There Are No Girls on the Internet - BONUS： The Meghan Markle information war

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00:00:34.940 I survived nine months in captivity,

00:00:38.460 and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive what should have destroyed them.

00:00:43.680 I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.

00:00:47.300 Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable,

00:00:51.020 abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.

00:00:54.640 These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive.

00:00:58.680 Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:01:06.680 Like, wow, they're kind of trying to expose this.

00:01:09.000 They're also trying to create a narrative.

00:01:11.480 Like, they understand that they're in an information war.

00:01:20.320 There Are No Girls on the Internet is a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative.

00:01:24.640 I'm Bridget Todd, and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet.

00:01:34.220 Last month, former royals Meghan Markle and Prince Harry released a Netflix documentary

00:01:39.260 all about their decision to step back from the duties involved in being a member of the royal family.

00:01:44.340 And this week, Harry's new memoir, called Spare, that chronicles his experiences in the royal family, debuts as well.

00:01:52.080 We've talked before about the wave of racist, sexist conspiracy theories and disinformation campaigns that target Meghan Markle.

00:01:59.740 And in a piece called What Harry and Meghan Can Teach Us About Information Warfare, former FBI counterintelligence agent Asha Rengada says that Harry and Meghan's recent media can actually provide a good blueprint for how to combat a disinformation campaign and win an information war.

00:02:17.820 So let's talk about the piece.

00:02:19.620 It is fascinating.

00:02:20.380 The piece is called What Harry and Meghan Can Teach Us About Information Warfare.

00:02:24.340 I know that you're a big fan of the royals.

00:02:26.900 What drove you to write this piece kind of breaking down Meghan and Harry and how what we can take away about propaganda and information?

00:02:36.380 Yeah, so I sat down to watch their Netflix docuseries thinking this was just going to be some mind candy for me.

00:02:43.880 I'm going to take a little break, you know, and escape it all.

00:02:47.420 But I thought it was actually a great window into some of the stuff that I teach about. And in particular, they describe what because what they're doing in the course of this documentary is really describing the propaganda machine that is the British tabloid.

00:03:04.400 you know, ecosystem and how it relates to the royal family. While they were describing that,

00:03:14.220 it reminded me a lot of about a lot of research that I've done about our own media ecosystem in

00:03:20.140 the United States, and in particular, propaganda feedback loops that we have, for example, on the

00:03:24.760 far right. And so I started my ears perked up, and I just started looking at the entire docuseries

00:03:33.540 through that lens. Like, wow, they're kind of trying to expose this. They're also trying to

00:03:38.280 create a narrative. Like, they understand that they're in an information war. And that's what

00:03:44.540 this is about, you know? And then I remembered, I said, Prince Harry is on the Commission on

00:03:51.560 Misinformation or Information Disorder with the Afton Institute. And I went and researched that,

00:03:56.120 and I looked at the report that they just put out, and I thought, you know, I think that there

00:04:00.880 are some things that they are actually doing really well in this docu-series just from a

00:04:05.140 strategic information warfare perspective, and I decided to write about it. Okay, so the piece is

00:04:10.620 so fascinating, and one of the things that you point out is that it kind of functions as almost

00:04:15.080 like counter-propaganda. You write that the film kind of works to give truth and advantage in our

00:04:22.120 own information ecosystem. Can you tell us more about what you mean? Yeah, so I have this sub-stack

00:04:28.040 where I'm teaching basically an online course for anyone who wants to take it about information

00:04:34.980 warfare and disinformation and how we combat it. And one of the things that I've covered is that

00:04:40.400 propaganda is such a loaded word, right? We tend to think of it as something that's always negative

00:04:47.900 and it's often used for manipulative and bad purposes. But there is a place for counter

00:04:55.340 propaganda, where, you know, you put out your narrative. We did this in the Cold War. You know,

00:05:00.820 we put out our democratic values. We were in ideological battle. And so, you know, in this

00:05:06.760 context, you can't just cede the information space to an adversary and let them shape perceptions

00:05:13.240 and opinions. You have to get out there and tell an affirmative story about the values that you

00:05:18.700 stand for. That is a form of propaganda. It's white propaganda. It doesn't mean that it's bad,

00:05:23.620 But I think that that's what they are doing, and that's absolutely what they should be doing.

