4 ms·
> Similarly, much of the Russian disinformation campaign of 2016 — especially in the beginning — was not about convincing people of falsehoods. It was about sow
by sammalloy 3y ago
> Similarly, much of the Russian disinformation campaign of 2016 — especially in the beginning — was not about convincing people of falsehoods. It was about sowing seeds of discredit and doubt about Hillary Clinton, and about the U.S. electoral system generally. It didn’t matter what was actually on Clinton’s email server, so long as talking about it cast doubt on her integrity.
This tactic of fear, uncertainty and doubt has been addressed by numerous authors in recent decades. Science historian Naomi Oreskes pointed to the deliberate cultivation of uncertainty about climate change by Bill Nierenberg, Fred Seitz, and Fred Singer to slow down and stop regulations on fossil fuel companies.
In 2012, Jay Rosen, journalism professor at NYU, described this cultivation of uncertainty on the right as a process of "reverse verification", with the example of the question, "Was Obama born in the United States?”
Rosen: "Verification is taking something that might be true, and trying to nail it down with facts. In reverse verification, you take something that’s been nailed down and try to introduce doubt about it."
This is the primary way that American democracy is being subverted now, in 2023.
- davidw 3y ago> Jay Rosen Very interesting to follow on twitter in that he picks apart bad journalism and explains why it doesn't work.
- Andrew_nenakhov 3y ago> Russian disinformation campaign of 2016 Are you referring to the disinformation campaign that promoted the conspiracy theory that Russia somehow influenced the 2016 presidential elections, or the conspiracy theory itself?
- sammalloy 3y ago[flagged]
- Andrew_nenakhov 3y agoYes, bought ads on a whopping $100k on Facebook. That really changed the outcome of the elections: https://time.com/4930532/facebook-russian-accounts-2016-election/ https://time.com/4930532/facebook-russian-accounts-2016-elec... Anyway, why the big fuss? US has meddled in the affairs of other countries via media/grants/other types of funding, public and covert, for over a century by now. Why being so sour because some countries influence you back? If it is the citizens who do the voting, your compatriots, and you should respect their choice. Or you think they are too stupid and too easily influenced by misinformation, that they are too naive to make a rational choice? How about stripping the voting rights from such people? They clearly need to be steered by more competent leaders!
- sammalloy 3y ago[flagged]
- Andrew_nenakhov 3y ago[flagged]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]