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With each news cycle, the false-information system grows more efficient.
Even on an internet bursting at the seams with conspiracy theories and hyperpartisanship, Saturday marked a new chapter in our post-truth, “choose your own reality” crisis story.
It began early Saturday morning, when news broke that the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein had apparently hanged himself in a Manhattan jail. Mr. Epstein’s death, coming just one day after court documents from one of his alleged victims were unsealed, sparked immediate suspicion from journalists, politicians and the usual online fringes.
Within minutes, Trump appointees, Fox Business hosts and Twitter pundits revived a decades old conspiracy theory, linking the Clinton family to supposedly suspicious deaths. #ClintonBodyCount and #ClintonCrimeFamily trended on Twitter. Around the same time, an opposite hashtag — #TrumpBodyCount — emerged, focused on President Trump’s decades-old ties to Mr. Epstein. Each hashtag was accompanied by GIFs and memes picturing Mr. Epstein with the Clintons or with Mr. Trump to serve as a viral accusation of foul play.
The dueling hashtags and their attendant toxicity are a grim testament to our deeply poisoned information ecosystem — one that’s built for speed and designed to reward the most incendiary impulses of its worst actors. It has ushered in a parallel reality unrooted in fact and helped to push conspiratorial thinking into the cultural mainstream. And with each news cycle, the system grows more efficient, entrenching its opposing camps. The poison spreads.
It's time to end "trending" on Twitter
By now you've probably read enough about the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, his death in a Manhattan jail, and the attendant conspiracy theories that consumed social networks over the weekend. President Trump led the charge, retweeting a conspiracy theory that sought to implicate former President Bill Clinton.
While there is much blame to go around, Charlie Warzel finds that Twitter bears a special responsibility for what one researcher termed "the Disinformation World Cup." Warzel writes:
At the heart of the online fiasco is Twitter, which has come to largely program the political conversation and much of the press. Twitter is magnetic during huge breaking stories; news junkies flock to it for up-to-the-second information. But early on, there's often a vast discrepancy between the attention that is directed at the platform and the available information about the developing story. That gap is filled by speculation and, via its worst users, rumormongering and conspiracy theories.
On Saturday, Twitter's trending algorithms hoovered up the worst of this detritus, curating, ranking and then placing it in the trending module on the right side of its website. Despite being a highly arbitrary and mostly "worthless metric," trending topics on Twitter are often interpreted as a vague signal of the importance of a given subject.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:10AM (58 children)
This particular story doesn't need misinformation to warrant a respectable conspiracy theory. Someone dying in custody who might have been able to testify against other rich and powerful people is suspicious as fuck regardless of the circumstances.
And let's not forget that before Snowden leaked all those documents, the NSA spying on everyone was a conspiracy theory too.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Arik on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:28AM (27 children)
No one believes this was a simple suicide. Maybe it was a suicide - but a suicide while in custody in supposedly one of the most secure lockups in the country, one that routinely deals with high profile cases where suicide/murder are likely to be attempted, and it's been, what, 40 years or so since anyone managed to do this there? Sounds like *assisted* suicide, at least. Nevermind the crazy stories coming out through the MSM regarding the case - the 'guard' who wasn't actually a guard, the roid-pumped ex-cop/convicted murderer that was put in his cell right before the first 'suicide attempt,' and so on.
The MSM will claim we're all conspiracy theorists, but under the circumstances, the 'just a suicide, nothing to see hear' theory they're pushing is the crazy conspiracy theory. You need to really want to believe that for it to make any sense at all.
Watch them throw their last shreds of credibility under the bus in a futile attempt to control the narrative.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:48PM (13 children)
From my perspective, I think it's just one of thousands of readily visible datapoints showing how bad the judgement of the current top executive staff is. They're pissing on us and not even having the decency to call it rain. It's bad enough we let this happen once, God help the world if the US goes for the bait again in 2020.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:46PM (12 children)
I will go out on a limb and predict that, despite my vote, Trump will be re-elected in 2020 and 2024.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:28PM (11 children)
I was in Houston, belly of the beast as it were, for 2004 - it was kind of inevitable, unbelievably sad, and the rest of the world collectively breathed a sigh of relief and congratulated US for 2008.
