It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.

Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.

Thank you.

 

Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.

 

The Twitter Fallacy

page: 1
6

log in

join
share:

posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 09:47 AM
link   
People have payed undue significance to Twitter, Facebook and other social media. Once reputable news organizations now dedicate much of their content to topics that “trend” on Twitter. The problem is that this significance disappears as soon as one averts her gaze from the screen and puts the device in her pocket. For journalists, the significance of social media is vastly overstated if not deliberately misconstrued.

It has been alleged, for instance, that foreign Tweets, status updates, and social media ad campaigns during the 2016 election in America was an instance of “meddling” in that election, “an influence campaign”, and to some alarmists, “the worst attack on America since 9/11”. These are puzzling claims because no single subset of any social media platform is a country. To complicate the “meddling in the election” trope even more, exactly zero percent of that election occurred on social media. Considering this, “the worst attack on America since 9/11” was no different than any other day, unless one conflates the states of affairs on social media with the states of affairs in real life.

In the aforementioned case, it is possible that a forensic investigation could prove which pieces of foreign propaganda were “shared”, “liked”, “retweeted”, and so on. But no amount of investigating could uncover what level of influence—if any—this “meddling” had on the user’s final decision. So, when someone says that a series of tweets, ads and facebook posts was “the worst attack on America since 9/11”, he is not only uttering a string of fatuities, he is using delusion or deceit—not evidence—to come to his conclusions.

It wasn’t too long ago that people were praising social media because they helped facilitate various “revolutions”. The media dubbed the election protests in Moldova a “Twitter Revolution” back in 2009. But this turned out to be a vast overstatement, maybe even a hoax, not only because very few people in Moldova used Twitter at the time, but also because there was no cell or internet service in the square where the protest was occurring. What’s more, this “twitter revolution” may not have been a revolution at all, but one devised by state actors. Several of the most violent demonstrators were recognized as members of the Moldovan security service.

The Twitter revolution narrative found credence again during the Iranian election protests later that same year. It was deemed so key to the uprisings there, that some suggested Twitter should receive the Nobel Peace Prize for empowering those who protested. The narrative even convinced the US state department to demand that Twitter delay its own scheduled maintenance until after the protests.

But again the significance was vastly overstated, and the narratives it promoted differed from the facts on the ground. As it turns out, most of the Twitter buzz around the protests in Tehran was propagated by westerners tweeting amongst themselves, not Iranians. As Iranian journalist Golnaz Esfandiari described it, “Western journalists who couldn’t reach — or didn’t bother reaching? — people on the ground in Iran simply scrolled through the English-language tweets posted with tag #iranelection. Through it all, no one seemed to wonder why people trying to coordinate protests in Iran would be writing in any language other than Farsi.”.

Why would a company fire someone for a social media post if most people believe political correctness is a problem? Can a small but virulent Twitter mob, in combination with the journalist’s social media churnalism, make it seem like everyone disapproves?

The twitter fallacy is simple. In each case the activity on social media was conflated and confused with the activity in real life. The narratives arising from the former only distorted and overshadowed the evidence from the latter.

On Twitter, self-concerned fantasy becomes truth, laziness becomes activism, and journalists make virtue-signalling the guiding principle of their craft.


edit on 18-10-2018 by NiNjABackflip because: (no reason given)



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 09:52 AM
link   


The twitter fallacy is simple.


Hypocrisy.

Farrakhan Proves it.
edit on 18-10-2018 by neo96 because: (no reason given)



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 10:00 AM
link   
a reply to: NiNjABackflip

I would love to read what you wrote but your meme kept diverting my eyes-I'm about to get a migraine.



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 10:01 AM
link   
a reply to: NiNjABackflip

People also tweet so and so didn't wear her veil and then she gets stoned. So it obviously effects human beings. It's fair to assume we have our own version of this we are too close to see.



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 10:03 AM
link   

originally posted by: Justso
a reply to: NiNjABackflip

I would love to read what you wrote but your meme kept diverting my eyes-I'm about to get a migraine.


Good to know. Apologies.



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 10:57 AM
link   
a reply to: NiNjABackflip

Twitter, FB, Instgram etc are all compromised.

Privacy is dead. People now help to 'police' each other. Nearly every moment of every day.

I don't think any of it is a good thing - everyday I see how it detriments people, relationships, society etc...

I do wonder if we spent more time away from VR, what would happen?

P.S love your username and avatar btw....!



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 11:23 AM
link   
a reply to: NiNjABackflip

But tweets combined with the power of Facebook likes overthrew Kony and saved Harambe!

Right?



posted on Oct, 18 2018 @ 05:14 PM
link   
a reply to: NiNjABackflip

I love your "avatar." It's my fav! Thanks.




top topics



 
6

log in

join