00:05:27.620 So there was definitely a time where I, and a lot of us, kind of thought that ignoring certain unsavory things online was the way to go.

00:05:36.180 You know, when they go low, you go high, be above it, or don't give that the time of day.

00:05:41.820 Well, it turns out that the just ignore it strategy was not the most effective, and it actually allowed conspiracy theories to fester and get even stronger.

00:05:51.660 Similarly, Asha says,

00:05:53.820 we can take a lesson from the way that Meghan and Harry

00:05:56.020 are not just sitting by

00:05:57.620 while an inaccurate narrative is created around them.

00:06:00.500 Instead, they're setting the record straight

00:06:02.580 by going to battle for the truth.

00:06:05.060 Okay, so I have to say, like,

00:06:06.600 I work in, like, media trying to combat things

00:06:09.480 like mis- and disinformation and online harassment,

00:06:11.380 and I guess I would say there was a time

00:06:13.780 where I thought that there were certain conspiracy theories

00:06:16.300 that, like, were not worthy of coverage, right?

00:06:18.780 I felt like covering them was like legitimizing them. And I feel like I've spent the last few

00:06:23.160 years of my career kind of playing catch up for that kind of error in strategy, error in judgment,

00:06:29.340 because, you know, by being like, oh, we're not going to pay attention to that. That's that's

00:06:33.380 crazy. Like, of course, Democrats aren't eating babies. We're not going to even like dignify that

00:06:37.920 with a response. You look and you're like, oh, wow, this has actually kind of like gotten out

00:06:42.020 of control. And one of the things that you write about is that the Netflix documentary is sort of

00:06:46.940 it. And one of the things that it does, it's like it's getting into the battle for the truth. It's

00:06:51.020 like at least being on the field. Can you can you tell us more about like how you see them doing

00:06:55.000 that? Yeah, I mean, they're they're getting into the battle because they they're putting something

00:07:00.860 out and they're putting it out at a level and volume that can compete with this other propaganda

00:07:06.600 machine, like this whole tabloid system, you know, they're if they were just tweeting on their own

00:07:12.540 or doing something, you know, as individuals, even though they're celebrities, it's just not

00:07:16.480 going to it's asymmetrical it's not going to be able to have the same impact whereas this

00:07:22.660 docuseries are kind of uh they're they're in the fight and i think to your point about conspiracy

00:07:28.820 theories the problem is that what we have now is that traditional gatekeepers that used to keep

00:07:37.700 lies and conspiracy theories and really wacky things to the fringes those gatekeepers no longer

00:07:45.740 exist. You know, traditional journalists, you know, that had journalistic, you know, standards

00:07:52.280 and things like that, you most of that stuff used to stay on the fringes, it could not become

00:07:57.040 mainstream. Well, with social media, where anybody can publish anything, everybody, you know,

00:08:02.700 we've democratized media, which is really good in many ways. But it also means that now anything

00:08:09.800 can become mainstream. So you can't ignore them because they will gain traction and lies travel

00:08:17.000 faster on the internet and social media than the truth. So in many ways, the truth is already

00:08:21.980 catching up. And so you have to get in there. Ideally, you get in there first and you get the

00:08:28.020 first mover advantage if you can. Yeah. What do you think it says about like our current moment

00:08:34.080 in in media or like digital media that yeah we can no longer depend on traditional quote-unquote

00:08:41.700 like media sources or you know figures to be those gatekeepers like like when you think about

00:08:47.960 the state of media are you are you hopeful that we can get to a place where like truth and

00:08:53.840 thoughtfulness and nuance can compete with lies conspiracy theories and inflammatory nonsense

00:09:00.360 i'm hopeful but i think it's going to require a lot of work so i think we need to think about

00:09:08.200 those types of information as sort of psychological hacking right like when you look and see all these

00:09:16.300 people who believe in q anon and the democrats are eating babies or whatever i mean they have

00:09:20.480 been hacked their brains have literally been hacked and you know hijacked and they believe

00:09:26.200 these things. And when you look at in the cyber intrusion realm, like the technical intrusion,

00:09:31.700 when people when companies get hacked, what they talk about is that, yes, you need to defend and

00:09:38.020 deter the hackers, you need to try to prevent them from coming in. But at some point, you kind of

00:09:43.780 have to acknowledge everybody's going to get hacked. And the best thing you can do is to be

00:09:48.060 resilient when it happens. And so I think the key is, how do we create resilience among the people

00:09:55.560 who are going to be consuming and are targeted by this information.

