Revelations about Russia’s use of social media in the 2016 elections are being used as a pretext for suppressing dissent by some dubious characters.
Read part 1 of this investigation here. This September, Oklahoma GOP Senator James Lankford alleged that the widely popular #taketheknee Twitter hashtag that promoted NFL protests against racial injustice was, in fact, a Russian influence campaign spawned by Kremlin operatives. Hours later, Lankford’s claims received uncritical coverage from the New York Times’ Scott Shane and Daisuke Wakabayashi, who asserted that Russia was attempting “to influence social media discourse and foment division in the United States.” The …read more
Source: AlterNet
