00:01:54.200So you might have seen that on Wednesday, Facebook announced they were upholding their ban of the twice-impeached former president Donald Trump.
00:02:01.720For now, here's what you need to know.
00:02:04.720Basically, Facebook played a huge part in the January 6th insurrection.
00:02:09.560Facebook was the main platform mentioned by those involved.
00:02:12.560It was used even more than other platforms popular by fringe right-wing types like Parler, according to charging documents from the Department of Justice.
00:02:21.280This is why we saw Facebook and other platforms ban Trump on January 7th,
00:03:46.820The Facebook Oversight Board, it's basically just a way for Facebook leadership to avoid real accountability.
00:03:52.580You know, the kind of accountability that comes with making a decision.
00:03:56.260Facebook has already done so much harm to our discourse and democracy.
00:04:00.280And don't forget, the kind of disinformation, harassment, and inciting of violence that has been allowed to fester on their platform
00:04:06.100overwhelmingly hurts women, LGBTQ folks, and people of color.
00:04:10.900Now, many detractors might say that banning Trump from social media is a violation of freedom of speech.
00:04:16.300But Nora Benavidez, director of the U.S. Free Expression Programs at Pan America Foundation, says those people are just wrong.
00:04:23.980Let's revisit her episode of There Are No Girls on the Internet and listen as she gets into why banning Trump from social media is not a free speech issue.
00:04:32.920Today marks the start of Trump's second impeachment trial for his role in the insurrection on January 6th.
00:04:38.420Here's Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin earlier today at the trial.
00:04:42.560If that's not an impeachable offense, then there is no such thing.
00:04:47.440On the day Congress met to finalize the presidential election,
00:04:51.860he would have you believe there is absolutely nothing the Senate can do about it.
00:04:58.220Now, it's clear that Trump continuously used social media to spread disinformation,
00:05:02.300including the repeated baseless lie that he won the 2020 election and that it was being stolen from him.
00:05:07.960That lie, as we know, culminated in his supporters attacking the Capitol.
00:05:12.240But even before that, Trump has always used social media to incite violence, stoke tensions, and spread distortions and baseless claims.
00:05:19.680That is, until January 8th, when Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms finally gave Trump the boot.
00:05:25.920But don't give tech leaders too much credit.
00:05:28.360They only did this after years of pressure from platform accountability advocates
00:05:32.420who warned that failure to act could lead to the kind of violence that we saw on January 6th.
00:05:38.140And even now, Facebook's oversight board is weighing whether they made the right decision
00:05:54.180But Nora Benavidez, free speech attorney and the director of U.S. free expression programs at Pan America Foundation, a nonprofit that protects and promotes free expression, says that when it comes to understanding free speech on social media platforms, a lot of us are asking the wrong questions.
00:06:08.780I remember when the insurrection happened, it felt for me like total whiplash.
00:06:13.660There was still a kind of hesitancy, you know, concern, like what was going to happen in the lead up to the inauguration.
00:06:20.520And so that January 6th just somehow felt not too surprising, but still very, very jarring. And in, you know, the weeks that have followed, we've just tried to, you know, be responsive to people.
00:06:35.500You know, people have questions like, were the people storming the Capitol exercising their First Amendment rights? Did Trump have a right to be on Twitter and on Facebook? And so a lot of questions have emerged that we've just tried to be ready to answer and to talk with people about what's really happening, because they're really, really complex issues.
00:06:56.200So full disclosure, like I have worked, as you know, work with organizations that have tried to pressure social media platforms to take disinformation seriously. And so a big part of that has been asking them to remove Trump when he, you know, tweets things that are incendiary or like inciting violence.
00:07:14.760And truly, I don't think I ever thought I would see Trump be banned from platforms.
00:07:19.600Like, I remember when that happened, I was fully kind of surprised because I think I
00:07:25.040was quite used to the idea that, oh, he's just above consequences or accountability.
00:10:41.020And truly, what has been the downside?
00:10:44.180Less noise, less lies, you know, spreading like wildfire on these platforms.
00:10:49.960It's been interesting to see how there was such a quick benefit, like a quick and obvious
00:10:55.760benefit with like very few in my book, if any, downsides.
00:11:00.980I think there may be the downside of people who supported Trump feeling somehow more,
00:11:07.720quote unquote, like in air quotes, I'm doing this, censored.
