Astro Turfing and Cheap Armies

4min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

Astro turfing means you take the idea that rapler is c i a. A year later, the same message comes out of president d Duterte's mouth. Within five months, in january 20, eighteenth, the first case the government tried to shut raper down. I've had to post bail eight times in a three months period. This year, i was arrested twice in a five week period. The real cost all of this is meant to be not just to harass, but to shut us up. We're just functioning for our jobs, it's the people at the front line in the global south who are suffering.

Maria Ressa is arguably one of the bravest journalists working in the Philippines today. As co-founder and CEO of the media site Rappler, she has withstood death threats, multiple arrests and a rising tide of populist fury that she first saw on Facebook, in the form of a strange and jarring personal attack. Through her story, she reveals, play by play, how an aspiring strongman can use social media to spread falsehoods, sow confusion, intimidate critics and subvert democratic institutions. Nonetheless, she argues Silicon Valley can reverse these trends, and fast. First, tech companies must "wake up," she says, to the threats they've unleashed throughout the Global South. Second, they must recognize that social media is intrinsically designed to favor the strongman over the lone dissident and the propagandist over the truth-teller, which is why it has become the central tool in every aspiring dictator's playbook.