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So someone I de-friended elsewhere has been posting links to disinformation sites, and pushed back when I asked them not to, saying to defriend them if I didn't want to see it.
But they replied to my parting comment, which briefly explained - or tried to explain, in shorthand - how these disinfo sites work, saying they weren't linking to disinformation, they were linking to the "little bit of truth" in it.
(Given that this was UFO nonsense, I contest the "truth" part, but I'm not going to argue that.)
So this was my final response.
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It's not the articles you linked. I mean, they're all nonsense. Sorry, but they are, and I won't sugar-coat it. People lie, people make things up. There was no planet hovering over Russia. Gravity is real. We'd all be dead, every single one of us, if a planet hovered over Russia.
It's nonsense, of course, but it's nonsense with an agenda. And that agenda is some of the other material at the same site.
Disinformation sites work by drawing people to them with - well, anything, really. Often, it's either real news (perhaps or perhaps not presented outrageously), UFO or pseudoscience bullshit that people click for a laugh, or, lately, I'm seeing a number of sites that are mostly real science but... also a few articles that really, really aren't.
Once you're there, they also start providing the political agenda, the politically-motivated disinformation that's the actual point of the site. The real (or at least interesting) articles are the bait; the disinformation is the trap, and by linking to them, you've raised their profile, so more people see the bait.
Like in the case of the site you linked in one of the posts I called out. The UFO articles are like, yeah, whatever. But you poke around at all, and what do you find? They're selling alt-right political conspiracy. First thing I found was Alex Jones - fitting, with the UFO focus - but it's not just him. And that's why the site exists. To draw people to that, and steer people along that agenda.
Come for the UFO nonsense, stay for the deep-state "Q-anon" conspiracy theories.
Lately, there've been a whole new fleet of "science" sites doing this, all with some repeating chunks of text (the "About us" text in particular seems to be identical or nearly so), implying strongly that they're all set up by the same group. The site you linked has the same text. And all of these sites have been pushing people towards alt-right and similar political conspiracy stories.
That is, again, the intent. It's standard disinformation technique. It's how it worked last time, and it's how it works now, because people keep falling for it.
So that's what you're supporting when you post those links. Having some "little bit of truth in that pile of disinformation," as you put it, IS THE POINT. News- and actual-science- versions of these sites are 95% truth, with just enough lies to do the political steering the disinformation group behind them want done.
The "little bit of truth" is the bait.
The disinformation is the trap.
And you're directing people right into it.
But they replied to my parting comment, which briefly explained - or tried to explain, in shorthand - how these disinfo sites work, saying they weren't linking to disinformation, they were linking to the "little bit of truth" in it.
(Given that this was UFO nonsense, I contest the "truth" part, but I'm not going to argue that.)
So this was my final response.
It's not the articles you linked. I mean, they're all nonsense. Sorry, but they are, and I won't sugar-coat it. People lie, people make things up. There was no planet hovering over Russia. Gravity is real. We'd all be dead, every single one of us, if a planet hovered over Russia.
It's nonsense, of course, but it's nonsense with an agenda. And that agenda is some of the other material at the same site.
Disinformation sites work by drawing people to them with - well, anything, really. Often, it's either real news (perhaps or perhaps not presented outrageously), UFO or pseudoscience bullshit that people click for a laugh, or, lately, I'm seeing a number of sites that are mostly real science but... also a few articles that really, really aren't.
Once you're there, they also start providing the political agenda, the politically-motivated disinformation that's the actual point of the site. The real (or at least interesting) articles are the bait; the disinformation is the trap, and by linking to them, you've raised their profile, so more people see the bait.
Like in the case of the site you linked in one of the posts I called out. The UFO articles are like, yeah, whatever. But you poke around at all, and what do you find? They're selling alt-right political conspiracy. First thing I found was Alex Jones - fitting, with the UFO focus - but it's not just him. And that's why the site exists. To draw people to that, and steer people along that agenda.
Come for the UFO nonsense, stay for the deep-state "Q-anon" conspiracy theories.
Lately, there've been a whole new fleet of "science" sites doing this, all with some repeating chunks of text (the "About us" text in particular seems to be identical or nearly so), implying strongly that they're all set up by the same group. The site you linked has the same text. And all of these sites have been pushing people towards alt-right and similar political conspiracy stories.
That is, again, the intent. It's standard disinformation technique. It's how it worked last time, and it's how it works now, because people keep falling for it.
So that's what you're supporting when you post those links. Having some "little bit of truth in that pile of disinformation," as you put it, IS THE POINT. News- and actual-science- versions of these sites are 95% truth, with just enough lies to do the political steering the disinformation group behind them want done.
The "little bit of truth" is the bait.
The disinformation is the trap.
And you're directing people right into it.
