{"id":353139,"date":"2018-03-21T04:05:57","date_gmt":"2018-03-21T03:05:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/youtube-as-conspiracy-conduit\/"},"modified":"2018-03-21T04:05:57","modified_gmt":"2018-03-21T03:05:57","slug":"youtube-as-conspiracy-conduit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/youtube-as-conspiracy-conduit\/","title":{"rendered":"YouTube as Conspiracy Conduit"},"content":{"rendered":"

The murder of 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, on February 14 has sparked protests and marches for gun control, led by many of the Parkland teenagers who experienced the horror of the massacre. The students have taken an <\/span>outspoken<\/span><\/a> stance<\/span><\/a> against the National Rifle Association and the politicians it <\/span>funds<\/span><\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

In response, some gun advocates pulled out a <\/span>familiar<\/span><\/a> rhetorical tool: accusing shooting victims of being paid \u201ccrisis actors,\u201d pretend victims supposedly employed by left-wing boogeymen like George Soros to drum up support for gun control and other progressive policies. Victims of past mass shootings, including <\/span>Newtown<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Sutherland Springs<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Las Vegas<\/span><\/a>, had earlier been accused of participating in “false flag” attacks designed to justify federal gun control. These preposterous claims have subjected the families of the victims of those tragedies to <\/span>death threats<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>harassment<\/span><\/a> from hoaxers and conspiracy theorists. <\/span><\/p>\n

Seventeen-year-old David Hogg was one Stoneman Douglas Student singled out for crisis actor accusations. An account named \u201cmike m\u201d reposted a <\/span>YouTube<\/b> video of a <\/span>CBS Los Angeles<\/b> clip that featured Hogg recounting a verbal altercation with a lifeguard in 2017, when he was living in Redondo Beach, California. Captioned \u201cDAVID HOGG THE ACTOR,\u201d the video set off <\/span>waves<\/span><\/a> among far-right internet circles, who saw it as proof that Hogg had already graduated from high school in California, and thus was an imposter. <\/span><\/p>\n

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The initial YouTube<\/strong> video accusing David Hogg as a crisis actor<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Citing the fact that Hogg\u2019s father was a former FBI agent\u2014something Hogg brought up on <\/span>CNN<\/b> (<\/span>2\/19\/18<\/span><\/a>)\u2014conspiracy theorists accused him of working alongside the Bureau, <\/span>ominously observing<\/span><\/a> that the FBI failed to preemptively apprehend the Parkland shooter after he <\/span>posted<\/span><\/a> numerous threats on <\/span>YouTube<\/b> comment threads. <\/span><\/p>\n

YouTube<\/b> took down the \u201cmike m\u201d video\u2014after it received over 200,000 views and appeared on the website\u2019s \u201c<\/span>trending<\/span><\/a>\u201d page. However, right-wing and conspiracy-oriented news <\/span>sources<\/span><\/a> and activists had already <\/span>picked<\/span><\/a> up the story and <\/span>run<\/span><\/a> with it. A former <\/span>congressmember<\/span><\/a> and a Pennsylvania state <\/span>representative<\/span><\/a> fanned the flames. Even Donald Trump Jr. <\/span>liked<\/span><\/a> tweets connecting the massacre to the FBI, which is currently investigating his father. While some sources didn\u2019t come out and endorse false flag\/crisis actor conspiracies outright, they used the typical rhetorical devices used to drum up paranoia, claiming they were \u201cjust asking questions\u201d or \u201cconnecting the dots.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

America\u2019s leading right-wing conspiracy-monger, Alex Jones, did much to spread the hoax that Hogg was a crisis actor. <\/span>Numerous<\/span><\/a> videos<\/span><\/a> about supposed \u201c<\/span>inconsistencies<\/span><\/a>\u201d in accounts of the shooting\u2014including coverups and multiple shooters\u2014have also appeared on his popular <\/span>YouTube<\/b> channel (currently the <\/span>16th most popular<\/span><\/a> News and Politics channel on <\/span>YouTube, <\/b>with over 2.2 million subscribers) and other <\/span>YouTube<\/b> channel affiliates that repost content from Jones\u2019 <\/span>InfoWars<\/b> website.<\/span><\/p>\n

YouTube<\/b> has increasingly become a haven for conspiratorial far-right media sources. Outlets like the <\/span>New York Times Magazine<\/b> (<\/span>8\/3\/17<\/span><\/a>) and <\/span>Salon<\/b> (<\/span>8\/13\/17<\/span><\/a>) have noted the upswing of hoax-laden right-wing videos on the <\/span>Google<\/b>-owned website in recent years, comparing the reach of reactionary opinion on <\/span>YouTube<\/b> to that of talk radio, long a mainstay of ultraconservative discourse. While radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Michael Savage indoctrinated older demographics in conspiratorial right-wing politics in recent decades, right-wing <\/span>YouTube<\/b> videos serve the same purpose for younger age groups. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cConspiracy theory\u201d is often a loaded term. The Merriam-Webster definition<\/a> is:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

A theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Of course, this definition could cover legitimate political critique as well as blatant falsehoods. For example, if you explain business-friendly regulations as the result of corporations funneling massive amounts of money to politicians through SuperPACs and lobbying groups, are you a “conspiracy theorist”? Clearly not, as there is <\/span>substantial<\/span><\/a> evidence<\/span><\/a> proving your claim’s veracity. Relevant political critique can more usefully be delineated from what are called “conspiracy theories” by the latter’s use of false, dubious and misleading evidence. Alex Jones and his acolytes could not advance their clearly bogus theories\u2014like ones involving crisis actors, the claim that 9\/11 was an <\/span>inside job<\/span><\/a>, and the idea that John Podesta and Hillary Clinton <\/span>ran<\/span><\/a> a child prostitution ring out of a DC pizza restaurant\u2014without a willingness to make logical leaps, accept as valid any confirmatory evidence and reject as “part of the plot” any information that calls their beliefs into question. Funnily enough, Jones often <\/span>walks back<\/span><\/a> his conspiracy theories after they have been debunked, but not before his videos have made their rounds and left impressionable people believing their lies.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jones maintains a facade of professionalism, with his snazzy studios and upscale production values, that other conspiracy theorists lack; the format of most hoax-propagating right-wing videos is usually just a person talking at the camera from their office, living room or car, or provocative news clips interspliced with incendiary narration intended to shock viewers. Like their talk radio counterparts, the <\/span>YouTube<\/b> right homes in on familiar right-wing punching bags: the purported evils of <\/span>political correctness<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>social justice warriors<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>immigrants<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Antifa<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Black Lives Matter<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Islam<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>feminism<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>transgender rights<\/span><\/a>, \u201c<\/span>cultural Marxism<\/span><\/a>\u201d and, as we have seen in the case of David Hogg, <\/span>gun control<\/span><\/a>. Their videos leave little room for context, nuance or factchecking, and frequently devolve into gross conspiratorializing. <\/span><\/p>\n

These far-right conspiracy videos insulate viewers in reactionary content bubbles through<\/span> YouTube<\/b>\u2019s \u201csuggested content\u201d algorithm. The algorithm is centered on bundling viewers into neat \u201c<\/span>identity<\/span><\/a>\u201d groups that the platform can then market to advertisers. Since 2012, <\/span>YouTube<\/b>\u2019s algorithm has done this by focusing on the amount of <\/span>time watched<\/span><\/a> per video, rather than number of clicks, on both channels and videos, thereby rewarding videos that attract dedicated viewers rather than quick samplers. Additionally, keywords, tags, descriptions and titles <\/span>help<\/span><\/a> videos get noticed and suggested by the algorithm, so having a set of buzzwords like \u201csocial justice warriors\u201d helps get related videos into viewers\u2019 suggested video queue. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Alex Jones acolyte Paul Joseph Watson<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

By targeting a specific demographic (say, the lucrative white males aged 14-34 demographic) with ads based on an identity profile built by monitoring the keywords and the amount of time an individual watches specific videos, <\/span>YouTube<\/b> can generate more clicks on the accompanying ads and in turn drive the costs of ads up. And this streamlined targeted advertising <\/span>is<\/span><\/i> lucrative: According to <\/span>Brightcove<\/span><\/a>, 74 percent of consumers have said that watching videos on social media affects their purchasing decisions, while the average consumer watches almost an hour of \u201csocial\u201d video a day, half of which takes place on <\/span>YouTube<\/b>. With <\/span>YouTube\u2019s<\/b> financial incentive to bring viewers more of the same kind of content, a trip down the right-wing conspiracy theory rabbit hole is specifically built to ensnare people, primarily young males, who might be lonely, alienated, politically naive or just in search of alternatives to mainstream corporate media sources. <\/span><\/p>\n

YouTube <\/b>has taken steps to ban some far-right users for spewing conspiracy theories or racist rhetoric. The website recently removed a video on the <\/span>Alex Jones Channel<\/b> titled \u201cDavid Hogg Can’t Remember His Lines in TV Interview,\u201d which claimed \u201cit’s about a 90 percent chance” that the Parkland shooting was a false flag, and insinuated that Hogg was \u201ccoached\u201d by \u201cthe deep state\u201d for a <\/span>CNN <\/b>interview. <\/span>YouTube<\/b> also told Jones that he had <\/span>received<\/span><\/a> his \u201cfirst strike,\u201d warning of a potential termination from the website if he accrues two more violations of the <\/span>YouTube<\/b> content policy within the next three months.<\/span><\/p>\n

