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The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) has an active campaign to battle disinformation, especially from foreign sources. They even used Soviet propag

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) has an active campaign to battle disinformation, especially from foreign sources. They even used Soviet propaganda-style ads on Twitter to convey their message. (1) Of course, the Twitter comments below the ads are full of people/bots/agents claiming that CSIS is in the pocket of Trudeau, legacy media, the WEF, etc. 1- https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.6955717 https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.6955717

verisimi 3y ago
[dead]
- Mountain_Skies 3y ago
  Depends on which the situation requires.
- standeven 3y ago
  Can you cite a single example of CSIS creating misinformation?
  - verisimi 3y ago
    Who has the truth that they can judge something to be a lie? Or is all this just a political football?
user3939382 3y ago
[flagged]
- standeven 3y ago
  What would it take to prove that CSIS is trustworthy?
  - suoduandao3 3y ago
    CSIS as an institution acting against the interests of an entrenched governing party/oligarch bloc. Particularly if it leads to a change in leadership and they do it again. Yes, it's a high bar. Intelligence agencies have a lot to make up for.
    - jameshart 3y ago
      State security services working to overthrow the governing authorities are not generally regarded as a sign of a healthy institutional culture
      - suoduandao3 3y ago
        I think that's largely because in the US there's a bit of a civil war between different security services and the politicians they respectively back. Canada doesn't have enough discrete agencies that they can really factionate that way, they can either play nice with the government or inconvenience it if the public good is at stake. It's of course possible that they're playing nice because the government isn't encroaching on the guarantees in the charter of rights, and I hope that's the case, but it's not evidence of anything that they're playing nice.
    - standeven 3y ago
      So...you won't trust CSIS until they try to overthrow the government? Personally, seeing them operate equally well under multiple generations of opposing political parties in one of the most free countries on earth for 40 years, PLUS having no track record of misinformation, is more than enough reason to trust them.
      - suoduandao3 3y ago
        not overthrow. Persecute individuals for crimes or publicize impolitic facts for the public interest.
  - user3939382 3y ago
slily 3y ago
More like "Soviet-style propaganda ads". The use of terms like mis/dis/mal-information is simply the contemporary mechanism through which propaganda is peddled.
- babypuncher 3y ago
  How would you label information that is objectively false? i.e. someone claiming the Earth is flat?
  - wrs 3y ago
    I believe part of “Soviet-style” is that nothing is “objectively” true. The measure is whether it fits the political/religious narrative locally in favor. Not that the Soviets invented this or had a monopoly on it. Until quite recently in historical terms, that was just how it worked pretty much everywhere. We’ve even managed to swing the pendulum back that direction recently. Really, even with the most modern approaches, nothing is “objectively” true. The best you can get is “the available evidence is extremely convincingly explained by this model of what the reality is”. Which is obviously a pretty effective approach. However, “objectively” false is achievable.
    - lupire 3y ago
      Soviet-style international propaganda goes further. It's not merely subjectiveand biased. Its goal is to make truth unknowable, so that lie and truth are on equal footing, and decisions makers are blind.
  - lupire 3y ago
    The foundational purpose of the Flat Earth movement was not to disinform or to pursue misguided science. It was to demonstrate that 100% objective proof is impossible, because all evidence is weighed by subjective humans. "Disinformation" is a matter of opinion. Truth is a matter of probability, and everyone gets their own priors.
    - krapp 3y ago
pastacacioepepe 3y ago
[flagged]
- standeven 3y ago
  Their agenda is “A safe, secure and prosperous Canada, through trusted intelligence and advice”. If they were caught lying, it would erode trust and disrupt their agenda. So yes, I believe their incentives and agenda align to inform Canadians accurately.
  - pastacacioepepe 3y ago
    > Their agenda is “A safe, secure and prosperous Canada, through trusted intelligence and advice”. That's their "agenda" for the public. The real agenda is to protect Canadian's capital and to prevent communism from ever taking place in Canada. As any other western secret service. > If they were caught lying, it would erode trust and disrupt their agenda. Oh boy, I wish the world was such a nice place. The secret service MO when caught lying is to firmly deny it in spite of all evidence and keep doing what they do.
    - nozzlegear 3y ago
      > That's their "agenda" for the public. The real agenda is to protect Canadian's capital and to prevent communism from ever taking place in Canada. As any other western secret service. Is that supposed to be worse? I like the secret agenda too.
tharmas 3y ago
[flagged]
baybal2 3y ago
[dead]
swat535 3y ago
As a Canadian, I absolutely don't need CSIS policing the internet and behaving like the arbiter of truth for me and if you think CSIS (or any other 3 letter agency for that matter) does not coordinate with government you are very naive. Additionally, calling anyone who disagrees with you Russian bots/agents/etc doesn't help your position to be honest. I am sure you can come up with a stronger argument than that.
- standeven 3y ago
  They weren’t policing, just warning of foreign interference. I also don’t want a government agency policing information, but I do expect them to take action against foreign interference. I never called anyone who disagrees with me a bot/agent, but the comments below the CSIS ads were clearly full of them.
motohagiography 3y ago
Reality is when a government is indexed on narrative control it already knows it lacks popular assent. It's a weak position. In Canada, the government knows they are burning the country so as to ratchet in changes that preserve their rule over its ashes. Most of what you believe about yourself comes from language that has been adulterated and subverted, and the very means of production of self and being is already corrupted for a radicalized minority of people in these institutions. They believe they are activists who have infiltrated an establishment to demolish it. It's a playbook and they're rubes. A conspiracy theory is just what people who aren't actually engaged in the dominant conspiracy itself infer about how it works, hence the "theory" part. Junk ideas get spread as chaff to discredit and neutralize any opposition and prevent it from forming or organizing. A lot of disinfo exists to just associate dissent to it to discredit it, as it spreads absurd ideas as tools to shout down reasonable concerns. These days, calling something a conspiracy theory is just a slogan of weak minded and fearful people who are made to feel powerful by repeating it. Never underestimate what a cadre of banal nihilists with the reins of a bureaucracy can achieve.
pastacacioepepe 3y ago
Do you think the CSIS has more incentive to inform you accurately, or according to their agenda, which is exclusively to protect Canadian's capital power?

