A lesson from Census Counts: How to prevent disinfo from spreading
This example from the Census Counts campaign shows how a network of civil rights organizations worked to prevent disinformation from suppressing participation in the 2020 Census.
Spitfire believes that fighting disinformation is a skill that organizations working on issues as far ranging as democracy, civil rights, immigration, racial justice, gender justice, poverty alleviation, health, climate change and more need to have as a core competency.
Disinformation is not a new phenomenon, but 24-hour news cycles and evolving technology have accelerated its dissemination in recent years. Whether to preserve corporate interests, hoard political power or maintain white supremacist and patriarchal systems, we can’t ignore the fact that the harmful narratives pushed for decades (or longer) are still at play in our current communication ecosystem.
Coordinated disinformation campaigns have manipulated social media users in an attempt to suppress Black voter participation in numerous election cycles. Disinformation running rampant disrupts and endangers our public health and economic responses to the pandemic so much so the World Health Organization has coined it an “info-demic.” And decades of disinformation have slowed the global response to climate change and discredited legitimate science.
Spitfire offers a number of training opportunities, from 2 hour webinars to full day session, based on the information provided in Just Truth. Please drop us a line for more information.
Explore the difference between misinformation, disinformation and fake news.
Disinformation is particularly dangerous because the falsehoods are often very sticky, meaning they stay in our memories. The module covers the psychology behind what makes disinformation sticky.
As communicators, we can’t effectively combat disinformation without examining the larger communication ecosystem within which it thrives.
Disinformation is spread through a variety of techniques to manipulate journalists, social media algorithms and users alike into amplifying it. This module details a few techniques that we as communicators should be aware of so we can prevent that amplification and also discredit the techniques when we see them used.
Disinformation agents create emotional content meant to provoke people to click, share, comment or retweet it. Unfortunately, social media platforms’ business models are based on algorithmic promotion of content for engagement and optimization of ads.
We all play a role in spreading disinformation online and offline, so we all need to learn how to recognize it and prevent its amplification.
The media plays an incredibly important role in society, and their job is not easy. But they also play a role in amplifying disinformation and the harmful narratives that prop it up.
Just Truth covers a lot of important background information that will inform an effective communication strategy against disinformation. Now let’s talk about what we as communicators and nonprofit practitioners can do to address disinformation.
Get started today. Enter your email to access the training modules and learn how to fight disinformation as a nonprofit communicator.
Get started today. Enter your email to access the training modules and learn how to fight disinformation as a nonprofit communicator.
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