00:10:00.140 One of the things you just mentioned is what is really about media literacy.

00:10:04.940 How do you train people to understand the sources of information that they're consuming

00:10:09.120 and be more critical about it?

00:10:13.700 You know, digital literacy, civic literacy, so that you understand how the government 0.86

00:10:18.100 works so it becomes harder to believe dumb conspiracy theories about it, you know?

00:10:23.300 So I think that there's a lot of things that we need to do to build resilience.

00:10:28.740 Unfortunately, I think we spend a lot of time focusing on the social media platforms and how they should police themselves.

00:10:34.140 And I personally think those platforms are kind of bad actors, right?

00:10:38.120 They're like the tobacco industry.

00:10:39.540 They have an addictive product that's bad for everybody, and people are hooked, and they have no financial interest in making it better.

00:10:49.160 They really don't.

00:10:50.200 It's so funny that you say this. My partner works in tobacco control and we make this comparison

00:10:56.780 all the time where every now and then Facebook will come out with like a very polished ad that's

00:11:01.860 like Facebook cares about digital literacy or blah, blah, blah. And it's like, or protecting

00:11:06.520 democracy. And it's like, then you would shut down. It's like the same way that like there's

00:11:10.120 not a safer cigarette. If you were really interested in like making a product that's not

00:11:14.660 harming everybody and breaking all of our brains, you would dismantle and shut down.

00:11:18.340 Yeah, you would you would burn the company down. They don't care about you. They don't care about democracy. They care about making a buck. And if you look at the top performing sites on Facebook, for example, what is it? It's like Breitbart and Dan Bungee. I mean, these are, you know, during COVID, it was the, you know, COVID misinformation sites, the anti-vax sites that were that were the most had the most engagement on Facebook. So, no, they don't care about you or me.

00:11:47.600 And I think, you know, because the damage is in many ways invisible, unlike with tobacco, you're not, you know, you don't have people dying of cancer and where you can point to something.

00:11:59.820 It becomes harder to really wrap our minds around, although with the Facebook whistleblower last year, Francis Haugen, you know, we have seen, you know, harms manifest, for example, with teens, teenage girls and suicidal tendencies and things like that that have come out of social media.

00:12:20.020 So maybe if we start to approach it in a public health mindset, the way we did with smoking, maybe we can start to get some regulations. But I really think the regulatory aspect is going to be very slow and long term. And what we need in the short term is to build resilience on our side.

00:12:41.800 Let's take a quick break.

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00:14:34.020 at our back it doesn't sound like you're holding out hope for like certainly not for tech leaders

00:14:47.220 that platforms to police themselves appropriately or responsibly or ethically it doesn't sound like

00:14:52.380 you're really putting a lot of hope into like government to sort of take action so in absence

00:14:58.820 of like tech leaders doing anything

00:15:00.800 or government doing anything,

00:15:02.560 what like, is the resilience factor

00:15:05.460 on us as individuals?

00:15:06.900 Like, just like really making sure

00:15:08.300 that we understand what we're consuming

00:15:11.660 and what it's trying to get us

00:15:14.420 to think or not think.

00:15:16.040 Yes, I think that it's up to us

00:15:18.520 as consumers of this technology,

00:15:21.780 as consumers of the information,

00:15:24.560 like the substance of the information.

00:15:26.020 And I think also as citizens in terms of understanding our relationship with other people, most of these disinformation narratives, like even the Meghan Harry thing, like it's all about trying to create cleavages, right? Like whose side are you on? Are you Harry Meghan? Are you William Kate?

00:15:44.140 Like it's all about division and tribalism and whose team are you on? And what we need to do, I think, also is think about our relationships offline, because the more that we can build true human connection in real life across all of these different social cleavages and beliefs and ideologies or whatever, the much it becomes much harder to divide you when you're when you're.

