Conservative media outlets have recently turned a great deal of attention to an improbable
topic: critical race theory (CRT). This article draws on historical sources and content
analyses to show that recent attacks on CRT build on well-established narratives about
“cultural Marxism.” It further argues that, to attach the antipathy that familiar enemies
inspire to new subjects, conservative CRT experts perform hate-reading, a mode of
communication that defines messengers and their audiences in contradistinction to the
content they reject. Rather than an aberration, I propose that hate-reading is a
longstanding communicative practice and urge disinformation scholars to attend to how
specific discourses and technologies afford such media affects