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The story is written in long form, so it's difficult to figure out what methods of "voter suppression" were used. I hesitate to cry "fake news" here, but only

The story is written in long form, so it's difficult to figure out what methods of "voter suppression" were used. I hesitate to cry "fake news" here, but only barely. Typically, in my experience, "voter suppression" refers to techniques designed to prevent certain targeted groups from voting -- things like voter ID laws are often accused of having this motive, or closing polling stations, or limiting polling hours, or refusing to protect workers from discipline for taking the time to vote. These are almost always structural in nature; creating barriers that prevent people from voting. It appears that the voter suppression they are referring to is a completely different beast -- they reference this [1] Bloomberg article, which says: > “We have three major voter suppression operations under way,” says a senior official. They’re aimed at three groups Clinton needs to win overwhelmingly: idealistic white liberals, young women, and African Americans. Trump’s invocation at the debate of Clinton’s WikiLeaks e-mails and support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership was designed to turn off Sanders supporters. The parade of women who say they were sexually assaulted by Bill Clinton and harassed or threatened by Hillary is meant to undermine her appeal to young women. And her 1996 suggestion that some African American males are “super predators” is the basis of a below-the-radar effort to discourage infrequent black voters from showing up at the polls—particularly in Florida. These are not "voter suppression" in the sense used above; this is just dirty campaigning; or arguably even just campaigning. For a long time the fact of the matter is that a campaign, especially a presidential campaign, is trying to increase the turnout of your supporters, and decrease the turnout of your opponent's supporters -- nobody is convincing anybody to change sides; everyone is just trying to convince people to not vote. As long as it is done through non-structural means, convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique, and it pains me to see the marketing hacks at Cambridge Analytica elevated to some sort of gurus that can magically hypnotize people. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-27/inside-the-trump-bunker-with-12-days-to-go https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-27/inside-th...

moorhosj 8y ago
>As long as it is done through non-structural means, convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique What if it is done fraudulently? For example, lying to people about when/where to vote or lying about your opponent's positions. That doesn't seem like a reasonable technique to me.
- andrewla 8y ago
  That's a ridiculous straw man. None of the cases cited above or the referenced article refer to any techniques even bordering on that. I suspect those techniques are rarely used because when they are exposed as being fraudulent they are massively counterproductive to voter apathy.
  - metamet 8y ago
    Pretty sure they were an integral part of pushing purely fraudulent conspiracies like Pizzagate, bolstered by Bannon's very own media arm's ability to amplify. > Breitbart is known for its anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim and anti-feminist sentiments, as well as for promoting far-right conspiracy theories like Pizzagate. > “We were testing all kinds of messages and all kinds of imagery. That included images of walls, people scaling walls. We tested ‘drain the swamp.’ Testing ideas of the ‘deep state’ and the NSA watching you—the government is conspiring against you,” the former Cambridge Analytica employee, Christopher Wylie, told CNN late Monday. Wylie said his work for Bannon went back to 2014. https://www.newsweek.com/watch-did-cambridge-analytica-use-facebook-data-snatch-election-trump-853351 https://www.newsweek.com/watch-did-cambridge-analytica-use-f...
  - moorhosj 8y ago
    You made this comment: ==As long as it is done through non-structural means, convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique== I took your own generic statement and asked you to further qualify it. I did this by posing a question (opposite of a straw man) and applying it to a hypothetical scenario (to make it realistic). I never accused anyone of doing it or claimed it was something you cited. I was trying to understand if there should be some type of qualifier on the phrase "convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique" because it seems to me that it isn't a universal truth.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
ajkjk 8y ago
You're correct, factually; this is just a perverse way of 'campaigning' that has no semblance to the 'spirit of democracy', rather than the criminal sort of voter suppression, but that's the age we live in. Hah. Imagine if all this effort had been turned towards anything _good_, like, say, electing a political party in Trinidad which supported the interests of both racial groups instead of suppressing one of them from voting so the other would win. Like, what if all this scheming was in the interest of helping do good things that help people instead of electing the powerful people who pay for it? Sure sounds nice.
munk-a 8y ago
I'd disagree pretty strongly due to the intent. Intent is important and clearly intended to suppress voters or describing your* actions as suppressing voters and continuing to do that is a clear intention to break the law and, IMO, a pretty repulsive thing to do. There are people out there who thing our democracy should work slightly differently (ranked choice, wealth based voting, removal of the electoral college) these approaches can be said to disenfranchise voters but if the motive for discussing/pushing for these changes is to make things more democratic their heart is at least in the right place. Having your heart in the wrong place and being open about it is a demonstration of a clear lack of scruples. I'd also mention that I idealistically believe that negative campaigning is undemocratic - I strongly support movements to let third parties play a larger role in politics because when you change the question from "Us vs. Them" to "Which one of us" I think a lot of the partisan issues our country is suffering from are removed. I can accept that negative campaigning is an optimal strategy in our current political system but I think the fact that it is indicates that there's some really fundamental stuff wrong with our system. All that said, I think if you were, in isolation, to refer to negative campaigning as voter suppression then you'd be incorrect and the "fake news" label would be appropriate for being purposefully misleading. [*] I tried to find more context around who "a senior official" was in this quote, it appears to suggest it's someone associated with CA and the campaign, and no matter who they are they're clearly in the wrong, but if it's someone not associated with CA then I'd agree this article is misleading by specifically calling out the CEO of CA.
- kortilla 8y ago
  Multiple opponents does not fix negative campaigning. Look at the Republican primaries that Trump one for an example of a very negative multi candidate campaign.
  - munk-a 8y ago
    Multiple opponents reduces the strategic value of negative campaigning... but if a player begins in a position of strength or the rules of the game favor them or if the cost of negative campaigning is far lower than normal it is still possible they'll end up winning.
dclusin 8y ago
I don't agree with your assessment but it was well said and I don't think you should be downvoted. It's too bad so many people are engaging the mantra of, "I don't like it so I'm going to downvote it." Dissenting opinions don't deserve to be buried because we disagree with them.