00:16:14.140 online. Yeah, that's something that we talk about a lot on the show is the way that these

00:16:20.980 things become kind of like turned into a really specific binary. And so if you're someone like,

00:16:28.140 I'm not a huge person who's into the royals that much. As a Black woman, I liked it that I liked

00:16:34.220 the idea of like a Black princess. I know she wasn't a princess, but whatever. Like we definitely 1.00

00:16:37.520 called her Black princess. I liked that. Like I was no huge Meghan Markle fan. I wasn't like a big

00:16:43.360 consumer of media around the royals but the way that it was so clear that it was like well are

00:16:49.100 you a kate or a megan and like how racialized and politicized that was there wasn't really a place

00:16:54.220 for the casual person who was like i'm interested in like casually following this person that i kind

00:16:59.520 of like but i i don't necessarily want to feel like i need to take these take a binary side in

00:17:07.660 this way and so when things become flattened out into this like tribalistic binary vibe the people

00:17:14.180 who are interested in just having thoughtful conversations or don't really feel one way or

00:17:17.520 the other kind of get drowned out because it's like are you with her or with her are you with

00:17:21.680 these people or those people like it really doesn't leave a place for nuance no it doesn't

00:17:27.520 at all um there's a term for it it's called cyber balkanization which means that you know when

00:17:33.420 you're online things become very narrow i mean even if you look at something like a facebook

00:17:37.000 group right it's it's all like along one theme and one topic and it's great it's a great way to

00:17:43.380 bring people together along that dimension but you're also not connecting on all these other

00:17:48.020 dimensions the other thing that happens on social media is you're creating these tribal alliances

00:17:55.060 but you're also not like exchanging actual human cues like you know you're not seeing people's

00:18:01.060 faces and you're not seeing the other side, right? Which makes it, you know, if you're actually in a

00:18:07.800 debate with someone in real life, like there's a certain amount of respect and, you know, because

00:18:15.140 you're, you're human, right? Like you actually have a human connection there in person. It's

00:18:19.260 much easier to become more toxic because it's so depersonalized online. And the other, the other

00:18:26.060 side is kind of abstract or anonymous in a way. And it gets really ugly, really fast.

00:18:33.680 Yeah, I have found myself as a personal exercise, trying to really engage in discourse online with

00:18:41.520 strangers in a way that really, I don't know, I just saw something about the exercise of like

00:18:48.420 getting into a debate on Twitter or something. Like your collar is, your fur is up. Like you're

00:18:53.600 just like and so like you can I feel it myself like you can so quickly be like so hostile and

00:18:59.040 you're like well if we were just two people talking at a cafe would I default to hostility

00:19:03.260 and so I'm really as a personal exercise trying to like really be mindful of that dynamic of like

00:19:09.480 if somebody is disagreeing with me about something that really is of no consequence on the internet

00:19:13.960 what like is it why is my first instinct to be like a hostile response or I'm part of me wonders

00:19:21.280 if it's because a lot of the times like you kind of sense that your like followers are watching

00:19:25.920 and maybe you want to like really dunk on this person so that other people will be like, yeah,

00:19:30.640 go you. And I'm just trying to really unlearn all of that because I do think it's like not

00:19:36.220 the healthiest instinct to show up with. Absolutely. And you have to remember that

00:19:41.900 these platforms are sort of designed for that, right? They want you to emotional reactivity

00:19:48.260 drives engagement. And that's why the content that triggers that emotional reactivity is going

00:19:55.000 to be the stuff that you most likely see. Like, you're not going to see the boring post that

00:19:59.140 you're like, oh, I just learned about the political situation and, you know, New Guinea,

00:20:04.800 or I don't know, whatever, right? It's going to be something really crazy and that pushes your

00:20:10.840 buttons. And that's the whole point. That's what keeps you addicted. Then you start scrolling and

00:20:15.920 then you start you know responding and you know that's what makes the money you are the product

00:20:21.460 that's what you have to remember and I I am with you like I succumb to it myself but I I'm trying

00:20:29.480 to be more mindful and to think about when I get triggered that way that's the cue to get off

00:20:36.180 because at the end of the day it's actually not that worth it like who are these people

