Jake Hanrahan is practising muay thai in the corridor between two carriages on the Eurostar.
WE'RE EN ROUTE to Paris where the journalist and frontman of alternative news site Popular Front will be covering the May Day protests. An embattled French people are gearing up to show Macron what they think of his pension reforms. Over the past couple of months, the French police have laid into protesters at these demonstrations. More than 300 people have been left injured, including two in a coma, while others have lost eyes and thumbs. I’m apprehensive. Hanrahan, however, is used to this kind of thing. He almost seems excited.
I hadn’t heard of Jake Hanrahan, or his work, until a friend of mine — someone who spends much of their time at free parties and doesn’t typically keep abreast of world affairs — suddenly began quizzing me on the geopolitical complexities of the second Nagorno-Karabakh War. “Where did you hear about that?!” I said, taken aback. “Popular Front”, he replied, matter-of-factly.
Popular Front, founded by Hanrahan in 2018, is a grassroots media platform covering world conflict. It has a large, dedicated following. The documentaries on its YouTube channel amass millions of views, while its Instagram account, despite being restricted by META for ‘breaching recommendations guidelines’ (despite multiple inquiries, Hanrahan does not know why), still manages close to half a million followers. There’s also a Popular Front podcast, a semi-regular zine, and a Discord server complete with its own lively online community.
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