00:11:11.020And that somehow their censorship, right, makes them emotional, driving them potentially to be more upset. And you know my work on sort of the psychology side of misinformation and that I think we have to, you know, stay vigilant to the ways that people will be emotional to information, the way we are all emotional to news.
00:11:34.740I mean, our relationship to news is emotional. We've seen the way, you know, platforms hinge our interactions on our likes or dislikes. And so it's, I think, important to make sure we don't completely marginalize people that may actually be movable, maybe not today, but down the line.
00:11:53.880And so I just, I kind of have this like lingering concern about how we engage those that continue to believe alternate realities, you know, that continue to want to see Trump. And it's really hard to reach those people.
00:12:08.380So I just, it's like a sort of weird gut instinct where I kind of wonder, what are they thinking about? How can we sort of call them in and talk with them about these issues in ways where, you know, if they had been unmovable before, slowly, slowly, some of these Trump supporters are starting to see the cracks in that reality.
00:12:31.580I hadn't even thought about that, sort of the kind of emotional response that someone might have to feeling the shame of, you know, a platform saying your ideas, what you have to say is not acceptable here.
00:12:46.760I hadn't even really thought about that. And I think it really highlights to me that at the heart of a lot of your work with PEN America and just generally is empathy and sort of trying to remember that deep down we're talking about people.
00:12:59.120people are all complex. We are all, all humans are like driven by a complex series of feelings
00:13:05.520and motivations internally. And so remembering that these are not just users, quote unquote,
00:13:10.640but they're people who have these complex emotional responses. I think that empathy
00:13:14.700can get lost in conversations about disinformation and how it spreads and what motivates people to
00:13:21.460spread it. But I'm grateful that that idea seems to be at the heart of so much of the work that
00:13:28.000you do to create off-ramps for folks like this? Bridget, I have to say, I never thought I would
00:13:34.320play even close to the therapist role that I feel like I do sometimes. Being a lawyer,
00:13:42.080thinking about the law, thinking about legality on Twitter or Facebook, and yet being faced with
00:13:48.200people who ask questions and actually want to engage somehow. And I think that the problem
00:13:56.940the internet has bred is that, as we all know, we're siloed, we seek out our own, and difference
00:14:03.860of any sort, whether it's something we can accept and listen to, or something we find so offensive
00:14:09.780and egregious, like, we simply want to shut it down and not hear it. And Trump, I think, went so
00:14:15.540far as to then, when he heard things he didn't like, he called those lies. And the tendency,
00:14:20.060of course, is to shut people out, to disengage, and that is not getting us anywhere. In fact,
00:14:28.200I think the idea that we never engage with people who are radicalizing or that we never seek out
00:14:34.880others has led to things like the insurrection, where we need to engage, we need to find entry
00:14:41.280points. And I think we need to have a kind of expectation setting where we're not all going
00:14:46.420to agree, but we can exist in disagreement and be civil and believe in each other's humanity.
00:14:52.780Of course, if our disagreement is grounded in someone believing you or I shouldn't exist or
00:14:58.400have the same rights, that's different. But the level of empathy that I hope we can bring
00:15:03.180sometimes to our online discourse is something that can try to create space for understanding.
00:15:10.500and I'm really glad that you see and talk about empathy in this way that you see the value of
00:15:18.580those things that as someone who is a storyteller you know you focus in media and stories like it's
00:15:25.200so critical to remember that even if we find it somehow offensive like we have to find ways to
00:15:31.660engage and find each other's humanity even if it sounds corny it doesn't sound corny I mean I
00:15:36.960often, it's, you said that you feel like a therapist, and when I have these conversations
00:15:41.100about tech platforms, it's funny how often they turn to sort of things that sound a bit corny,
00:15:46.220like empathy, or, you know, remembering there's a human on the other end of the screen,
00:15:50.640things like that. And I think you really hit on something that is one of the reasons why I'm so
00:15:56.280interested in disinformation and making this show, is that I feel that the thing that you
00:16:01.560just described, the silos and sort of people being closed off and all of that, I feel like
00:16:06.960we've gotten to a place where you can no longer assume, it's no longer easy to assume good faith
00:16:12.720when you're having discussions on the internet, right? When I first got online, the reason why
00:16:16.760I found such a freedom and love of talking on the internet was because it felt like I was able to
00:16:23.440reach so many different people, get so many different perspectives, and it felt relatively
00:16:27.660safe. Now, I feel that that doesn't, like that safety is gone, right? Like when I have a
00:16:34.620conversation with somebody on Twitter, I'm not sure if there's someone who we can have a good
00:16:40.300faith disagreement or a good faith dialogue. It just feels like we're no longer able to assume
00:16:44.500good faith in all of our discourse online because the temperature has been turned up
00:16:48.220so high in part by things like disinformation and, you know, lies and violent rhetoric online.
