Slurs, hatred, and Nazi UFOs: what really hides beneath Imperial’s popular “Agarthan Society”?
The now-deleted but once widely-followed meme account was one of dozens that had begun to share discriminatory and neo-Nazi content across universities in recent months.
Warning: the following article contains references to racism, antisemitism, and Holocaust denial, in addition to quoting slurs.
In September, an account for the “Imperial Agarthan Society” appeared on Instagram, under the username @imperial_agartha. Popularised by its fast-paced montages of seemingly absurd content over energetic music, the account grew fast, surpassing the 3,000 follower threshold by mid-November, before eventually being deleted on Thursday 20th November.
Despite the account’s extensive reach, much of the imagery and vocabulary used in its posts drew from alt-right or neo-Nazi tropes and symbolism, ranging from explicit references to obscure dogwhistles.
The account is not affiliated with Imperial, and no such society is recognised by Imperial College Union.
Felix investigated this account as well as the society it purports to represent, and found it was part of a much wider trend, with at least 30 Agarthan pages created on Instagram for universities and high schools across countries since October. Felix joined Imperial Agartha’s discussion group, finding an abundance of racist, antisemitic, and Nazi-glorifying content, posted both by the “society” and by members of the chat, some of which were Imperial students.
The Agarthan myth
“Our society is inspired by the popular online mythology of Agartha, the legendary hidden city said to lie within the hollow Earth,” the society (henceforth referred to in this article as “Imperial Agartha”) told Felix via Instagram. “Agartha is imagined as a utopia of flawless civilization and advanced technology – a perfect realm untouched by the chaos of the surface world. Naturally, we felt it was the ideal thematic home for Imperial students.”
The name “Agartha” itself refers to a mythical underground world devised by a French writer in the 19th century, which later proved popular among far-right figures of the following century. The account also mentions “Vril” in its description and as a recurrent hashtag – a term introduced in another 19th-century novel by a British author, referring to a fictional technology used by a superhuman race as a source of physical and spiritual energy. “Vril” has reportedly since become part of neo-Nazi occultist canon.
An investigation published in April by Pitchfork, an online music and culture magazine, concluded that “in the most despicable clips, Agartha and Vril have become stand-ins for bigotry.” The article noted that “what makes this wave of videos particularly bizarre is its overlap with brain rot memes,” which stands true for Imperial Agartha.
Concerning references
The Agarthan society called itself “mostly satirical” in its story highlights, adding: “We at ICL Agartha Society do NOT condone members who possess a genuine racial hatred for any ethnic group. (Even Israelis)*”. When questioned by Felix, the society explained: “Mostly satiracal [sic] means that our content is supposed to be light hearted and not taken seriously. Even though our content could be thought [of] as a tiny bit dodgy we obviously don’t believe in any hateful rhetoric.”
Yet under the pretence of humour, the account has been conveying extremist imagery. An attentive look into its publications revealed an abundance of Nazi, occultist, and alt-right references.
The logo from the Instagram page is based on the capital “I” from the university’s logo, to which was added a foreground showing a controversial influencer in a what resembles an SS uniform, next to Yakub – a scientist credited with creating White people in Nation of Islam mythology – and other alt-right internet tropes such as Pepe the Frog and a White Pharaoh.
Images frequently found in the reels posted by the account included CGI representations of the Horten H.IX (a Nazi-era prototype bomber) and UFOs with WW2-era Luftwaffe roundels (a reference to the “Nazi UFO” conspiracy theory), Hans Landa (a fictional Nazi officer from the movie Inglorious Basterds), the Black Sun (a Nazi symbol), a statue of Arno Breker (the Third Reich’s “official state sculptor”), and animated characters performing Nazi salutes.
Across its posts, some tags include #stoptheboats, #rapenetanyahu, and #freepalpatine (a deformation of “Free Palestine”).
