The role little known websites play in spreading hate and disinformation

[Kaleva]

having loaded up the dishwasher and cleaned up the kitchen, I thought I'd go over to FR to see what they are talking about. Much the same and I once again notice something that I've often spot there before. That a number of articles are linked to sites and sources I've never heard of.

An example:

"Idaho doctor reports a ‘20 times increase’ of cancer in vaccinated patients"

The source is Life Site News and I won't proved a link to it. It was posted late last night and there are already close to 60 comments. Mostly praising the article and talking about this being another example of how dangerous the COVID19 vaccinations are.

Another thing I've noticed over there at FR is that articles from mainstream sources such as CNN, WP, NYT, NBC, LA Times and sometimes even Fox are often attacked and labeled "fake news" while crazy talk from fringe sites are often lauded for telling the real truth.

Such sites are found also on Facebook. Every once in awhile my wife would ask me about an article that showed up on her feed. Something a friend posted. Stuff like Biden having dementia, that he's a child molester, that the WH is helping Hunter Biden sell paintings or some other off the wall stuff. I ask her for the source and if it's shown, it's usually one I haven't heard of before or it's one I've spotted at FR.


Time to empty the garbage and dust.

[Skittles]

1. "an article that showed up on her feed"

it struck me how ridiculous that sounds (I have never done FB), and then I realize that is a huge part of the problem we have today regarding how people receive "news"

[Kaleva]

4. A brother told me recently he had blocked a number of our relatives

Because his newsfeed was being filled with RW political crap they were posting. He also blocked a cousin who kept posting pics of her cats.

[Skittles]

16. "blocking a relative" "defriended"

it's all just fucking ridiculous and everyone acts like it is normal

[Bernardo de La Paz]

14. FB amplifies fake news & misinfo. If you like or even click a post, you get a ton more similar. .nt

[Skittles]

17. they just plain MANIPULATE people

it is disturbing how many people were sucked into the FB Borg, UGH

[OneGrassRoot]

2. I discovered years ago...

like 12 years ago, how right-wing media works. When a viral story was making the rounds (at that time mainly in email), I tried to track the source of the bogus-sounding news. I realized every single Google hit was verbatim. Literally verbatim. The Google returns consisted of a plethora of blogs, all purporting to be news sources. The original source was a similar random blog site, not remotely a news source, nor were they even claiming to be a whistleblower site or anything like that. Just a random blog by a random person.

I eventually spoke to the general in question who denied ever saying what he was reported as saying and nothing remotely was happening that the right was all up in arms about. We now know this is common.

Now these blog sites are more full-blown websites that look more official but the same pattern occurs. Random site with no credibility starts a rumor and it spreads, verbatim, like wildfire online.

The right-wing are the most gullible people I have ever encountered in my life and they get more so by the day. They've been in a cult long before Trump came along.

[Kaleva]

5. I've foudn the same thing when looking for the original source.

Your comment:

"The right-wing are the most gullible people I have ever encountered in my life and they get more so by the day. They've been in a cult long before Trump came along."

Trump tapped into that cult.

"Now these blog sites are more full-blown websites that look more official but the same pattern occurs. Random site with no credibility starts a rumor and it spreads, verbatim, like wildfire online."

Yes.

[JHB]

12. Precisely. That's why I have to remind people of this when they always attribute it to the Russians

The Right-Wing foam factory designed and built this beast. All the Russians had to do was clone another set of controls.

[JHB]

10. Yep, that's been a pattern since the dial-up BBS days

An anonymous user posts something on a message board, someone copies it and posts it to other forums, the same guy and others circulate it via email forwarding chains (in those days).

The copies would pick up embellishments, like additional/replacement text grinding an axe over one of the copy/paster's hobby high-horses, or have a name grafted onto it to make it sound like a public statement from someone who has earned some respect.

I can think of two specific examples, both having a bogus attribution to Hamilton McWhorter, a Marine pilot in WW2 who gained some fame as the first pilot of the Grumman F6F Hellcat to make ace. He authored a book about it in 2001, and shortly thereafter his name started appearing in emails claiming he said something he didn't.

One of them was a slam against Al Gore, quoting Oliver North's answer to a question by Gore in a congressional inquiry, where North was quoted as warning about Osama bin Laden, and bashing Gore for ignoring the warning. Of course, in North's actual testimony he was talking about terrorist leader Abu Nidal. The name was swapped due to the usual wingnut propensity for dishonesty in the service of despising the people they enjoy despising.

The other was against Hillary, then senator from New York. The screed ranted about how she "refused" to meet with a delegation of Gold Star mothers. In reality, the mothers were in Washington on other business, their visit to Hillary's office was a spur of the moment decision with no appointment, and Hillary couldn't meet them because she was out of town that day. But the writer of the screed didn't need no steenking facts, and wasn't going to allow any to get in the way of some good, chewy Hillary Hating.

As with the Gore screed, McWhorter's name was pasted on to it to add gravitas for the ready-to-believe chumps who'd receive the emails.

[Tetrachloride]

3. A freeze on new web domains would be a start.

[overleft]

6. What is FR?

[Kaleva]

7. Free Republic

[left-of-center2012]

8. I wondered if they met FB as in Facebook?

If it is Facebook I just use mine to keep in touch with friends and family.
I do not get news there.

[JHB]

13. Free Republic, a wingnut website that goes back to dial-up days

Infamous for its bile, its temperamental (emphasis on "mental" ) owner, and a web design so unchanged over the years its preferred web browser is probably still Netscape.

And runs off electricity generated by hamsters running on their exercise wheels. Seems like that, anyway.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

15. It's like this

(a mild example, but shows the brainwashed cult aspects)

I don’t care what the lying media says
The vaccine industry is pure evil and fraudulent
They are the spear tip of the communist great reset
19 posted on 2021-09-14, by Truthoverpower (Arizona !!!! Now the
TRUMP TRAIN is getting back on TRACK ! TRUTH! FREEDOM !LIBERTY! I could )

[left-of-center2012]

9. Why not just stay away from them?

[Kaleva]

11. You could tell them that but I don't think they'll listen