moorhosj 8y ago

>As long as it is done through non-structural means, convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique What if it is done fraudulently? For example, lying to people about when/where to vote or lying about your opponent's positions. That doesn't seem like a reasonable technique to me.

andrewla 8y ago
That's a ridiculous straw man. None of the cases cited above or the referenced article refer to any techniques even bordering on that. I suspect those techniques are rarely used because when they are exposed as being fraudulent they are massively counterproductive to voter apathy.
- metamet 8y ago
  Pretty sure they were an integral part of pushing purely fraudulent conspiracies like Pizzagate, bolstered by Bannon's very own media arm's ability to amplify. > Breitbart is known for its anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim and anti-feminist sentiments, as well as for promoting far-right conspiracy theories like Pizzagate. > “We were testing all kinds of messages and all kinds of imagery. That included images of walls, people scaling walls. We tested ‘drain the swamp.’ Testing ideas of the ‘deep state’ and the NSA watching you—the government is conspiring against you,” the former Cambridge Analytica employee, Christopher Wylie, told CNN late Monday. Wylie said his work for Bannon went back to 2014. https://www.newsweek.com/watch-did-cambridge-analytica-use-facebook-data-snatch-election-trump-853351 https://www.newsweek.com/watch-did-cambridge-analytica-use-f...
- moorhosj 8y ago
  You made this comment: ==As long as it is done through non-structural means, convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique== I took your own generic statement and asked you to further qualify it. I did this by posing a question (opposite of a straw man) and applying it to a hypothetical scenario (to make it realistic). I never accused anyone of doing it or claimed it was something you cited. I was trying to understand if there should be some type of qualifier on the phrase "convincing people not to vote is a perfectly reasonable persuasion technique" because it seems to me that it isn't a universal truth.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

ajkjk 8y ago

You're correct, factually; this is just a perverse way of 'campaigning' that has no semblance to the 'spirit of democracy', rather than the criminal sort of voter suppression, but that's the age we live in. Hah. Imagine if all this effort had been turned towards anything _good_, like, say, electing a political party in Trinidad which supported the interests of both racial groups instead of suppressing one of them from voting so the other would win. Like, what if all this scheming was in the interest of helping do good things that help people instead of electing the powerful people who pay for it? Sure sounds nice.

munk-a 8y ago

I'd disagree pretty strongly due to the intent. Intent is important and clearly intended to suppress voters or describing your* actions as suppressing voters and continuing to do that is a clear intention to break the law and, IMO, a pretty repulsive thing to do. There are people out there who thing our democracy should work slightly differently (ranked choice, wealth based voting, removal of the electoral college) these approaches can be said to disenfranchise voters but if the motive for discussing/pushing for these changes is to make things more democratic their heart is at least in the right place. Having your heart in the wrong place and being open about it is a demonstration of a clear lack of scruples. I'd also mention that I idealistically believe that negative campaigning is undemocratic - I strongly support movements to let third parties play a larger role in politics because when you change the question from "Us vs. Them" to "Which one of us" I think a lot of the partisan issues our country is suffering from are removed. I can accept that negative campaigning is an optimal strategy in our current political system but I think the fact that it is indicates that there's some really fundamental stuff wrong with our system. All that said, I think if you were, in isolation, to refer to negative campaigning as voter suppression then you'd be incorrect and the "fake news" label would be appropriate for being purposefully misleading. [*] I tried to find more context around who "a senior official" was in this quote, it appears to suggest it's someone associated with CA and the campaign, and no matter who they are they're clearly in the wrong, but if it's someone not associated with CA then I'd agree this article is misleading by specifically calling out the CEO of CA.

kortilla 8y ago
Multiple opponents does not fix negative campaigning. Look at the Republican primaries that Trump one for an example of a very negative multi candidate campaign.
- munk-a 8y ago
  Multiple opponents reduces the strategic value of negative campaigning... but if a player begins in a position of strength or the rules of the game favor them or if the cost of negative campaigning is far lower than normal it is still possible they'll end up winning.

dclusin 8y ago

I don't agree with your assessment but it was well said and I don't think you should be downvoted. It's too bad so many people are engaging the mantra of, "I don't like it so I'm going to downvote it." Dissenting opinions don't deserve to be buried because we disagree with them.