Steven Rustad🇦🇺🇳🇴

This one has been around for a while, but AAP Factcheck has proven the claims false. As many people know, there are quite a few Facebook pages touting Pauline Hanson as the holy hagrid grail to a flag-waving patriotic paradise. We’ve uncovered quite a few online offerings that are being administered and moderated by foreign operators - as evidenced below.. but believe me, there are likely thousands of them when you include the countless moderators posting thousands of pieces of clickbait content for engagement every single day. The admins and the moderators of these pages don’t do this stuff for free. There is no driving need for a patriotic stance for a red-headed purveyor of populist shyte when you are living in an entirely different country separated by a big ocean. Some of these foreigners are known to post influencing political commentary about their own country. Some of them have had absolutely no political engagement whatsoever… .. which begs the question… who is paying foreigners to boost the presence and push the algorithms specifically with regard to Hanson. It is unlikely that this political tomfoolery operates in a vacuum - but the sheer volume of fake pages regarding Hanson would indicate that there is a good deal of “investment” behind it. Hanson has said that she knows nothing about these sites - but she also said she knew nothing about the online “satirical” cartoon regarding Jacqui Lambie a week after she told Lambie to “get over it”. According to AAP Factcheck, “a network of foreign-operated disinformation pages are sharing a fake story on social media that Pauline Hanson is dealing with a significant but unspecified health issue” AAP verdict: “ Senator Hanson has made no such announcement and the quote attributed to her is fabricated” 🙄 I’ve seen some of these so-called illness claims from different sources on facebook - and have noted the reactions to the posts underneath. Illness, even unconfirmed, attracts sympathetic responses like flies to a cow pie. There is no fact checking and very little negative commentary. These posts play on sympathy and emotion … and most of all, engagement. I would imagine that the more engagement a post attracts, the more the poster is paid and the more data that is collected for future reference. Far be it from me to wish Hanson an illness, so I say nothing because one day it might be true - but I note that some people have no online filter when it comes to politicians and bad things happening to them. I have seen some hateful commentary directed at politicians when they are going through a crisis or are seriously unwell. I will say this, however - populist politics, hateful and divisive rhetoric constantly repeated by politicians, by the media and in online forums does have a very disturbing effect on our society. It enables hate and disrespect. It desensitises us to its impact. If you do one thing today check facebook for Hanson pages, Anthony Albanese pages and check who administrates and moderates the pages. Report them for false information. Tell your friends to report them, but don’t engage. They rely on engagement to keep them going. Some of the pages that AAP have listed are: Pacific Ledger Mood Space Civic Lens The Daily Brief These pages are all run by users based in Vietnam. There are many more. We need to start seeing online spaces for what they are. Outside of our own personal sphere there are a significant number of pages run by foreign entities that influence and manipulate opinion and actions in this country. It is generally politically based but is not always limited to politics. Vulnerable people in our communities are often targeted. The toxic manosphere uses these spaces to attack specific women and women’s groups. Anybody, any company, any political party has access to what is considered to be a new form of control of “the masses”. How it pans out depends on how governments and communities respond to it.