Misrepresentation: the world’s great, burgeoning industry

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Paper Truths is a weekly newsletter that combs some of the darkest corners of the internet for disinformation and misinformation, analyzing the strategies and tactics, providing the tools needed to fight back against bad actors’ narratives. Every week it focuses on the issues that are at the center of American politics, outlining the facts that are being manipulated and warped: voting rights, abortion, education, the economy, and more. This is one contribution:

SOCIAL MEDIA
19 of Facebook’s Top 20 Pages for American Christians are Run by Eastern European Troll Farms Overseas

Millions of Americans have joined a variety of either Christian American or Black American Facebook groups in an attempt to create a community for themselves. These groups purport to be made by Christian/Black Americans, for Christian/Black Americans, with the largest reaching over 75 million users a month, an audience 20 or 30 times the size of the next largest Christian Facebook group.

What the facts say: The reality is these groups are managed by individuals largely based in Kosovo and Macedonia, in what is called “troll farms.” These groups were part of a larger network that collectively reached nearly half of all Americans, according to an internal Facebook company report, and achieved that reach not through user choice but primarily as a result of Facebook’s own platform design and engagement-hungry algorithm.

This is a continuation of the argument that social media’s algorithm can create group-think, adhere to confirmation bias, and prioritizes ad revenue versus positive social benefits.

My comment: Why do people waste their time on these social media sites? I can understand using (former) Facebook as a means of keeping in touch with one’s immediate family, but beyond that why would you waste your time reading the blatherings of strangers, particularly strangers peddling lies and disinformation?

Go for a walk. Read a good book

Is this a non-sequitur?

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Speculation has emerged that penguins may be aliens after scientists found traces of a chemical from Venus in their droppings.

Experts are struggling to explain how phosphine exists on Earth – 38 million miles away from Venus. Scientists in the UK who believe alien life forms may have already been detected say studying penguins could help them identify the types of organisms that exist on other worlds. (The Week, 22 Sept 2021)

My comment: Epicurus would have pointed out that we are bombarded with lumps of rock which originate who-knows-where in the universe. Just because phosphine has been identified on Venus doesn’t mean that it isn’t present in galaxies, and in asteroids, in even more distant reaches of the universe.
Epicurus might have pointed out that all this is is common sense. But this is just the view of an historian. Historians are renowned for proudly stating the obvious.

If you can’t win on policy and care for fellow humans…….

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The University of Florida has barred three professors from providing expert testimony in a lawsuit that restricts voting rights. The university said in a statement that testimony by professors Dan Smith, Michael McDonald, and Sharon Austin, as paid experts for the plaintiffs, would be “adverse to the university’s interests as a state of Florida institution.”

Lawyers for the coalition of civics groups challenging the law said in court papers that the university told the professors their testimony would create a conflict for the school because it would clash with the position of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration. Critics of the Florida law, which reduces drop-box and mail-in voting, say it discriminates against voters of color in violation of the Voting Rights Act. (Associated Press)

My comment: The professors are not only totally right, but restriction of the voting rights of Democrats is precisely the point of the new law, which is part and parcel of the slow-motion coup d’etat. If you cannot stand up for truth, freedom, and democracy at a university you have no business running a university. So much for liberty and freedom of speech!

Cop26

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Oil delegates dominate Cop26

There were more delegates at Cop26 associated with the fossil fuel industry than from any single country, the BBC reported. It said 503 people with links to fossil fuel interests had been accredited for the climate summit, compared with 479 from Brazil, which has the largest official team of negotiators. A campaigner said the fossil fuel industry “is one of the biggest reasons why 25 years of UN climate talks have not led to real cuts in global emissions”.

My comment: We either stand up to fossil fuel industry or effectively lose the planet. But who is brave enough to do the standing up? Were I a national leader I fear my courage would not last long, to be honest. We can tut-tut as much as we like, but these people are powerful and determined. They need a huge incentive to back off.

P.S: On second thoughts, cancel last bit of the comment. Yes, actually I would stand up to the fossil fuel industry! What worth is my career and life next to those of the millions who will suffer grievously if nothing is done? At least I would be jobless and would keep my self-respect.