkers like Wendy Chun, Alberto Toscano, and Legacy Russell, the talk crosses media, political, and feminist theory with myths, memes, and internet culture, aiming to explore new strategies for radical speculation and reality-making.
M. Maddalena Lenzi is an Italian designer and cultural mediator based in Basel, CH. With a BA in Advertising and an MA in Transversal Design, she works at the intersection of community-oriented projects, CIVIC spaces, and cultural organizing. In community, M.M. practices collective conspiring against authoritarian storytelling and atomizing infrastructures. Recently, she has co-organized HackThePromise Festival 2025, joined the Unofficial Hiking Society, and contributed to various happenings.