Recently, <\/span>YouTube <\/b>notified Jones that advertisers were <\/span>fleeing<\/span><\/a> his channel after a <\/span>CNN<\/b> study (<\/span>3\/3\/18<\/span><\/a>) alerted them that their ads were appearing alongside his videos. Painting himself as a victim of a censorship campaign against right-wing media sources by more centrist media, Jones claims that his longtime enemy <\/span>CNN<\/b> has been actively lobbying <\/span>YouTube<\/b> to ban <\/span>InfoWars<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet the libertarian-influenced free-speech stance maintained by many big Silicon Valley tech platforms, like <\/span>Twitter<\/b>, <\/span>Facebook<\/b> and <\/span>YouTube<\/b>, is frequently applied only selectively, and is seemingly more favorable towards the far right. People have been banned on content platforms for <\/span>much<\/span><\/a> less<\/span><\/a> than\u00a0 genocidal Nazi chanting or smearing massacre victims as hired actors. For example, <\/span>Twitter<\/b> has locked users for swearing<\/a> at people with \u201cverified\u201d accounts, <\/span>Facebook<\/b> has locked or banned users who post pictures of <\/span>breastfeeding<\/span><\/a> and Black Lives Matter activists who have called white people <\/span>racist<\/span><\/a>, and both <\/span>YouTube <\/b>and <\/span>Facebook<\/b> have, at the behest of the Israeli government, <\/span>de-platformed<\/span><\/a> Palestinian journalists and activists documenting brutality of Israeli soldiers.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conversely, the content platforms <\/span>frequently<\/span><\/a> drag<\/span><\/a> their<\/span><\/a> feet<\/span><\/a> on banning Nazis and conspiracy theorists that run afoul of their content policies. <\/span>YouTube<\/b> banned Nazi group Atomwaffen from their website, following an article by the <\/span>Daily Beast<\/b> (<\/span>2\/26\/18<\/span><\/a>), but only after repeated refusals to do so. <\/span><\/p>\n

Recently however, large tech platforms like YouTube<\/strong> have shown a new\u00a0<\/span>willingness<\/span><\/a> to shift towards a tougher approach in enforcing their content policies with the addition of displaying<\/a> Wikipedia articles alongside conspiracy theory videos and with <\/span>crackdowns<\/span><\/a>\u00a0against<\/a> Nazis. However, Sam Levin of the<\/span> Guardian <\/b>(<\/span>2\/28\/18<\/span><\/a>) argues that taking down conspiracy theory videos and potentially banning users like Jones from their platforms only reinforces their narrative that the \u201cdeep state\u201d conspiracy is persecuting them to silence \u201cthe real truth.\u201d Additionally, when the left acts as cheerleaders for political censorship, or deputizes a company like <\/span>Google<\/b> to move against a particular group, these tactics can backfire when the same censorship is used against them. Indeed, it’s likely that a mandate to censor conspiracy theories could end up targeting legitimate structural critiques of power that are misleadingly grouped into the same category. Asking <\/span>Google<\/b>, perhaps the most powerful corporate entity in the world, to become the arbiter of what is and isn\u2019t a conspiracy theory is certainly <\/span>not ideal<\/span><\/a> for healthy political discourse. The moral panic among Democrats about the influence of \u201cfake news\u201d during the 2016 election provides a <\/span>stark<\/span><\/a> example of similar potential <\/span>blowback<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Still, real life exists outside the internet: Conspiracy theories peddled by the far right can incite real-world <\/span>harassment<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>violence<\/span><\/a>. This harassment has not come without reprisal: Jones has been <\/span>sued<\/span><\/a> for defamation by Brennan Gilmore, a former State Department foreign services officer who was attacked by Jones as a \u201cdeep state operative\u201d after he caught the horrific murder of Heather Heyer by a Nazi on camera during the Charlottesville \u201cUnite the Right\u201d rally.<\/span><\/p>\n

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InfoWars<\/strong>‘ latest YouTube<\/strong> video on David Hogg<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Conspiracy theories and challenges against the \u201cofficial narrative\u201d have long been fixtures in the <\/span>paranoid style of American politics<\/span><\/a>. <\/span>InfoWars<\/b> continues to release conspiracy theory videos on <\/span>YouTube<\/b> that receive millions of views. One of Jones\u2019 <\/span>latest<\/span><\/a> videos, \u201cThe Florida Shooting Happened! \u2018Crisis Actors\u2019 Are a MSM Hoax to Censor the Web,\u201d now denies that the shooting was a false flag, but maintains that the mainstream media is using the massacre as a tool to promote gun control and censor right-wing internet \u201ctruth tellers.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Conspiracy theories such as these are unlikely to dissipate any time soon, especially while the internet remains a useful tool for spreading disinformation to the masses, and while content suggestion algorithms like <\/span>YouTube<\/b>\u2019s provide financial incentives not to stop them. While deputizing <\/span>YouTube<\/b> to silence Alex Jones and his ilk is an approach that is likely to have negative consequences, it is still necessary for both public and media to continuously call out blatantly false conspiracy theories peddled by the right.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

One group that is not afraid to challenge the conspiracy-mongers: the Parkland survivors themselves. It’s refreshing to see David Hogg and others striking back against those who have smeared them. Jones has of late gone on <\/span>Twitter<\/b> to beg Hogg to tone down his attacks, <\/span>pleading<\/span><\/a> with him to come on his show. <\/span><\/p>\n

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