00:20:39.980 and you don't even know if they're real it could be like some it could be Ivan in St. Petersburg

00:20:45.320 right sitting in a troll form like you don't even know um so but yeah that what you're feeling is

00:20:51.540 real um and it's designed to do that too because that's what keeps you on the platform as someone

00:20:59.800 who has worked in counterintelligence like i don't even know how to ask this without sounding

00:21:05.960 not informed so if my it's the way that i'm framing this does not sound informed feel free

00:21:10.220 to let me know because i am certainly not the expert but you know you mentioned like you don't

00:21:13.880 even know if these people are real. And we've covered quite a bit this idea of bad actors

00:21:19.880 impersonating people, getting into online communities and, like, causing chaos and

00:21:25.380 confusion. What is going on there? Like, why would a foreign agent be invested in me,

00:21:33.740 Bridget Todd, in my kitchen, getting hot under the collar and, like, rage-tweeting somebody?

00:21:39.220 Like, why is that a tactic that we see?

00:21:43.880 Because when they do it on a mass scale, it erodes trust among the citizenry.

00:21:55.560 I mean, how you feel when you're online is going to carry over when you go out into real life, right?

00:22:00.980 Like that, you carry that with you.

00:22:03.560 I mean, I have found even in the last five years, like I'm kind of more mistrustful in general.

00:22:08.520 When I walk around, like I see people, you know, and it's, I have to like think about

00:22:13.880 who I am and who I want to be in the space. But it, it sows division, and it sows chaos. And with

00:22:22.820 the more that you're on Twitter arguing with some person, you're not out doing, you know,

00:22:29.700 you're not volunteering, you're not being civically engaged, you're not, you know,

00:22:36.720 going to a show at a theater or a sports event where you're like, you know, forging, I think,

00:22:42.520 healthier connections. And for places like Russia that can't compete with us technologically, 0.74

00:22:48.960 militarily, economically, their objective is to have us implode from within, to create dysfunction 0.98

00:22:56.720 and discord, have us all hate each other, ideally have us all shoot each other,

00:23:02.260 and essentially bring and have us lose faith in our institutions and bring our entire form of

00:23:09.080 society and governance to a standstill that's what they want and i hate to say i mean like

00:23:16.480 i agree and i hate to say that we have people in the united states who are kind of like doing

00:23:24.740 like helping them along it's like absolutely it like makes me want to pull my hair out where i'm

00:23:29.900 like don't you see that this is what they want don't you see that you're just doing the work

00:23:35.380 of bad actors for them yes no absolutely i think um their interests are aligned with a subset of

00:23:45.240 uh actors including political actors i mean they're we got we have a group right now that's

00:23:52.500 holding our house of representatives hostage right these are the people who try to overthrow

00:23:58.140 the government yes it's one of those things where there's a little bit of truth because

00:24:01.380 i can understand somebody who was like i'm not going to trust these people to govern to govern

00:24:06.520 for me and it's like we i could i like like i i agree that having people lose trust in our

00:24:12.720 institutions is like bad and like what bad actors want but on the other hand part of me is like well

00:24:17.340 they're not making it very difficult for someone to lose trust these like kooky people yes i will

00:24:23.420 say i think in that regard the midterm elections were i think heartening you know you had a lot of

00:24:30.780 these election deniers defeated. And I do think that there's, I think the pendulum is gonna move

00:24:39.260 maybe slowly, but it is gonna move in the direction because people are sick of it. And I do think

00:24:43.660 people are more aware now of, you know, what is being done to us and that, you know, it's really

00:24:52.200 up to us to try to take it in another direction. Absolutely. I kind of agree with you. I think that

00:24:59.900 People that are just, like, sick of it.

00:25:02.580 It's enough already.

00:25:03.840 Enough already.

00:25:04.520 Yeah, like, we have to be able to have, like, a baseline understanding of reality.

00:25:11.280 And if we don't have that, like, we don't have anything.

00:25:13.800 Absolutely.

00:25:17.640 More after a quick break.

00:25:18.760 We'll be right back.

