Persistence Is The Key To Winning The Information War

The goal of the censorship, trolling, and media marginalization that the establishment has been using against independent online voices isn’t just to disable those voices, but to make them give up on fighting the war of ideas. At a time when, as Caitlin Johnstone assesses, “our governments become increasingly concerned that we are developing the wrong kinds of political opinions,” killing our will to resist the establishment propaganda onslaught is the best the deep state can hope for.

“Until there is an ideological framework that large numbers of people embrace to challenge the old ideological framework, nothing is going to happen,” said Chris Hedges in a 2015 interview about the possibility of a revolution. “Some things can happen; you can have sporadic uprisings as you had in Ferguson or you had in Baltimore. But until they are infused with that kind of political vision, they are reactive, in essence.” As we’ve since seen, the internet is the crucial thread that’s giving these outbursts of rebellion a coherent purpose. It’s let movements and independent journalists coordinate and spread their messages.

So the establishment has been attacking the open internet at a drastic rate in the last year or so: new Facebook algorithms that automatically punish users who post disfavored material; the demonetization of major YouTube users who make similar types of political videos, and the automatic unsubscribing of those users’ followers; shadow banning and the similar unsubscribing of certain Twitter accounts; Google algorithms that make websites like Truthdig and World Socialist Website harder to find; partnerships among these companies with the CIA, the Israeli government, and the Atlantic Council to police information that threatens the deep state’s agenda.

Troll attacks from these entities have also been part of it, ironically as the corporate media obsesses over Russia’s relatively small troll operation. Hillary Clinton’s Brock trolls have returned since the 2016 election, filling online threads with smears against Bernie Sanders and anyone else who criticizes corporate Democrats. Even more substantial is Israel’s troll army, whose strategy is to attack public figures who criticize Israel with negative comments so that they’ll be pressured into accepting pro-Israel narratives. Then there are the attacks by the Global Engagement Center, the State Department’s troll farm whose supposed purpose is to fight “Russian meddling.”

All of this, added onto the paranoid accusations of working for Russia that dissenters have been constantly targeted with, create a fascistic atmosphere. Speaking the truth is now associated with treason, and protecting the powerful is associated with upholding American civilization. We are being gaslighted into accepting the expansion of the police state and the eventual destruction of all liberties.

Nonetheless, as people are banding together to overthrow the Orwellian global oligarchy, they are creating a new cultural paradigm. This paradigm is one where partisan and ideological differences are no longer as important, where thinking independently is encouraged, and where opposing war, corruption and corporatism is the norm. The centers of power can’t survive amid this level of consciousness, so they’re using censorship and propaganda to try to shut down free thought. We can ultimately win out by being persistent in our efforts to counter establishment narratives, and by always trying to build each other up in the process.