What Is NPC, the Pro-Trump Internet’s New Favorite Insult?

Last week, a trolling campaign organized by right-wing internet users spilled over onto Twitter. The campaign, which was born in the fever swamps of 4chan and Reddit message boards, involved creating hundreds of fictional personas with gray cartoon avatars, known as NPCs. These accounts posed as liberal activists and were used to spread — among other things — false information about November’s midterm elections.

Over the weekend, Twitter responded by suspending about 1,500 accounts associated with the NPC trolling campaign. The accounts violated Twitter’s rules against “intentionally misleading election-related content,” according to a person familiar with the company’s enforcement process. The person, who would speak only anonymously, was not authorized to discuss the decision.

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What is an NPC?

NPC means “nonplayable character” or “nonplayer character.” It’s a term, borrowed from the world of video games, for a character that is controlled by the computer rather than by a player. An NPC often advances the game’s plot by saying scripted lines, or assisting the playable characters in some way.

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What does this have to do with politics?

Several months ago, users on 4chan and Reddit, the online message forums, started using the term NPC to refer to liberals. These people, they said, join the anti-Trump crowd not because they are led by independent thought or conscience to oppose President Trump’s policies, but because they’re brainwashed sheep who have been conditioned to parrot left-wing orthodoxy, in the manner of a scripted character.

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And this is a thing … why?

It’s a long story, but the short version is that a group of young, extremely pro-Trump internet trolls have spent the past several years mocking anti-Trump people as whiny, easily triggered snowflakes who are primarily motivated by social acceptance rather than by logic and critical thinking.

Many of Mr. Trump’s supporters — including, as of last week, Kanye West — put their support for him in the language of freethinking rationality and paint the other side as being motivated by blind loyalty and identity politics. {snip}

The NPC meme fits neatly into this narrative and offers Mr. Trump’s online supporters an easy shorthand way to paint liberals as humorless prudes who say “Drumpf” because the HBO host John Oliver told them to, who march in protests and put on pink “pussyhats” because they’re the popular things to do, and whose views can’t withstand scrutiny.

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So what happened with Twitter?

Late last week, a group of users on r/the_donald, Reddit’s largest pro-Trump forum, decided to take the NPC meme to a wider audience. They created dozens of Twitter accounts using fictional NPC personalities, the NPC Wojak avatar and bios like “fighting against Nazi Racist Drumpf Fascist Cheetofinger.” They used these accounts to follow and tweet at one another, as well as at liberals, creating the semblance of an army of resisters mindlessly repeating anti-Trump talking points.

The campaign began as a joke. But a few of the accounts started posting misleading information about the midterm elections, including encouraging liberals to vote on Nov. 7. (Election Day is Nov. 6.)

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Are these Russian bots?

Probably not. (Although some of the NPC accounts may have been automated, there is no sign that Russia is involved in this.) Mostly, it appears to be a 4chan joke that spiraled into some mild voter suppression.

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