DO NOT FEED THE TROLLS!

There is right now a campaign of disinformation on social media designed to sow division in the United States. America is under attack.

Many of the accounts on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (5), potentially millions of accounts, are being used by foreign agents to create division in this country on all major issues. The current focus is to fuel racial division, to increase distrust in our Government, to feed misinformation, and to drive division on COVID-19 strategies. This is a propaganda campaign, and attack on the minds of Americans, by foreign entities.

FBI Director Christopher Wray, discussing a case of similar interference (4) in 2018, stated: “This case serves as a stark reminder to all Americans: Our foreign adversaries continue their efforts to interfere in our democracy by creating social and political division, spreading distrust in our political system, and advocating for the support or defeat of particular political candidates.”

The social media accounts are designed to look like real people. Often with several hundred friends, with family pictures, and other posts – this is part of the deception that has been ongoing since at least 2014. (3)

Kathleen M. Carley, et. al., Carnegie Mellon University’s Center for Informed Democracy & Social Cybersecurity (5): “Their patterns of behavior have grown more sophisticated, too. Bots are now often more deeply networked with other accounts, making it easier for them to disseminate their messages widely. They also engage in more strategies to target at-risk groups like immigrants and minorities and help real accounts engaged in hate speech to form online groups.”

There are foreign troll farms, that have hundreds of full-time employees, who each manage hundreds of accounts, and their 9-5 job is to get on social media, and sow division. They post controversial comments, on random sides of issues, and then coordinate to “like” and “share” their own comments and posts.

Clint Watts, distinguished fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute: “The volume [of activity] isn’t the same as it was in 2016, but the approach is the same, which is: Identify and infiltrate audiences on both the left and the right, and try to pit them against each other across race, socioeconomic status, religion – any social issues.”

Have you noticed that often the most popular comments on social media are the ones that say the most offensive and/or illogical things? Such is meant to erode your faith in humanity, and specifically the faith in your fellow Americans. Makes you start to wonder what kind of a depraved country we must have, when a person says something offensive or illogical, and it rapidly becomes one of the “most liked” comments. The manufactured “likes” are a social proof, and it is easy to be fooled into thinking that many other persons agree with the ridiculous or inflammatory comment. Do not be fooled, for the goal of the troll, is to create division and confusion. The target of the troll, is your mind.

Spotting The Troll

You can spot the troll comments, and dismiss them. The troll farms focus on the most controversial, divisive, and political issues. On Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, a troll comment will always be one of the top 10 most popular comments, and it will have many troll “likes,” plus other naturally occurring reactions from unsuspecting, real people. Realize, that sometimes you will even agree with a troll comment on a controversial issue. Trolls focus on the most controversial or confusing statements they can make on a topic of national interest. A troll may say “All Lives Matter” and then add to the statement a subtle racist comment; or a troll may say “Black Lives Matter” but then mischaracterize what that phrase means. The demographics for the troll will be stereotypical, and they will feed into the standard media left-right-black-white narrative, but to draw you in, the troll will add just a dash of malevolence, just a low key sprinkling of mischief.

Troll #1, Sharon Adams from Massachusetts, who apparently has a degree from a top university, will explain how wearing a mask will kill you! Whoa! Debate ensues; but Sharon appears to be a trusted authority figure because she has an authentic looking account, and even a picture with a lab coat. Confusion and conflict. Meanwhile troll #2, David from San Diego, will say that you must wear a mask at all times, even when alone in the park, or else you face certain death! Scary, because this convinces some, though clearly unreasonable. Some trolls start off reasonable in order to pull you in – very subtle; while other trolls will go straight for the jugular with the most vulgar and prejudicial statement that can be made without violating the social media platform’s terms of use.

The goal is to confuse Americans, and to get us to lose trust in each other, and to increase distrust of the government. The goal is to get us to debate, to doubt, to dawdle, to die. The goal is to deceive with false information on key topics, and then once our minds are infected by the particular idea that most confirms our own bias, we deceive and infect each other by spreading that plausible sounding but false, information. Right now, you are not only part of the fight against COVID-19, the biological virus, but when you log onto any social media you are also fighting an information virus which is deliberately spread by paid foreign trolls.

How You Fight The Trolls

Save your mental energy for more important things. Simply reply to the troll comments with this article:

http://www.movingthroughparallelworlds.com/post/do-not-feed-the-trolls That will post the title, “DO NOT FEED THE TROLLS!” as your reply. This gives others the opportunity to read the article, and the reference articles listed below. When you see anyone else on social media responding to what is clearly a troll, you should also paste this article as a reply to them. In general, share this article as much as possible so that other social media users understand the game that is being played. Once there is broader awareness, the job of the troll farms is made more difficult.

Do your part to fight the information virus by being responsible on social media. Do not engage with the trolls beyond letting them know that you are on to their game. Their goal is to get you to engage. The trolls have information viruses to suit every fancy. Challenge your own views, slow down, think, and read research from reputable sources if you decide to reply to comments. Get in the habit of replying more slowly, and prioritizing reason over emotion, and also educating yourself on various topics before you reply. By doing these things, you will be implementing the ultimate Judo move against this attack on your mind. That is, you will be using these troll attacks to become a more critical thinker, and a better assessor of ideas and information. You will be using the trolls to develop greater mental toughness, and intellectual rigor. You will be using the trolls to realize when an opponent is seeking to use language to weaken you and to gaslight you.

Our country must come together, even though we face an approaching election and there is the temptation to make all things political. We must come together because when we are under attack, we shall not long stand, if we are divided. We must come together by listening to each other, and by having real conversations with real people, both on and offline. We must not feed the trolls.

Kevin L. Michel is a Performance Psychology Consultant based in New York, with an MSc. in General Psychology. He is author of the books "Moving Through Parallel Worlds To Achieve Your Dreams" and "The Greatest Player."

References

1. Graff, G. M. (October 19, 2018). Russian Trolls Are Still Playing Both Sides—Even With the Mueller Probe. WIRED. http://www.wired.com/story/russia-indictment-twitter-facebook-play-both-sides/

2. Matthews, G. (June, 29, 2020). Bots and trolls control a shocking amount of online conversation. http://www.fastcompany.com/90521340/bots-and-trolls-control-a-shocking-amount-of-online-conversation

3. Indictment. United States v. Internet Research Agency, et al., 1 :18-CR-32 (DLF) (D.D.C. Feb. 16, 2018). http://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1102316/download

4. Russian National Charged with Interfering in U.S. Political System (October 19, 2018). U.S. Department of Justice – Office of Public Affairs. http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/russian-national-charged-interfering-us-political-system

5. Nearly Half of Twitter Accounts Pushing to Reopen America May be Bots. Hao, K. (May 21, 2020). MIT Technology Review. http://www.technologyreview.com/2020/05/21/1002105/covid-bot-twitter-accounts-push-to-reopen-america/

6. Deep, A. (May 14, 2020). Facebook Banned 1.7 Billion Fake Accounts in Q1 2020. http://www.medianama.com/2020/05/223-facebook-banned-1-7-billion-fake-accounts/