00:25:48.760 a one podcaster, iHeart's twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers

00:25:53.160 listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only iHeart can extend your message to audiences across

00:25:58.260 broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business? Think iHeart. Streaming, radio, and

00:26:03.680 podcasting. Call 844-844-iHeart to get started. That's 844-844-iHeart. When I was 14 years old,

00:26:12.480 I was kidnapped and held captive for nine months. I survived and I've spent my life exploring

00:26:18.700 how other people survive what should have destroyed them.

00:26:22.440 I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.

00:26:26.140 I just remember this low, taunting voice next to my ear saying, 0.96

00:26:31.580 shut up, don't say anything.

00:26:34.320 Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable. 0.98

00:26:38.760 I knew if he woke up, without a doubt, he was going to hurt me.

00:26:43.320 I started feeling that there was someone at the end of my bed,

00:26:47.880 and I just started screaming.

00:26:50.840 They are abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.

00:26:54.720 But these aren't stories about what's taken from them.

00:26:58.200 They're stories about what it takes to make it out alive.

00:27:01.820 Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart

00:27:04.580 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

00:27:07.760 or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:27:15.960 Let's get right back into it.

00:27:17.880 One of the things that you talk about in your piece is something called the propaganda feedback loop that that was coined by the Columbia law professor Benkler.

00:27:27.040 And this really blew my mind. And the way that you saw it working in the dialogue around Harry and Meghan, can you tell us a bit about how you see that, what it is and how you see it functioning?

00:27:37.740 Yeah. So the propaganda feedback loop, this is developed by a Columbia law professor, Yochai Benkler, who co-authored a book called Network Propaganda. But what they were describing is that in the United States, the right wing media system is basically a closed system.

00:27:59.720 so you have sort of these symbiotic relationships where these outlets like Fox News provide

00:28:07.540 favorable coverage of particular political figures who then will go on those shows and then

00:28:12.760 the audience for that is sort of siloed right like they are not getting other narratives because

00:28:18.260 they're sort of sucked into this and so they're in an alternate reality to get to what you were

00:28:23.320 saying before like if we live in alternate realities we can't function that is an alternate

00:28:27.560 reality. It's very hard to pierce that. This is unrelated to the Megan piece, but what they are

00:28:36.300 trying to show in that book is that the media, the center of gravity on the left and right are

00:28:43.880 asymmetrical, meaning that that propaganda feedback loop is a system that allows for

00:28:54.680 conspiracy theories and false narratives and all of that. And there's nothing external that can

00:28:59.580 come in and check it or correct for it. Whereas even if you have more of a left bias in traditional

00:29:06.580 media, CNN, MSNBC, whatever, there are still guardrails there that prevent largely, you know,

00:29:14.960 complete conspiracies or false narratives from piercing it. And so you have like two different

00:29:19.940 media ecosystems and one that is just more truthful than the other. What I saw playing out

00:29:25.440 with Meghan and Harry is that they were describing a similar feedback loop with the British tabloids

00:29:33.120 and the Royal Palace. It's called the Royal Rhoda, which is this, I guess, some handful of these

00:29:41.540 tabloids or these outlets. And there's just sort of this implicit understanding that as long as

00:29:48.540 the members of the royal family pose and you know give them content uh both in terms of you know

00:29:58.580 photographs stories dirt on other people in the royal family then they get rewarded by favorable

00:30:05.620 coverage or at least by distracting from bad coverage by covering other people it's really

00:30:09.920 sad i mean it was you know it's essentially they're like circus animals where they have to

00:30:16.320 be on display all the time and this media system can like punish them if they're not if they don't

00:30:23.560 play along then they can like you know circulate these narratives and it creates these incentives

00:30:28.820 for members of the royal family to actually throw each other under the bus in order to take you know

00:30:35.360 take the heat off themselves or to get i mean for whatever reason and you see this playing out i

00:30:41.820 think you know with even Harry and his brother right I think this is one of the main reasons

00:30:46.720 that he was really upset with his brother um I don't know that the public audience in the UK 0.70

00:30:53.540 is as you know if there's as much capture as there is here I don't know if they're as siloed

00:31:00.140 so I'm not sure if it's necessarily the exact same as our the propaganda feedback loop on the right

00:31:05.600 here, but that symbiotic relationship between the royal palace and these tabloids, to me,

00:31:13.100 was what I saw playing out. A truism about false information is that, while it can be good to

00:31:19.600 debunk lies on the internet, it doesn't always work, especially with folks who are deeply committed

00:31:24.880 to a false reality. So rather than trying to debunk all the different conspiracy theories

00:31:29.580 and misleading statements out there, one by one, like, no, Meghan Markle did not wear a fake tummy

00:31:35.460 to fake a pregnancy, or no, she did not use a doll as a stand-in for her baby, because

00:31:39.980 that would never work for people who are fully and deeply invested in an alternate reality.