I prefer not to imagine a Carrot topped tweet led U.S. of A. in 2021, if such a thing happens I guess I'll deal with it, but it is a new level of sadness that even W could not aspire to.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:41PM (10 children)
Look at the upside. You won't have to go to the trouble to vote in 2024.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:47PM (9 children)
Hollywood is so good at dystopian future movies, what would a Russian controlled USA even look like in 2024?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:56PM (3 children)
This is a hilarious glimpse into the delusional echo chamber. You two republicrats aren't even reading the right book.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:42PM (2 children)
Willful ignorance is not an attractive trait.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:49PM (1 child)
The willfully ignorant can still believe they are attractive.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:39PM
DRUMPH HAS AN ORANGE MUSHROOM PENIS.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:46PM (3 children)
Give me a break. Russia can't even manage Russia, a piddling country of 120 million people.
If you like thinking about foreign states controlling the United States, you really are ignoring the elephant in the room. Look up AIPAC.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:58PM (1 child)
Russia managing Russia is recently reported as resulting in 50,000 protesters in the streets... They can't do it well, but they are doing something.
By "Russian controlled US" I would mean: top level power players in Russia getting control of similar US sources of power/money, such as energy companies, possibly internet/information brokerage companies, and doing what they will with them.
How do you feel about full-on fracking exploitation of all available US natural gas resources? Increased internet censorship through keyword trawling, arbitrary binding take-down of content, more pervasive and harder to spot distribution of information targeted at modifying behavior in certain population groups... straight up propaganda office control of the news outlets...
Just because people are inept doesn't mean they're not in power or attempting to control.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:43PM
Go for it. I heat with natural gas at home.
Wait. Make up you mind. Are you ctrl-left or alt-right? I thought it was the right wingers that were complaining about increased internet censorship through keyword trawling and arbitrary take-down of content.
Have you seen CNN and MSNBC anytime in the past three years? Regardless, I fail to see what any of this has to do with Russians though. Did you forget to take your TDS meds this morning?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:20PM
Russia may be trying to seize control of the US from the hands of AIPAC.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:35PM
A lot more vodka distilleries, comrade. You will need them.
Ty chto mumu yebyosh? ;-)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:19PM (8 children)
Did you see the story about the monstrosity cellmate they put in with Epstein? https://yonkerstimes.com/dirty-westchester-ex-cop-is-epsteins-cell-mate/ [yonkerstimes.com] I can imagine anyone preferring death rather than the possibilities with that guy.
WTF has truly happened to our legal system?
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:36PM (7 children)
I feel like this is Trump's fault. The Orange Carrot Penis.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:43PM (4 children)
Misinformation like this about our dear leader is why Anonymous Coward should not be believed.
According to Stormy, it is a small misshapen mushroom of nondescript color.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @03:21PM
Way too much information! What has been visualized cannot be unvisualized. Ugh. Carry on. :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:50PM (2 children)
As a (ahem) "professional" in her field, I would assume anything less than enormous would seem small to her. She is accustomed to tackle you could hang a tire down at the old swimmin' hole.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:15PM (1 child)
I think you are wrong Mr. Coward. People who are well endowed probably have no need for the services of a professional. People who seek out such professionals probably have no other outlet. Why a "star" and "president" would seek out such services remains a complete mystery. Perhaps done out of charity. I suspect these professionals mostly see equipment that is at the current forefront of miniaturization capabilities.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:51PM
Do you know that Miss Cliffords has sex on film for money? That is why she is a professional. Male performers are not chosen for their intelligence, talent, looks, lack of tattoos or any other criteria other than their genitals. Therefore her work related experience is with higher percentiles of size. Our president has never seems to want for sexual partners due to his ready access to large sums of money. Money is the ultimate aphrodisiac for certain types of women. (See Anna Nicole Smith or Lauren Sanchez for reference) Circumstances appear to implicate Miss Cliffords to be also that certain type.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:15PM (1 child)
Why is this not upvoted insightful?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:51PM
Probably because our legal system has been in a long slide before the arrival of the Orange one. Therefore maybe not insightful.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:08PM (1 child)
Watershed... to what? His death is so highly inconsequential to the 99.999% of US population, their agreement on this matter is as relevant as the one on "the water is wet".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:57PM
A watershed is very meaningful if a slight change in where a raindrop falls leads to a vast difference in its eventual destination. (Pacific vs Atlantic, or Heaven vs Hell, etc)
But if both destinations, no matter how far apart, are equally undesirable and unlivable, then did it really matter which path the raindrop takes? If the raindrop fell an inch to the left, or an inch to the right, would it still make a sound? Oh, wait . . . wrong I'm mis mixing again . . . nevermind.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by bussdriver on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:05PM (1 child)
Trump's usual pattern of blaming others of variations of WHAT HE DID, works extremely well: He already is accepted as a horrible person (He said he could shoot somebody in the street and win...) but this gets everybody attacking conspiracies. Remember Pizzagate? That distracted from his friend Epstein, he used to disavow. Epstein was going down for criminal conspiracy... the #1 crime the FBI does is conspriacy. Legitimate conspiracies get harmed by these actions; every dictator is watching and learning... more than just repeating "Fake News!"
