The United States 2016 elections and Donald Trump’s resulting win was a matter of controversy. Media outlets called the voter turnout to be fraud citing that intervention was used to influence the vote. Social media was often used to spread fake news and other tactics that would create other electoral favoring. Facebook was no exception to this matter. Facebook’s algorithm towards users regularly employed fake election news stories before and after the election to push their agenda. Their platform was even used to spread Russian disinformation campaigns. What’s important, however, is that these news spreads are damaging democracy and the political spectrum with this news spreading. [In this Case Analysis, I will argue that Confucianism shows us that Facebook did engage in information warfare because they allowed misinformation about the 2016 election to damage democracy, and further that they were partly responsible for the election outcome because their social media platform was a cesspool for a political agenda that destabilized the electoral system.
Presidential candidates running for election have used a form of persuasion in which they promise things to people that they desire or would solve the issues the country faces. Whether this might be talking about solving global warming or reducing healthcare costs, they make promises that are skeptical in terms of achievement. This form of persuasion to the American people can be seen as homophily, where people attract to others who are like them or have the same interests.
Jared Prier of “Commanding the Trend: Social Media as Information Warfare” tells of the effectiveness of homophily and how it can be used on anybody to provide a feeling of persuasion onto the victim. Prier states that homophily on social media creates an aura of trustworthiness and professionalism to others, because of this, it creates persuasion to the people and allows anybody less insightful to be believed that a scholar, such as your friend or brother (Prier 59). This means that even ourselves can create a trend or following with a little persuasion or interest to the people. It is manipulation onto the people that creates a hive mind where everyone flocks towards the same interest or belief with enough persuasion. What makes homophily even more effective is that they will believe most things the manipulator says or make believes because they created an establishment of trust between them and the people, opening creativity room for the manipulator’s desires. Their role of being an important person in society, specifically as presidential candidate, also adds on to this because they show professionalism.
Facebook has been a suspect of potential election interference for a long time. When the 2014 case surfaced about political strategists in Florida were used Facebook to drive their ads in promoting their right-wing political intentions, it became clear of how centralized figures were going to use the platform. Although this wasn’t their intentions, Facebook created an algorithm that forced ads upon users to influence their vote in a way that would soon violate democracy. These figures that promoted their agenda created a manipulation of the Facebook system similarly to homophily. Political figures used Prier’s concept of homophily to influence the vote of the 2016 election by making ads in Facebook’s algorithm that made the viewers trust it. Eli Pariser’s “The Filter Bubble” talks about how personalization is becoming an issue and of how ads can now be targeted specifically to groups of people. Political figures can now use this feature along with homophily to purposeful target certain groups that they could persuade effectively, creating a domino effect of others following the influence.
The tool of Confucianism is important in this case because it is all about playing your role in society. The role of social media companies in society is to improve the quality of life and communication between users. The platform they are navigating should be appealing to them with nothing feeling intrusive. Facebook failed on behalf of Confucianism because they didn’t play their role of supporting the quality of life of user with the intrusive political ad campaigns being pushed into Facebook’s algorithm. Because they didn’t do anything to mitigate this issue before and after the 2016 election, they also failed on Confucianism because they didn’t help political Trump-supporting figures act appropriately, rather than intrusively with their ad campaigns for Trump. Through Prier’s concept, they acted intrusively by homophily to target groups of people on the platform. Based on this assessment, the right thing to do would have been for Facebook to ban the usage of political campaigning on the platform seeing as the campaigns were specifically supporting Trump. The combined perspective of seeing lots of Trump ad campaigns and the intrusiveness felt by the users through the ad’s homophily would pressure Facebook to take action to block the campaigns. Because they didn’t act on this matter, it created the sensation as if Facebook was supporting the Trump narratives and misinformation, thus involving them in an information warfare.
Margin change Gossip is often seen as the backbone of social media. Whether this is between friends or relatives, people gossip as a form of casual communication to discuss matter. However, Keith Scott in “A Second Amendment for Cyber? Possession, Prohibition and Personal Liberty for the Information Age” discusses the hostilities that can form in a social media environment. The innovation of technology has brought about a hostile environment of hotbeds of gossip, backbiting, and vicious hostility known as a “global village.” This is leading to an age where politics, bullying, and cyberstalking are becoming ever more dangerous (Scott 2). These global villages are what’s occurring in today’s society where people are more emotionally driven and are driven by certain motives. People have strong backing behind their views which is why some people are willing to show hostility or violence to back it. Technology has changed social media into a treacherous wasteland of strong emotions and misinformation. This is why the constant gossip and staunch views of people have risen because they are changed by a dangerous current society of hot topics such as politics.
With people becoming overly indulgent of social media, they have shown to display conversations of real life such as gossip and hostilities and transferring that over to online platforms such as Facebook with the use of Scott’s concept. Tons of fake news gossip occurred through Facebook’s trending algorithm where even people who didn’t want to these in their feed were seeing it. In the weeks leading up the election, it became clear that hostile figures were attracted to supporting Trump. From alt-rights to white supremacists, these people brought hostility to the Facebook feeds, spreading fake news before the election. A surefire way of bringing hostility to the Facebook environment is through Trump’s progressive ad campaign. By late October, his campaign was forcing “dark” ads that targeted towards idealistic white liberals, young women, and African Americans. This combination of fake news gossip and hostilities by both innocent civilians and alt-right supporters would generate a global village that was best described by Scott’s concept.
Confucianism plays a role in the case because of Facebook’s mishandling of the political campaign. They failed to play their role to the users from the radical Trump supporters spreading ad campaigns and misinformation. Their nonexistent presence in the midst of the political chaos created Scott’s global village of hostility and gossip between Facebook users and Trump supporters with Facebook ghosting amidst it. This global village is what fueled the information warfare that Facebook created by allowing the Trump misinformation to dwell on the users. To allow them to spread fake news and take advantage of Facebook’s trending feature shows that Facebook neglected their role to their users. Facebook also failed on part of Confucianism because they didn’t act so the people spreading the misinformation would act appropriately in their roles, supporting Trump civilly rather than recklessly. Based on this assessment, the right thing to do is to either disable the trending feature temporarily until the 2016 election has passed or make an announcement stating that they don’t abide by any side of the political race. Both of these ways they can show the Facebook users that they are playing in their role of Confucianism by showing that they are aware of the situation and that this could possibly qualm the global village that has existed.
In conclusion, Facebook initiated an information warfare due to them allowing Trump supporters to spread misinformation and fake news on the platform, influencing their vote on the 2016 election. They made users feel pressured by the forced dark ad campaigns on the trending algorithm, allowing them to take advantage of their own features. These ad campaigns created a dangerous aura of homophily for Trump, which prompted people to trust this information being given in a form of manipulation. Facebook’s mishandling of the situation created a hostile village in which hostilities and gossip initiated onto users. Their improper handling of their social media role to the people demonstrates how they violated Confucianism. Although with the sudden outburst of many figures spreading misinformation, it can be hard to be able to track down and stop all of it from happening. However, this still doesn’t mean that Facebook shouldn’t have done anything to stop it. Their neglect caused a wildfire of information warfare with them being in the middle of the chaos.
Works Cited
Madrigal, Alexis C. (2023). “What Facebook Did to American Democracy.” The Atlantic.
Prier, Jarred. “Commanding the Trend: Social Media as Information Warfare.” Strategic Studies Quarterly.
Scott, Keith. (2018). “A Second Amendment for Cyber? Possession, Prohibition and Personal Liberty for the Information Age.”