00:31:45.460 Instead, Meghan and Harry are shifting the conversation.

00:31:49.600 One of the things that I think is so fascinating that you point out in your piece is how I

00:31:53.640 think because it being this, like, closed feedback loop where an outsider is never going

00:31:59.160 to be able to pierce it, never going to be able to, like, somebody who is a true believer,

00:32:02.780 they're probably never going to be able to really get any kind of alternative, you know, perspective in there,

00:32:09.120 is that they don't really focus on debunking a lot of the lies and misinformation coming out of this.

00:32:16.860 Instead, they kind of change the narrative and, like, peel back the curtain to sort of explore the ways that the monarchy is this, like, dysfunctional, toxic system.

00:32:25.680 So do you think that's like why they sort of do it that way, that they're like, we're not going to debunk all of the lies and half-truths. We are instead going to like tell a different story.

00:32:35.740 Yeah, they just changed the debate, right? Like they just reframed the whole controversy, which I think was smart, A, because of what you just said, you're not going to convince people who already believe something, but you're just changing the paradigm. And you're exposing how it how the tactic works. This is the key to neutralizing, as we would say in the intelligence world, disinformation is, I mean, you can fact check, you can counter.

00:33:05.740 That's and that's helpful, but it's often not super productive.

00:33:09.880 People, it's very hard to undo someone's belief when they have it.

00:33:15.080 What you can do is explain to them what's being done to them.

00:33:19.060 And then that might open their eyes and make them more skeptical of what they consume after

00:33:25.400 that.

00:33:25.820 Right.

00:33:26.740 You're kind of pulling back the curtain.

00:33:29.080 And I think they did that very smartly.

00:33:30.980 And by reframing the entire controversy in terms of, you know, this is how the royal family is exploited by this, you know, tabloid system that makes money off of this voyeurism of the public.

00:33:48.840 It really places both those outlets and I think the royal palace in a defensive posture, because now they have to explain, like, why do you go along with this?

00:33:59.180 Right.

00:33:59.660 why are you into the outlets like why are you exploiting them so i mean i'm not surprised that

00:34:04.960 i'm sure the british media is really really mad because they just got completely exposed and

00:34:09.760 called out yeah and i'm sure when uh harry's book comes out next week like i'm sure they're all

00:34:16.460 like nobody in the in the palace is like having a good time i'm sure everybody is very stressed

00:34:21.640 a lot on their plates yes i i think i read some snippets of that today or or i saw some tidbits

00:34:28.880 Like, I guess there's drama about how William was beating up on Harry.

00:34:33.840 I don't know, something like that.

00:34:34.800 It sounds like lots of drama will be revealed.

00:34:39.180 What do you think that either the Netflix show or just generally like the media ecosystem around Meghan and Harry,

00:34:47.980 do you think that it tells us anything about how we can counter other more like broad or widespread disinformation campaigns 0.55

00:34:54.800 like critical race theory or, you know, drag queens are out to harm your kids, like things

00:35:00.000 like that. 1.00

00:35:00.500 Like, do you think there's any lessons to be learned there?

00:35:02.840 There are definitely lessons to be learned.

00:35:04.880 And, you know, the CRT thing, I mean, the reframing the controversy is really important

00:35:09.680 there, right?

00:35:10.580 Because that's a very deliberate psyop, basically, a psychological operation to take this term

00:35:19.120 critical race theory, and basically make it a catch-all phrase for teaching anything having

00:35:25.380 to do with race or, you know, no one can define it. And that's the key, right? It becomes shorthand.

