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Sam_I_am  2d ago (open.substack.com)   1498 thread views

How to make me Instinctively Distrust You Part 3: Priming

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Part 1

Part 2

About a month ago, as I was browsing twitter, I stumbled upon the following article by Cathy Young:

https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/the-making-of-the-maga-hoax-about

At the time, talk about pet-eating Haitian immigrants was all over twitter. Donald Trump had just referenced it in the latest presidential debate, and his his running mate, J.D. Vance had tweeted about it. It was fascinating how the story played out. Every day, I would see a new story that supposedly validated the claim. Also every day, I would find that an earlier story had been debunked. Either it wasn’t about a Hatian, wasn’t about an immigrant, wasn’t in Springfield, or wasn’t about a pet getting eaten. The article seemed like it would be an interesting read.

Early on in the article, I came across the following paragraph:

It started with an X hatefest I happened to catch at the outset. On Sept. 7, a full three days before the debate, I saw left-wing-crank-turned-right-wing-loon Naomi Wolf share a post from misinformation superspreader End Wokeness (an account that may be run by far-right troll and Pizzagater Jack Posobiec), containing what seemed like an obviously made-up story: “ducks and pets” in Springfield, Ohio being gobbled up by Haitian migrants. The evidence: an anonymized Facebook post about a “neighbor’s friend’s daughter” who had seen her lost cat being carved up by the Haitians next door. I decided to post a sarcastic comment, unaware that I was wading into a dumpster fire.

Nothing about this paragraph is factually incorrect as far as I know, but something in there caught my eye: “Misinformation superspreader End Wokeness”

I am familiar with the End Wokeness twitter account. They’re pretty prominent on twitter, and they are not exactly what I would call trustworthy. I can understand why they might be described as an misinformation superspreader. That characterization isn’t entirely wrong, but even so, it put me on alert.

I think what I’m sensitive to is the way this pattern judges a thing at the same time it’s introduced. It wants me to make up my mind about who End Wokeness is before I’ve had the chance to evaluate them and come to my own conclusion.

When I see that pattern, it always puts me on alert. I’m so sensitive to it, that it sticks out like a sore thumb even in articles that I’m predisposed to agree with (like this one). “Misinformation superspreader” isn’t the only example of it here; “hatefest” “left-wing-crank-turned-right-wing-loon” and “far-right troll” are all examples of this pattern.

Furthermore, it’s trying to persuade me of something without being an actual argument. It’s like when a movie plays sinister music just to let me know that a character supposed to be bad. If I didn’t already know who End Wokeness was, I shouldn’t just take Cathy’s word for it that they’re a misinformation superspreader. Any writer can introduce someone with whatever label they want to, regardless of whether or not it’s accurate.

It also indicates bias. It makes Cathy seem predisposed to be against them. With an introduction like that, it seem unlikely that she would give them a fair shake. It may be that they don’t deserve a fair shake, but I still need to get my bearings as a reader. I can’t always be expected to already know who they are, and I need a way to validate their trustworthiness for myself.

Right-wing publications do this too. I think that Cathy herself would be sensitive to it in these cases. Take this passage for instance:

Just when you think the barrel-bottom standards at Politico cannot get any more bottomer or barreler, the disgraced outlet publishes talking points from a man who is not only facing murder charges, but who is alleged to have tried to commit one of the worst crimes imaginable: assassinating an individual who represents the will, hope, and future of tens of millions of Americans — and I would say the same about Kamala Harris had she been a target.

Does that seem like a reliable narrator to you? Do you think they’ll accurately present what the Politico really said? I know I wouldn’t trust them after reading the above paragraph. You can read the full article here.

I’m sure this sort priming is persuasive to some people. That’s probably why It’s so common. Still, it makes me feel skeptical, and I think for good reason. When I get skeptical like this, I’ll occasionally have the patience to go thorough the article, validating and double-checking the whole way through. Most of the time, however, I’m not that motivated, and I will probably decide the article isn’t worth engaging with.

This is a phenomenon I’ve been meaning to write about for some time. I don’t have anything against Cathy young, but when I read the article, the pattern really just jumped out at me, and it seemed like a good anchor point for this article. It’s an even more interesting case due to the fact that it’s an article that I essentially agree with, which means my aversion to it was pure sensitivity to the pattern, and not bias against the content itself.