The account also referenced more subtle alt-right dogwhistles – coded symbolism targeted to a specific in-group – including references to “raw milk” and “white Monster” energy drink. References to conspiracies such as Atlantis or the extraterrestrial origin of the Giza pyramids were also rife. The account often mentioned the legendary realm of Hyperborea, with many of the videos showing images of blond, blue-eyed people from the 1990s Czech UFO religion “Universe People”.
The society calls itself “Imperial’s most inclusive society,” yet also listed in an email having “blonde hair” and “blue eyes” as “criteria to be eligible” to become an “Agarthan citizen”. This is in apparent contradiction with the “Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) Charter” they later sent Felix, which states: “We do not tolerate discrimination or harassment on any grounds”.
The society has also replied “Yes [white hand emoji]. As long as Ur blonde U r welcome” to an inquiry on membership conditions, “Music to my ears [white fist emoji]” to a comment saying “Silence jew ah reel”, and “[handclap emojis] What is this angelic word U have graced us with” to a comment saying “N*gga [uncensored]”.
Regarding this last comment, Imperial Agartha told Felix, “It was meant to be a humorous reference the frequent use of this word in music produced in the black community where it is not used with racist intent but rather in a humorous way. We apologise however as this was clearly not false although our intention was clearly not to discriminate or denigrate anyone.”
Growing popularity
“Since our founding, we’ve managed to attract an unexpected amount of attention to Imperial,” the Agarthan Society told Felix.
As of 19th November, the Society’s Instagram account had 3,146 Instagram followers, and its most popular video had accumulated over thirty-two thousand likes since being posted in early October. These figures increased steadily before the account’s deletion.
Many of the followers were Imperial students, some of whom are personally known to members of Felix. Those approached by Felix usually thought of it as an innocuous “shitpost” page. When asked what they knew about the page, a follower told Felix: “Not much, it’s brain rot”. (“Shitpost” and “brain rot” refer to forms of low-quality and often absurd humour popular on Instagram.)
The page’s reach was such that it was at one point followed by an elected Union representative and a Felix section editor who were unaware of the meaning of the dogwhistles.
Imperial College Union told Felix: “Once it was highlighted, the student representative unfollowed the account. The account was followed from a personal profile and should not be taken as endorsement from the Union of the account’s content or views. The representative’s values also do not align with the account in question, and they apologise for any concern this may have caused. With busy social media feeds, it can be easy to follow accounts and lose sight of their content; we encourage everyone to review their follow lists periodically and to unfollow any accounts they feel do not reflect their values.”
The Imperial’s Department of Computing society (DoCSoc) had liked a reel from the account, although the video did not contain any extremist references. Aidan Madge, the President of DoCSoc, told Felix: “It is committee policy to not use the Instagram for anything other than our own activities or promotions of/collaborations with sponsors and other student societies. However, I can confirm that the account did like this reel. I’ll be continuing to investigate how this happened and how to avoid it in the future. We’ve had committee members like posts because they’ve been unaware they’re signed in instead of their main account before.
“I think it’s important to note that the post itself, whilst weird in tone and definitely not appropriate for DoCSoc to promote, in and of itself, was not antisemitic or Nazi related, likely intended as part of the slope from relatability to hatred of the agartha account.”
DocSoc strongly condemned that “any antisemitism, racism, discrimination or hate in any form,” and called the account and antisemitic stances in general “disgusting.”
The Imperial Agartha account also published screenshots showing that it is blocked by the official SOAS University account.
The Instagram account for the Conversative Association of King’s College London (@kclconservativesassociation) commented “Agreed” under the page’s second post, a montage titled “Growing poor in Agartha” that notably showed a Nazi UFO and a picture of Hans Landa, with the tag #saveeurope followed by two lightning bolts. The double lightning bolts, which were also found on the account’s bio, can symbolise the SS.