00:35:33.580 It's like Hunter Biden's laptop. It's, you know, groomers, all these buzzwords that no one really

00:35:40.240 understands, but it just becomes associated with bad. So if you try to engage on that term,

00:35:45.380 you're always going to be losing i would see people saying but critical race theory isn't

00:35:49.580 taught in you know elementary schools it's not but at this point you're already you're accepting

00:35:55.000 the term why are you why are you fighting about that you know why not respond with why would you

00:36:03.240 not want children to learn about the history of the united states including slavery like that's

00:36:10.340 the question whatever you want to call it but you know so it just to reframe it to stop using the

00:36:17.860 terms that are being given to you stop using the assumptions that are being given to you because

00:36:22.440 it's a trap it's a trap to make you engage in that and then to basically you know keep you

00:36:28.540 tied up in that loop you got to get out of the loop got get out of the loop that's that's words

00:36:35.220 to live by one of my last questions for you how was diana the musical oh my god

00:36:43.440 did you watch that clip i've never i i watched the break dancing because i was like really

00:36:50.900 wasn't it so bad oh my god i was like i wasn't i had nothing to do with the production and i

00:36:57.680 was embarrassed i was so embarrassed i know i know i was like our feet like do these people

00:37:03.820 have no dignity um no it oh it's so bad you have to it's actually so bad you have to watch it

00:37:11.240 so it's so bad it loops back around to good yes you have to watch it a winning endorsement there's

00:37:18.600 a there's a there's a um the thriller in manila with camilla which is like a faux like boxing 0.97

00:37:29.860 fight between diana and come out like i mean it's so it's just so dumb and the lyrics are so dumb

00:37:35.680 and this person who plays diana is not a convincing diana at all right like it's just sort of like why 0.92

00:37:43.460 are you doing this but you can't stop watching it i was like rubbernecking the whole time

00:37:47.700 all right well that's going on my list it sounds like choices were made in this production

00:37:53.240 definitely have to check it out yes where can people follow all the very fascinating work that

00:38:01.120 you are up to i think the best place if you're interested in the topics we talked about today

00:38:07.000 is my sub stack asharingapa.substack.com um that's where i've been writing about this stuff

00:38:15.260 uh i have free content if you're interested in taking the course you can sign up for that too

00:38:21.200 I am on Twitter though

00:38:23.400 I'll be honest I'm trying to

00:38:25.160 wean off I'm trying to use that as a

00:38:27.580 tool to enhance

00:38:29.520 other parts of my professional

00:38:31.380 life

00:38:32.500 and to not

00:38:34.940 let it suck up my whole time that's one of my

00:38:37.120 New Year's resolutions so but you can follow me there too 0.60

00:38:39.420 it's AshaRangappa underscore

00:38:41.440 and

00:38:43.520 those are the two main places

00:38:45.440 We'll see you next time.

00:39:15.440 Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the iHeartRadio app,

00:39:20.060 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:39:35.100 I survived nine months in captivity, and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive

00:39:41.760 of what should have destroyed them.

00:39:43.840 I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.

00:39:47.460 Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable,

00:39:51.160 abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.

00:39:55.000 These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive.

00:39:58.820 Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart

00:40:01.600 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

00:40:04.660 or wherever you get your podcasts.

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00:40:37.040 Honey, is it on? Is it on? Is this thing recording?

00:40:39.780 This is your girl T.S. Madison coming to you 0.58

00:40:41.600 loud, live, and always and forever in color

00:40:43.440 from the Outlaws podcast with me, T.S. Madison.

00:40:45.960 This week, Laverne Cox is

00:40:47.600 back. We're talking about her new

00:40:49.660 book, her controversial ex,

00:40:51.500 and going off on the red carpet.

00:40:53.700 20 minutes later, he was like, let's squash this

00:40:55.520 and talk about it. I was like, no, you do

00:40:57.400 not talk to me like that. That is

00:40:59.540 unacceptable. I walked in and I was like,

00:41:01.520 we need to break up. And can you ever really change

00:41:03.740 a man? Listen to Outlaws 0.78

00:41:05.780 with T.S. Madison on the iHeartRadio

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There Are No Girls on the Internet - January 12, 2023

BONUS： The Meghan Markle information war

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