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2. knows that the intent of the alleged misinfo was to deceive or bullshit.

AIUI, this is the characteristic of disinformation. From dictionary.com "“Misinformation” vs. “Disinformation”: Get Informed On The Difference":

Misinformation is “false information that is spread, regardless of intent to mislead.” Put a flag in the second half of this definition; it will be important later.

The spread of misinformation happens often in our everyday lives. We human beings—news flash—are not perfect. We can all make mistakes. We all forget things. We mishear or misremember details. We tell our friends something we heard on TV or saw on social media that wasn’t really true. If you are spreading around information that is wrong but you don’t know it is wrong, then you are, well, technically, spreading misinformation.

…

Disinformation means “false information, as about a country’s military strength or plans, disseminated by a government or intelligence agency in a hostile act of tactical political subversion.” It is also used more generally to mean “deliberately misleading or biased information; manipulated narrative or facts; propaganda.”

So, disinformation is misinformation that is knowingly (intentionally) spread. Our first definition of this word gives one major reason why a person or group might want to spread wrong information, but there are many other nefarious motivations lurking behind the creation of disinformation.

My personal favorite in this area, though, is "malinformation."

Harmful opinions

So this gives us four quadrants along two axes, right? The true/false axis and the benevolent/malevolent axis.

True and benevolent - information. Facts offered with the intent of illuminating another person or improving their understanding.

False and benevolent - some (but not all) misinformation. Offered with the intent of improving someone else's understanding, but failing in this regard due to good-faith error.

True and malevolent - malinformation. Facts offered in order to harm another or decrease their overall understanding, whether through selective choice of facts, removal of context, inflammatory content, or similar.

False and malevolent - disinformation (a subtype of misinformation). Offered with the intent of deluding another, decreasing their understanding, or causing them to take action based on false foundations.

I crept the whole enterprise is dubious. Who gets to decide what is true or not (god knows a lot of info turned out to be misinformation and a lot of misinformation turned out to be information)?

But even if we get that point, who gets to decide what is helpful info and what is hurtful true info? And what if the very process of deciding what is helpful info and hurtful info is hurtful? Also is disinformation against malinformation good?

The whole concept is designed simply for one side to censor the other side. It isn’t an honest inquiry but rotten from top to bottom.

I can't argue with that. I think a schema like this is reasonable in the abstract, but the moment you start positing regulating information on this basis, you run into the question of who judges.

I don't know if I have an absolute rule here, because it seems in principle reasonable for a government to act to curtail certain forms of false information (e.g. false advertising), as well as certain forms of malevolent communication (e.g. propaganda fron an enemy power), but I think I would want to permit those only to the minimum extent necessary.

True and malevolent - malinformation. Facts offered in order to harm another or decrease their overall understanding, whether through selective choice of facts, removal of context, inflammatory content, or similar.

Definitions I've seen vary between that and "truth that causes harm" absent a requirement of malevolence.

To me that seems much too broad, particularly since 'harm' is difficult to clearly define, and no one can reasonably foresee all the effects of their speech. For instance, is it malinformation for Lisa Simpson to tell Springfield that their beloved founder was a murderous pirate? It's true, and her intent is to promote historical truth and increase everyone's genuine knowledge of the past - her motive is disinterested truth-seeking, not to promote or conceal any political agenda. However, it's also clear that the knowledge will make most of the townspeople unhappy. Malinformation? What if the truth would do such damage to the town's annual festival as to cause real economic damage? That seems like real harm, at least in an economic sense. Malinformation?

Intuitively I feel like to be malinformation there has to be a motive that is, broadly speaking, malevolent - it has to be true information that is intended to in some way mislead or disadvantage the people receiving it, usually to further the agenda of the person revealing it.

To me that seems much too broad, particularly since 'harm' is difficult to clearly define, and no one can reasonably foresee all the effects of their speech.

My understanding is that many or perhaps most (though not all) of the people going around using (rather than critiquing) the term "malinformation" are basically using it as a dysphemism for "truth that damages the Narrative" - the Swedish study that showed immigrants committed more crime than native-borns, for instance.

Obviously, I oppose these people's efforts to stigmatise and censor inconvenient truths.

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