00:16:55.340I'm going to like make it really personal. Sometimes I get retweeted on Twitter
00:16:59.260by people who then have a comment about my tweet. And often the assumptions, often wild assumptions
00:17:08.100people will make about more of me and who I am really stress me out. And I totally, totally know
00:17:17.900what you're saying, where it feels like you may not be able to trust someone. And so I often try
00:17:24.300to then engage with the people that retweet me, whether it is someone on, frankly, any side of
00:17:29.880the political spectrum, making these assumptions. And in no way to defend myself, but just to
00:17:35.880open conversation, I've had really wonderful learning experiences where people will
00:17:42.060kind of turn down their temperature when I respond in ways that engage them with open-ended
00:17:48.260questions, which is hard to do. I mean, you can't do that at scale every day. And that's one of the
00:17:55.500questions that I think about all the time is how we scale empathy. But in the meantime, those like
00:18:01.460little one-offs that can help change or slowly, you know, bring people together and help their
00:18:07.480attitudes kind of move at a slower pace where they're assuming less about me or you, I think
00:18:13.340is a great thing. Um, and the internet has changed. I mean, I remember when something
00:18:18.600like section two 30, you know, not to get technical, but when that was an exciting
00:18:23.120regulation to actually help people feel safer on the internet, to be able to like have conversations
00:18:29.080on blogs and the, you know, the internet is just such a different place now that it feels so, um,
00:18:37.080you're always like just about to have a complete crisis on Twitter. That's how I always feel. I'm
00:18:42.060like, oh, this could really go badly. And, and we can't all spend all of our days, you know,
00:18:48.260having those meaningful, slow conversations. So I guess I just sort of wonder, like,
00:18:53.580how do we scale empathy? Let's take a quick break.
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00:20:28.360Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable.
00:20:32.900I knew if he woke up, without a doubt, he was going to hurt me.
00:20:37.440I started feeling that there was someone at the end of my bed, and I just started screaming.
00:20:44.900They are abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.
00:20:48.860But these aren't stories about what's taken from them.
00:20:52.300They're stories about what it takes to make it out alive.
00:20:55.440Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:21:04.400If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.
00:21:10.320This is Prose Society, the weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for thought daughters, pop culture obsessives, and anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:21:22.800I'm Eli Rallo, and every week we're connecting the dots between books,
00:21:26.500the internet, and the conversations everyone can't stop having.
00:21:29.920I'm going to have to look up this story.
00:22:12.360We need to completely reimagine how we think of the internet.
00:22:15.280And that means rethinking so much of the infrastructure around technology.
00:22:18.940It means creating a tech press that centers and valorizes empathy, not scale.
00:22:23.700It means building platforms that center people, not, quote, users, or clicks, or how much time we spend with our faces at a screen.
00:22:31.060Now, what I'm describing is a radical reimagining, and it might sound as big or as complicated as, like, smashing the patriarchy or ending white supremacy.
00:23:10.940to everything. You know, the best tech emphasis, like the people who are working on innovation
00:23:18.140that I think are doing the best work, understand that these are not tech issues. They're human
00:23:24.860issues. And we're never going to solve everything by sort of abdicating control or brainstorming to
00:23:33.060what can be automated, what, you know, AI can do, what the platforms can do better somehow to
00:23:39.740basically game our way out of what humans are fundamentally now doing, which is why are we
00:23:45.480hateful sometimes? Like, why are we bigoted? Why do people have an interest in trolling others?
00:23:51.640And so I think that, you know, a lot of the solutions have to be human centered, where we
00:23:56.840instead of just saying, oh, well, the platforms can do X, Y, Z, or the government can do all these
00:24:01.700other things. Like, well, what can we do? You know, like, what can everyday people do to feel
00:24:06.500more empowered. Like maybe they can build, imagine this, like build an ecosystem of users and other
00:24:13.280people they enjoy connecting with. I mean, can you imagine the joy of actually thinking that your
00:24:19.640Twitter feed is an interesting place to learn things instead of just who has the best like
00:24:24.900breaking news 140 character tweet? That would be really exciting, I think. So I love the idea. And
00:24:31.860I think there just need to be more of us doing this, like more of us committed to talking about
00:24:37.320humans and how humans fit into what we're doing as users, because it really should go the other
00:24:43.080way around. Users don't come first. It should be people coming first. You're actually doing a lot
00:24:47.640of that work in terms of building more people who see things like that. At Penn, you have this
00:24:53.380weekly series where you are joined by other journalists and other thinkers to help people
00:24:58.480understand the role that we all play in making the internet a better place. Can you talk about
00:25:03.160some of the steps that people, anyone listening could take to help make the internet a safer and
00:25:08.480better place? Oh, Bridget, that's like my favorite question. You just, you got me at the sweet spot.
