I am talking about the global phenomenon. Something like rox news does not exist here in Germany for example.

We always had right wing propaganda. But now we have social media too. And that produced a confirmation cycle. The propaganda channels spew lies, people spread does lies on social media, and the media cam say “look, there, normal people on X say the same thing, it must be true”.

And of course, also the other way around

There are some studies. Mostly behind pay Walls. A good source I found a while back was this meta study.

Social media is to blame, at least in huge parts.

It offers a platform for unproven claims, and especially the short content formats are an issue:

You can not cover important topics fairly in those formats. Only populism can profit from it. And the far right does this.

We reached a point where people don’t believe the published agendas of candidates and parties anymore. They only trust what the hear and see on social media.

Of course there are other factors, but this is an important one.

Deine Mutter ist der Fußgänger

You can not fix the limitations of a growing brain. People are getting influenced in a young age, damage that is hard to undo. We can of course limit access (at least in theory) to such content. And then we regulate what? TikTok.

While am RCA goes hast to be done until we either can not further because of physical limitations for example, we must fix the thing closest to the root that can actually be fixed.

Young brains must be able to develop fast. Social media and specifically the short content format have a massive negative impact on this development.

We always had far right propaganda. Social media is what allows it the flourish in the minds of young people, future voters and politicians.

I don’t said that social media is bad or that social media is responsible for far right mindests.

I said: social media is the root cause for the electoral success of the AfD and other far right parties in Europe.

The root cause for far right movements is “the human being”. Of course we could go in depth here about the natural fear of the unknown, and the support dorbfar right parties is higher in places where voters are less like to see “aliens” in their neighborhood. But also, this is here much longer and European youth was left leaning for decades.

So let’s focus on what changed that those parties get so much traction with young voters. Answer: social media

Dude, a huge part of my job is doing RCA.

And I don’t stop after 2 why’s. I gave you a link to a good analysis you could read. Or just ignore it…

I am also active in german politics for 20 years, and I habe done youth work for 10 years. I have gathered my fair share of first hand knowledge…

I am well aware what an RCA is. The issue here is that the “root causes” like immigration fear and “the economy” are mostly fabricated or blown up.

The AfD pushes propaganda to young people. And to cite from the RCA I linked you

Younger people in particular can be strongly influenced by manipulation strategies and disinformation. They can develop problematic views of the world and people that run counter to basic democratic values.

The shorts format itself is an issue. It reduces complex issues and possible solutions to a few seconds of content. That is how the young people want to consume content. But they only thing you can do is oversimplified bullshit I’m that amount of time.

I suggest to read this in depth analysis.

Social media. Especially TikTok

If the scale would not be consistent, the results is actual worse. The whole political spectrum is moving towards the right. Traditional left wing parties here in Germany doing right wing stuff is getting normal.

And I don’t see any left party in the U.K. or U.S. parliaments.

While the soup attack caused damage in the historic frame if the picture, this protest did not cause any permanent damage. From the choice of glue to the choice of spraypaint, everything was well thought out. So no, I don’t think this is proof that the Soutwark conviction is totally unreasonable

I am with you regarding the big ones. But what about smaller media outlets and journalists to try to make a living on their own ? We need them. More then the big ones. Then the solution is to just ignore all the big ones and read the smaller ones. With ads or paying for it.

I was talking about paywall removers not adblockers in that sentence

We didn’t care. We were the hosting provider nor the news outlets. But we had close contact to our customers. And a lot of the smaller customers had a hard time to even survive. The primary source of income was print until paywals came around. Some customers never had print and had to close down with the surge of ad blockers

That is true and false. Adblock plus takes money for the acceptable afs program, yes. But there are clear guidelines about the ads. Containing criteria for privacy, size in relation to content and more.

I work in IT for 20 years now. Half this time my salary was paid for by ads:

My company hosted big german news outlets. All money they made online was from ads.

More adblockers meant less income so their required more ads just to come out without losing money.

ABP tried to break this cycle.

Now we are having paywals, and paywal breakers. And at this point this is outright stealing.

If adblockers would allow ads that adhere to the acceptable ads criteria, the world would be a better place. Less paywals, less ads and maybe some companies would pay their employees a little bit more.

I feared as much.

It is getting late over here, so thanks for the great discussion!

Amd I wish you good look in a few weeks. Feeling with you over there

I see your point. But that is such a toxic environment, and as you mentioned this can be observed from a far, that I would assume many prefer to stay under the radar to be able to at least something and not thrown under the bus by other Republicans.

Having more parties solves this part of the issue. And if the MAGA party or the Republicans end up with more votes is a completely different thing. And a thing I am scared to think about

Exactly. And there comes in the issue: if you want to vote conservative you have to take the far right bullshit. There is no in between. There is no “conservative without that nazi bullshit”. So, if they could separate bit still have some power in the sense of seats in the parliaments, would that impact the political landscape?

Anyway, the US is stuck with American voters. So I’m glad our election system enforces patience.

I take that ;)

But srsly, it is not voters or voting system. It is both.

Imagine there would be a MAGA party with equal chances like the Reps, how would that change the policies of those parties? And would this influence the voters behavior? That is not a rethoric question, it is a thought play. I, as an outsider, would assume that the extreme right wingers would unite under the MAGA flag and their policies would adapt accordingly while the Republicans would go back to their kind of normal.

Thanks. That was my rough assumption. And that worries me. While I am not a US citizen, the USA have such immense power that yout politics affect people around the world. From privacy and data protection to the simple fact if we leave in peace or in war.

I understand it is a big issue. And I hope you find a way to change that.