The Israel-Hamas War Is Drowning X in Disinformation - eviltoast

People who have turned to X for breaking news about the Israel-Hamas conflict are being hit with old videos, fake photos, and video game footage at a level researchers have never seen.

  • Sabre363@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    201
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Maybe it’s not a good idea to use a media platform run by a megalomaniac moron as a primary source of news and information.

    • IninewCrow@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      54
      ·
      1 year ago

      It’s a great timeline … 99% of the planet relies on megalomaniac morons, mega corporations, billionaires and for profit media corporations for all their information.

      And we wonder why there is so much misinformation, disinformation, non information and covered up information everywhere.

      It’s definitely the information age … expect no one said it would actually keep us informed or have any benefit to humanity.

      • foggy@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        It’s a great timeline … 99% of the planet relies on megalomaniac morons, mega corporations, billionaires and for profit media corporations for all their information.

        Same as it ever was

      • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        Oh no, it’s DEFINITELY the informarion age. The truth is out there.

        There’s just no money to be made with hard work and actual journalism.

    • pastabatman@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      14
      ·
      1 year ago

      Fair, but this article is talking about primary information from people who are actually there and small local news outlets being drowned out by misinformation. A lot of primary information in 2023 comes from social media which is then investigated and fact checked by larger and more reputable news outlets before being reported.

      So yes, the average person who just wants to know what’s happening should not be getting that info from social media but reporters often have to. Changes to Twitter since musk took over (specifically paid blue check marks and the removal of titles from links) have made the process of sifting through the misinformation and disinformation exponentially harder, even for people who do it for a living like the researcher in the article.

    • phx@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      9
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      It’s not just TwitX, there’s a bunch on Lemmy and Reddit feeds too

      • SCB@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        10
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        1 year ago

        At this point Hexbear is essentially co-opted by astroturfing terrorists

          • SCB@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            6
            arrow-down
            6
            ·
            1 year ago

            Their disgustingly aggressive support of terrorism is because they are idiots who fall for propaganda

            • mycorrhiza they/them@lemmy.ml
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              8
              arrow-down
              2
              ·
              1 year ago

              Or because they are aware of the conditions of life imposed in Palestine?

              That 50% of the children in Gaza express no will to live? That 95% of the water is contaminated and Israel strictly controls the water supply? That thousands of civilians have been killed by the Israeli army since 2008? That Gaza functions as an open air concentration camp administrated by an openly racist apartheid state? That Israel helped fund and create Hamas in the 70s and 80s as a counterweight to the largely secular leftist PLO and this whole fucking situation is partially blowback from an effort to divide-and-conquer Palestine? That Hamas fucking chased the PLO out of Gaza, and now Hamas is essentially the only militant force left that can resist the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians?

              Who else is there for Palestinians to root for? What the fuck are they supposed to do? Just sit in their squalid concentration camp and raise their depressed children to be unemployed adults with no future, in a crumbling city with no concrete to rebuild itself, because a rich nation on the other side of the fence deemed it so?

              And in an overseas media environment where no one even fucking talks about any of this shit, and the attack is being treated as this sudden unprovoked thing out of left field, maybe some people are going to overcorrect in the other direction out of sheer frustration?

              • SCB@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                arrow-down
                6
                ·
                1 year ago

                I’m well aware of conditions of life in Palestine. Perhaps if Hamas allowed elections in the last 20 years, there would be radically different relationships there.

                • mycorrhiza they/them@lemmy.ml
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  4
                  arrow-down
                  1
                  ·
                  1 year ago

                  The elections that determine those conditions are Israeli elections. Israel prevents Palestinians from voting in those.

        • prole@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          1 year ago

          The 12 year old loser 4channers that thought (probably still think) saying the ‘n’ word is hilarious, turned into 25 year old fascists that think “nihilism” means “make life shitty for everyone else.”

          • mycorrhiza they/them@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            Who are you talking about right now? Hexbear? Is your basis for who is a fascist just that they are rude to liberals on the internet and have intense feelings about capitalism and imperialism?