The association’s account commented again under another of the Imperial Agarthan Society’s posts, and at one point followed the Lancaster University Friends of Agartha Society page (@lu_agartha). The KCL Conservative Association did not immediately reply to our request for comment. Imperial Agartha told Felix, “We noticed some of their content related to agartha so we made a couple of jokes with them. This is the full extent of our relationship [and] they did not contribute to any content posted on the account.”
The Instagram account for the St Andrews Conservative and Unionist Association also followed @lu_agartha before this was pointed out by Felix. A representative for the association said, “I am unsure why we followed this account. As a rule, we do not follow ‘meme pages’; I can only assume this was the action of a previous social media manager, for which I apologise. We have unfollowed this account and ensured that all other accounts we follow are appropriate. We stand against Fascism, Nazism and other such hateful ideologies; we find any suggestion that we support them horrifying. We would like to highlight our opposition to anti-Semitism in any form and note that the accounts we do follow, and wholeheartedly support, include, among others, the Conservative Friends of Israel and the Pinsker Centre.”
Agartha beyond Imperial
Overall, Felix has found 32 Agarthan societies on Instagram bearing the names of universities or sixth forms. These include most major British universities (UCL, Warwick, LSE, King’s, etc.), but also universities and colleges in the United States (MIT, NYU, John Hopkins, etc.), and in continental Europe (such as the University of Padua in Italy and the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands). There is no indication that any university, nor its student unions or associations, endorse these societies.
28 of these accounts were created in September or October of this year, and many of the older ones have undergone recent username changes – for instance, LSE’s @lse_vrill_soc appeared in August 2023 but had changed its username three times since joining.
Some accounts appear to have grounding in their respective universities and refer to jokes, events, or rivalries internal to universities they represent.
A drawing of Yakub saying “Agartha needs you!” appeared on a blackboard in Imperial’s Blackett laboratory on Tuesday 11th November. This drawing was later claimed by one of the society’s members on a discussion group.
The Imperial Agarthan Society told Felix, “Obviously we have had contact with other agartha societies to collaborate and say hi. However, due to the number of societies being produced it is nearly impossible for us to be in contact with almost all of them. We don’t affiliate with anyone.”
Descent to Hell: the society chat
Imperial Agartha initially told Felix that it was currently a strictly online community: “We are still ‘testing the waters’ to determine whether hosting in-person gatherings is actually a good idea, especially given the… [sic] considerable potential for such events to go spectacularly wrong.
“In the near future, though, we plan to take a small but meaningful step toward community-building by creating an Instagram group chat. This will serve as our first experiment in bringing Agarthans together in a more interactive space before we attempt anything as ambitious as meeting face-to-face in the physical plane.”
On Friday 14th November, the Imperial Agartha Instagram account shared a story inviting viewers to join a group chat for which they provided a link. Felix joined the chat with pseudonymous accounts. At its peak, the chat had 52 members, including a dozen identifiable Imperial students or applicants whose identities Felix have not disclosed.
Most content was shared in the form of reels. Frequent themes included conspiracy theories targeting Jewish people, Holocaust denialism, criticism of Israel (which sometimes switched to possibly ironic support), ethnic slurs including more uses of the N-word than Felix could keep track of, displays of hatred towards Black and South Asian people, and support of Hitler and the Nazi regime. Members sketched a swastika, slurs, and crossed-out Stars of David in the chat.
Debates around the quality of teaching at Imperial (“Applied math is hell bro”, “Certified City and Guilds Building classic”) also appeared. Math advice was requested, with one student uploading coursework and texting “Please bro help / It’s 20% of my maths module”, which prompted a debate on whether integration by parts was an appropriate technique.
After having shared a news post that read “TEEN ‘GAS’ JEWISH STUDENT AS PART OF ANTISEMITIC HAZING”, the Imperial Agartha account sent “This will be our ritual”, followed by “Makes sure no slimy one gets through”.
