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It's possible, but I don't consider it plausible at my current level of understanding.

My null hypothesis is that there are some really loud people on the internet who like to talk loudly about their unpopular ideas. And they're unaware of how deeply unpopular those ideas are until their little corner of the internet suddenly gets mainstream public attention.

So my thinking is the origin story of the sub is definitely organic. However, it is an easy win for a bad actor to push the narrative that a handful of loud voices are shouting about for their own interests.

Occam's razor. The parent comment is very likely right, it's probably just angry people posting on the internet.

Perhaps, if you consider, there is genuine feeling of resentment among a large portion of the population trying to survive, and that resentment stems from actual material conditions in the labor market. And a community focused on that could garner actual popularity?

How did the foreign nation state convince reddit to put /r/antiwork in /r/all?