verisimi 3y ago

[dead]

Mountain_Skies 3y ago
Depends on which the situation requires.
standeven 3y ago
Can you cite a single example of CSIS creating misinformation?
- verisimi 3y ago
  Who has the truth that they can judge something to be a lie? Or is all this just a political football?

user3939382 3y ago

[flagged]

standeven 3y ago
What would it take to prove that CSIS is trustworthy?
- suoduandao3 3y ago
  CSIS as an institution acting against the interests of an entrenched governing party/oligarch bloc. Particularly if it leads to a change in leadership and they do it again. Yes, it's a high bar. Intelligence agencies have a lot to make up for.
  - jameshart 3y ago
    State security services working to overthrow the governing authorities are not generally regarded as a sign of a healthy institutional culture
    - suoduandao3 3y ago
      I think that's largely because in the US there's a bit of a civil war between different security services and the politicians they respectively back. Canada doesn't have enough discrete agencies that they can really factionate that way, they can either play nice with the government or inconvenience it if the public good is at stake. It's of course possible that they're playing nice because the government isn't encroaching on the guarantees in the charter of rights, and I hope that's the case, but it's not evidence of anything that they're playing nice.
  - standeven 3y ago
    So...you won't trust CSIS until they try to overthrow the government? Personally, seeing them operate equally well under multiple generations of opposing political parties in one of the most free countries on earth for 40 years, PLUS having no track record of misinformation, is more than enough reason to trust them.
    - suoduandao3 3y ago
      not overthrow. Persecute individuals for crimes or publicize impolitic facts for the public interest.
- user3939382 3y ago

slily 3y ago

More like "Soviet-style propaganda ads". The use of terms like mis/dis/mal-information is simply the contemporary mechanism through which propaganda is peddled.