Imperial Agartha told Felix, “This was a joking reference to computer science students at Imperial. I joined in September 2020 and at that point slimy was frequently used to refer to computer science students due to their lack of showering. If you only joined imperial in the last couple years, you may not know this as I think this has fallen out of use and is no longer widely used at ICL. [...] We accept that this was not clear given that the term is not widely used anymore so we have removed the message. However the only intention of the message was to poke fun at stinky CS students not to deningrate and ethnic or religious groups.
“We do however accept that sharing that post of a hazing ritual was not acceptable. We intended to just show an extreme example of an initiation ritual as a joke, for new members without making it about ethnic grup [sic]. This was the first result that came up when we searched up initiation ritual on Instagram. We now realise that making light of this news story was not acceptable and we have removed the posts from the chat as a result. We sincerely apologise for this, however we would like to emphasize that we in no way wanted to target a specific group with our fake “ritual”. This was a significant oversight on our part, we accept this should not have been shared but please accept that the intent was innocent.”
Imperial Agartha also shared a montage of Nazi troops marching and footage of high-ranking Nazis, adding “W edit” next to two lightning bolt emojis.
After a member asked, “Should we vote on banning certain groups?”, a “Banned races/religions” poll was created, with “Jewish”, “n*gger [uncensored]”, and “Sand Brown” receiving the most votes. “We should do a prove white skin test before allowing new entries,” a member suggested, later adding, “Can I go on record saying I hate all n*ggers [uncensored] and Jews”.
On another poll that was simply titled with a Star of David emoji, members including the Agarthan society account unanimously voted for the “271,000” option instead of the “5,000,000” one – a probable reference to Holocaust deniers who only recognise the killing of 271,00 Jews by Nazi authorities instead of the estimated 6 million. “If I have 6 million cookies and 10 ovens, how long would it take me to bake them?”, one member asked.
Imperial Agartha told Felix, “In terms of the chat with the option 271,000 we accept this was a mistake. We did not initially realise what the poll was referencing with the seemingly cryptic title of just an emoji, and we just put the most popular answer. We did not realise the significance of the 271,000 figure as we do not frequent neo-nazi web pages. We now realise how unacceptable this was and deleted out response as soon as we realised. We also blocked any of the users that put the 271,000 option as well as the original poster. We sincerely apologise for this. We unconditionally accept the historical consensus that 6 million Jews died horrific deaths in the holocaust. We never doubted this and this was a very unfortunate oversight on our part, for which we apologise.”
After removing a member who they said “wears small hats” and “kisses walls,” the Imperial Agartha account (which by then had renamed itself to “Nate Higgerson,” a suspected spoonerism) congratulated another member they referred to as “Officer Jas gews” (another likely spoonerism) for having “found him in time”.
Shortly after Felix approached the Agarthan Society for comment, the account posted to the group chat: “It has come to my attention that sum of U have posted “anti-Semitic” and “racist” we remind U that our society does not endorse such behaviour”, and later added “No human is illegal / Unless Ur Palestinian”. One member replied, “Is it racist if it’s a fact”. Members eventually voted in favour of deleting the group “due to edgy content”, with one member explaining, “Can’t tell who’s a n*gger [uncensored] Jew snitch or a normal member of the society.”
Imperial Agartha’s future
During an initial exchange, Imperial Agartha told Felix: “We fully intend to register with the Students’ Union in the future, both to establish a more professional foundation and to help create a genuine social scene around our activities.” The Imperial College Union said it hadn’t been approached by students who wished to set up such a society.
An Imperial College London spokesperson said: “Any form of racist or hateful behaviour will not be tolerated at Imperial, and all incidents will be taken extremely seriously.
“We encourage members of Imperial’s community to use the Report and Support tool to report incidents of unwelcome behaviour, such as bullying, harassment, and racial discrimination.”
The account was deleted on Thursday at around 10:30 a.m. Felix understands that it had been flagged to Meta for removal.
One comment below a video by Imperial Agartha reads, “Can’t wait for this to land on the student unions desk”. Underground civilisations might not exist, but some prophecies do come true.
