Conspiracy Theories
Why do some people who support Trump also wind up believing conspiracy theories? There’s a scientific explanation for that. Why do people believe some politicians’ lies even when they have been proven false? And why do so many of the same people peddle conspiracy theories? Lying and conspiratorical thinking might seem to be two different
Propaganda
US police departments spend tens of millions of dollars every year to manipulate the news, flooding the discourse with “copaganda.” These aggressive tactics give the public a distorted view of what public safety means, what threatens it, and how to solve it. According to police department documents provided to the County Board of Supervisors, budget
Agitprop
For every one of the few anti-militarist screenplays that are made into films, far more are reflexively spiked because their defiant content raises objections from military leaders. The military quietly infiltrating a movie studio . . . the idea might seem like a fantastical plot from a film, but Top Gun: Maverick is a reminder that it’s
Propaganda
Over the past year, the US public has been subjected to an avalanche of propaganda attempting to stoke future war with Russia and China. What’s stunning is how few Americans are buying it. The US public’s appetite for war is still remarkably small, despite the best efforts of its elite. A recent survey from YouGov and the
Media
China’s efforts to subdue the turkic-speaking Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region will be familiar to Techdirt readers. International awareness is increasing, too, not least thanks to the diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics that the US and other countries have announced. That presents an interesting challenge to the Chinese authorities: how to counter the growing evidence of pervasive
Climate
Nov 18 (Reuters) – Facebook advertisers promoted false and misleading claims about climate change on the platform in recent weeks, just as the COP26 conference was getting under way. Days after Facebook’s vice president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, touted the company’s efforts to combat climate misinformation in a blog as the Glasgow summit began, conservative media