babypuncher 3y ago
How would you label information that is objectively false? i.e. someone claiming the Earth is flat?
- wrs 3y ago
  I believe part of “Soviet-style” is that nothing is “objectively” true. The measure is whether it fits the political/religious narrative locally in favor. Not that the Soviets invented this or had a monopoly on it. Until quite recently in historical terms, that was just how it worked pretty much everywhere. We’ve even managed to swing the pendulum back that direction recently. Really, even with the most modern approaches, nothing is “objectively” true. The best you can get is “the available evidence is extremely convincingly explained by this model of what the reality is”. Which is obviously a pretty effective approach. However, “objectively” false is achievable.
  - lupire 3y ago
    Soviet-style international propaganda goes further. It's not merely subjectiveand biased. Its goal is to make truth unknowable, so that lie and truth are on equal footing, and decisions makers are blind.
- lupire 3y ago
  The foundational purpose of the Flat Earth movement was not to disinform or to pursue misguided science. It was to demonstrate that 100% objective proof is impossible, because all evidence is weighed by subjective humans. "Disinformation" is a matter of opinion. Truth is a matter of probability, and everyone gets their own priors.
  - krapp 3y ago

pastacacioepepe 3y ago

[flagged]

standeven 3y ago
Their agenda is “A safe, secure and prosperous Canada, through trusted intelligence and advice”. If they were caught lying, it would erode trust and disrupt their agenda. So yes, I believe their incentives and agenda align to inform Canadians accurately.
- pastacacioepepe 3y ago
  > Their agenda is “A safe, secure and prosperous Canada, through trusted intelligence and advice”. That's their "agenda" for the public. The real agenda is to protect Canadian's capital and to prevent communism from ever taking place in Canada. As any other western secret service. > If they were caught lying, it would erode trust and disrupt their agenda. Oh boy, I wish the world was such a nice place. The secret service MO when caught lying is to firmly deny it in spite of all evidence and keep doing what they do.
  - nozzlegear 3y ago
    > That's their "agenda" for the public. The real agenda is to protect Canadian's capital and to prevent communism from ever taking place in Canada. As any other western secret service. Is that supposed to be worse? I like the secret agenda too.

tharmas 3y ago

[flagged]

baybal2 3y ago

[dead]

swat535 3y ago

As a Canadian, I absolutely don't need CSIS policing the internet and behaving like the arbiter of truth for me and if you think CSIS (or any other 3 letter agency for that matter) does not coordinate with government you are very naive. Additionally, calling anyone who disagrees with you Russian bots/agents/etc doesn't help your position to be honest. I am sure you can come up with a stronger argument than that.

standeven 3y ago
They weren’t policing, just warning of foreign interference. I also don’t want a government agency policing information, but I do expect them to take action against foreign interference. I never called anyone who disagrees with me a bot/agent, but the comments below the CSIS ads were clearly full of them.

motohagiography 3y ago

Reality is when a government is indexed on narrative control it already knows it lacks popular assent. It's a weak position. In Canada, the government knows they are burning the country so as to ratchet in changes that preserve their rule over its ashes. Most of what you believe about yourself comes from language that has been adulterated and subverted, and the very means of production of self and being is already corrupted for a radicalized minority of people in these institutions. They believe they are activists who have infiltrated an establishment to demolish it. It's a playbook and they're rubes. A conspiracy theory is just what people who aren't actually engaged in the dominant conspiracy itself infer about how it works, hence the "theory" part. Junk ideas get spread as chaff to discredit and neutralize any opposition and prevent it from forming or organizing. A lot of disinfo exists to just associate dissent to it to discredit it, as it spreads absurd ideas as tools to shout down reasonable concerns. These days, calling something a conspiracy theory is just a slogan of weak minded and fearful people who are made to feel powerful by repeating it. Never underestimate what a cadre of banal nihilists with the reins of a bureaucracy can achieve.

pastacacioepepe 3y ago

Do you think the CSIS has more incentive to inform you accurately, or according to their agenda, which is exclusively to protect Canadian's capital power?