@tkanos@twtxt.net @prologic@twtxt.net @bender@twtxt.net I think we cannot ignore the fact that there are nations with “cyberwarfare” divisions. Hundreds, possibility thousands, of people who sit in rooms all day every day–it’s their job–doing nothing but creating and spreading what we call “misinformation” or “disinformation”. That is a very different phenomenon from ignorant people spreading beliefs that happen to be dangerous. It is an explicit attempt to cause harm. Social media sites have been horrible conduits of this, but misinformation circulates many ways, including through trusted news media.
One aspect of cyberwarfare that information warriors take advantage of is that well-meaning people spread the bad information by reacting to it. Misinformation tends to target the emotions, and receptive people (which is all of us, basically) react to it on an emotional level. However, well-meaning people tend to react to the logical content of the information. They debate the facts being presented, or they attack the logical structure. But this functions to reinforce the bad information in people who react emotionally. In other words, the process of debating misinformation functions to reinforce it. Bad actors know this full well. I’ve read training materials for spreading misinformation–they know exactly what they’re doing.
I don’t know what the answer is, but we can’t be naive and think that just by “debating” we are going to stop people from spreading bad ideas. That’s like throwing water on an oil fire–it makes it worse, not better. We need to be better equipped than this.