Look up "Guantanamo of New York". Guess what comes up? This SAME maximum security prison! The one that held drug lords, terrorists, and Bernie Madoff.
Suicide is totally unacceptable in a maximum security prison especially with a recent alleged attempt. The fact Epstein was WAITING for an appeal on his request for bail or house arrest makes it an unlikely motive (this is a man who bought his way out before.) Then you have blatantly corrupt Barr who is in charge with 2 years of purging FBI staff who look disloyal to Trump (starting with the man who handed him the election.) I wouldn't be surprised if a former prison staffer becomes our next Labor Secretary!
Known Russian tactics are for undermining all trust in institutions and poke up extreme factions to topple societies and the result is we can't trust our institutions to function properly whenever the powerful benefit. Incompetence being the most acceptable excuse; it is also promoted to be expected from our institutions. So all we have left is a mountain of theories, gossip, lies burring the truth which needs even more help to stand out... but that help is nearly gone.
(Score: 1) by Arik on Wednesday August 14 2019, @07:21PM
Aww jeez.
You were doing so well at first. Enjoy your TFH.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by qzm on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:42AM (11 children)
Yes, there is quite an effort in some parts of the media (*cough* also pushing russian links stories *cough*) that 'if you think anything odd happened, then you are a trump loving conspiracy nutjob.
However, as you rightly say, this is dirty as all hell, and quite clearly so.
Is it POSSIBLE he offed himself? well, yes.... possible.... but not likely. And if he did so, it was almost certainly not due to normal suicide motives.
However, SO MANY THINGS are clearly not right in this picture - things already verified, that it is quite sensible to be asking 'wtf happened here'.
It stinks of people high enough up making a decision that we are all stupid enough not to look at what is somewhat obvious... and that they can do what they want.
Now, will we ever find out who and exactly why? very unlikely.
However, if it doesnt shake your trust in the US state... then you need to open your eyes.
The list of people who would want him dead is MUCH longer than 'The Clintons' of course, but hey, they just make the mistake of being an obvious possibility..
Trump? you have to be kidding - its bordering on desperation how hard people are working to tie him in to things. It actually seems surprising how LITTLE he had to do with Epstein.. considering he is a definite womaniser.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:54AM (7 children)
Note that it's "womanizer" not "childizer". He may like them younger than himself but I've yet to see any hint that he likes them below voting age.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:59AM (6 children)
He used to regularly walk in on naked underage girls in dressing rooms, on purpose. That's well known.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:14PM (5 children)
[Citation Needed]
And not one from Huffpo, The Atlantic, MSNBC, or the like.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Informative) by fyngyrz on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:50PM
This is likely based on Trump's comments about his beauty pageants:
You can hear Trump talking about peeping on pageant contestants as he is being interviewed on the Howard Stern show at 2:25 here. [soundcloud.com]
Trump said:
--
Dark humor is like medical care.
Not everyone gets it.
(Score: 5, Informative) by fyngyrz on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:07PM (3 children)
Here are some of the allegations that deal specifically with the Miss Teen USA pageant:
--
When I get a headache, I take two aspirin and keep away from children.
Just like the bottle says.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:25PM (2 children)
With the Miss Teen USA pageant, there may be something to what you say but that account wasn't thorough enough to say one way or the other. Voting-aged women were explicitly excluded from my statement though. And implicitly excluded from any moral judgment of his tastes on the grounds that seeing naked women is something pretty much every straight male enjoys. Walking in the dressing room on adult women is a dick move because he's swinging his dick around not because wanting to see women naked is immoral.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:46PM
Ah, so Buzzy feels personally attacked because he tends to objectify women and gets shit for it. He thus excuses a president with the moral fiber of a flea.