          • SCB@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            arrow-down
            3
            ·
            1 year ago

            Words have actual meanings

            divert to or use in a role different from the usual or original one.

  • InternetUser2012@midwest.social
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    136
    arrow-down
    5
    ·
    1 year ago

    If you’re getting your information from facebook, twitter or fox news (to name a few top offenders) you’re in for a bad time.

    • IHawkMike@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      45
      ·
      1 year ago

      And if a significant enough portion of the people are getting their information from those sources, we’re all in for a bad time.

    • prole@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      18
      ·
      1 year ago

      More like: we’re all in for a bad time.

      Unfortunately, their inability to discern fantasy from reality does not only affect them.

    • Pofski@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      13
      ·
      1 year ago

      I think another big issue is that there are a lot of news outlets that get their info from those three sources.

      • KoalaUnknown@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        When Bank of America announced 0% downpayment loans for people living in red lined communities with an abnormally low home value, Reddit was flooded with posts saying “BoA is giving better loans to black people” completely ignoring that the loans had no race qualifications. All it takes is one poorly summarized post and the whole site starts screaming nonsense.

    • Zoolander@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      That’s not a fair assessment. A lot of news outlets get their info from social media like Twitter so, even if you’re not getting it directly from there, it’s very likely that you’re still getting information from there.

    • Blackmist@feddit.uk
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      2
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      1 year ago

      Hard enough to get unbiased reporting at the best of times.

      Every media outlet picked sides on this a long time ago.

  • ViewSonik@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    62
    arrow-down
    8
    ·
    1 year ago

    X is a far-right nazi sympathizing website. Advertisers should have pulled their products a year ago

      • Nalivai@discuss.tchncs.de
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        1 year ago

        Yeah, it was very useful at getting hot takes, misinformation, sensationalist and outsourced soundbites. It still useful for that, but now there is more unchecked nazism.

    • KoalaUnknown@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      1 year ago

      They have always had more accurate news than the mainstream media, they just have a roundabout way of giving it.

  • Pratai@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    29
    ·
    1 year ago

    In fairness… People who turn to twitter for news aren’t the type of people that generally like to be informed by reality.

  • Stefen Auris@pawb.social
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    18
    ·
    1 year ago

    I disagree with the headline, the war is not causing disinformation. Its bad faith users posting disinformation and ~~X’s ~~ (nope still calling it Twitter) policies that not only let it happen but encourage it.

  • hesusingthespiritbomb@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    20
    arrow-down
    4
    ·
    1 year ago

    Honestly I blame the news orgs for this.

    There are a ton of videos floating around that ARE credible. They simply aren’t getting reported on in a meaningful way. If they do get mentioned, it’s often in an extremely watered down manner that almost feels intentionally misleading.

    You also have videos that are 100 percent verifiable (or the protest videos) that are only being reported on by a few organizations, often leaving out important context.

    If the mainstream media refuses to truly engage in the situation, then people will turn to dubious sources.

    • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      9
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      I mean, that’s just the other side of the same coin. They need good info to dig through, and they need to actually dig. Both are required for actual journalism, and both don’t work under capitalism. There’s too much money in lies, and it’s expensive to fight them in the first place.

    • isles@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      1 year ago

      I’ve been wondering when pages would drop the “formerly Twitter” clarifier.

    • Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Yeah, it kind of looks like the author of the article forgot to fill in their placeholder during proofreading.

      HBO destroyed their brand with “Max”, and Elon was like “hold my beer, I’ll make the single dumbest and most confusing brand decision in the history of business.”

    • Pxtl@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      17
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      It was the social media of choice for journalists. It was an excellent place to get your news as long as you followed the right people (reputable, credible professionals).

      Now many of those right people have left and they’re far more difficult to distinguish from the wrong people.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        1 year ago

        Agreed. I didn’t use Twitter, but friends followed NPR correspondents for information and, while it didn’t replace the news, it enhanced it for them.

    • ohlaph@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      1 year ago

      It actually had some credibility before. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but it did have some credibility. Not so much now.