You're a disgusting person, and I know it isn't just ignorance.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by fyngyrz on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:07PM
Trump's taste is not the issue. Nor is his enjoyment of women's beauty, clothed or otherwise.
The problem is that he is imposing himself on them in a manner that violates their privacy without their consent.
--
🎶When you're down by the sea
And an eel bites your knee🎶
🎶That's a moray
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:50PM (1 child)
It's more likely he was beamed up by aliens and replaced with a vat-grown clone.
Look, there's one solution to this: tell the feds that if they don't hang those implicated in the Epstein case, they themselves will suffer the fate due all such pedophiles: hanging by the neck until dead. Either they do their jobs and bring the rich and powerful pedophiles to justice, or the citizenry will do its job and bring them all to justice.
Enough is enough. If we citizens can't even get the feds to defend our children against depredation, then those feds must be forcibly removed and new guards of our freedom put in place.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:57PM
FTFY
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:01PM
Trump would have had to hire someone with bigger hands to choke Epstein.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:47AM (14 children)
After seeing the suicide report, I speculated something I haven't seen anywhere else (yet) -- what if this was a faked suicide? Has anyone seen the body, has there been positive ID (by who??)
Epstein was rich and well connected, he's got everything to gain by slipping away to somewhere in the Caribbean, or maybe to SE Asia where sex tourism has been widely reported.
But I didn't post this anywhere--you see it here first(grin).
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @11:51AM (8 children)
Ooooh, that's a good one! Five NSA-free Internets for you.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:08PM
Just where are you keeping those NSA-free Internets?
Are they in your pocket, since they must be very small?!!
Meanwhile Epstein is basking in the sun, with kiddies tending to his _every_ need...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:12PM (3 children)
Don't worry, the NSA will never identify C0lo.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:15PM (2 children)
My mad admin powers tell me it wasn't culo.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:13PM (1 child)
Careful mister buzztard with the spelling of those nicks, will yea? (grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @05:59PM
He meant sudo.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:57PM (2 children)
NSA-free internet sounds almost like: Free internet from the NSA !
Oh, wait . . . maybe I just gave them an idea.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:04PM (1 child)
Naw, it's run by the IRS instead and I had to pay for it. The telco lobbies would never stand for the government giving away free Internet.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:21PM
Maybe the telcos could secretly be "nationalized" and run by NSA. Maybe levels of service would improve. Another idea would be to let the likes of Facebook provide free internet, like they wanted to do in India.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Wednesday August 14 2019, @12:41PM (2 children)
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:45PM (1 child)
That didn't take long...
I hope he is in the witness protection program, even hope more Seth Rich is there too. But I doubt it. They are probably both dead and Julian Assange is dying of some neglected health ailment in a jail cell somewhere.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 14 2019, @08:26PM
If they really want to get you, maybe the witless protection program won't help.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by RS3 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:25PM (1 child)
Yup, and now all the reports of falsified guard reports coming in, jailhouse video evidence (which could never be faked, right?)
We're living in the disinformation age.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 14 2019, @04:52PM
Yes, so nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Wednesday August 14 2019, @01:51PM (1 child)
> before Snowden leaked all those documents, the NSA spying on everyone was a conspiracy theory too.
Even before the Snowden leak - let's not forget the intelligence reports that led to the second Iraq war, the so-called "Dodgy Dossier".
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 14 2019, @02:07PM
Me, I knew about it well before Snowden but nobody believed me when I told them. My little brother worked not fifty feet from the NSA room in the MCI offices that asking about or looking at crossways would get you summarily fired.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Wednesday August 14 2019, @06:29PM
Agree. But now that the Clinton-related conspiracy has been widely recirculated, and a Trump-related one fabricated for lulz, nobody is going to pay attention to anything else. I'll bet at least one investigative journalist has been told to cancel an Epstein story because it would be immediately associated with all the cranks.
If I were going to perpetrate a conspiracy of this scale, I'd definitely be in the market for any politically-motivated false conspiracies to distract people.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?