00:25:15.160I'm like, here we go. Well, you know, we've looked at disinformation for years and everyone always
00:25:22.700asks, what's the solution? And so kind of to, you know, my last point, I think a lot of it,
00:25:26.900we have to focus on humans and give people power to, you know, take control of what they're seeing
00:25:33.940online. So I always think it's best to frankly, just start with understanding what you do when
00:25:39.320you're online. You know, like, how are you consuming information, Bridget? Is it on Twitter?
00:25:43.500Are you, let's be honest, are you going to Facebook? And are you clicking on links? Or are
00:25:48.160you maybe privately just reading the headline that I shared or your other friend shared? Like,
00:25:53.300let's be real, you know, like, sometimes that's all I do. I'm like, Oh, I can make a wild
00:25:57.900assumption based on what Bridget shared. And I'm not even clicking the link. So just sort of like
00:26:02.420taking a pulse, being honest with yourself. Are you going to Fox News? Are you going to the New
00:26:08.800York Times? Are you going to, you know, news websites? How are you doing things? Are you
00:26:13.380listening to podcasts like this? I think it's good to know how you consume information. And then I
00:26:19.460also think with that we should all start asking ourselves how we feel when we're online like are
00:26:25.340you feeling anxious when you read things are you angry a lot of times disinformation will thrive
00:26:32.200because we're emotional and we often want to share things we want to engage with people quickly
00:26:37.320and so we'll accept something without fact checking it without thinking about or asking
00:26:42.400ourselves you know who wrote this where did it come from why am I seeing it so if you can just
00:26:47.680sort of pause, like that is my number one recommendation. Pause to ask a number of things,
00:26:53.980but just pause. And from slowing down, I think we actually could all benefit. You know, we could
00:27:02.640potentially share less misinformation. We could also then think more carefully about what our own
00:27:09.320attitudes are based on what we're seeing. A whole host of, I mean, frankly, empathy could arise out
00:27:16.280of just slowing down and getting to a place where we're not just liking, disliking, loving,
00:27:22.300laughing at things, but maybe where we're in a place of, huh, I want to learn more about that.
00:27:27.100Yeah. If you were in my kitchen right now where I am, I have a Post-it note on my laptop that
00:27:32.280just says, slow down. And it's just a reminder for me, just in all the ways, because I can
00:27:38.740sometimes move too quickly just in life. Totally.
00:27:41.280Yeah. But I think that the idea of just taking a breath, taking a beat has been so helpful. It sounds so basic, but before I started really thinking critically about the way that I felt when I was online, I would be moving so quickly.
00:27:58.980And then when I started to slow down a bit, I actually kept a little journal. So if I saw something that made me feel anxious, I would write that down. If I saw something that made me my heart race, I would write that down.
00:28:09.340If I saw something that made me laugh, I would write that down. And from doing that, I really
00:28:13.960saw the ways that I, it's just like my brain chemistry was just firing so quickly and I wasn't
00:28:20.900even stopping to think. And I find that, you know, when you have those moments where somebody tweets
00:28:26.000something and they like really wish they had it and it's going viral and you're like, oh God,
00:28:29.440I always wonder, were they in that moment where they've just been seeing so many different takes
00:28:34.540and different jokes and different tweets, their brain is no longer processing what they're doing,
00:28:38.760that they're just putting a tweet into the world without even really thinking about it.
00:28:41.680And so I really find so much value in almost thinking about using the internet as a kind
00:28:47.480of meditative practice and an opportunity to really be mindful of just how you're doing,
00:31:05.900even though sometimes it feels like we don't.
00:31:08.080You're not going to be great at this overnight.
00:31:11.900You know, it won't be like suddenly you feel more excited
00:31:17.040or eager to be online and to find this healthier internet.
00:31:22.200But I think that it can slowly lead to other practices.
00:31:27.720And if you can start with slowing down, so let's say just questioning yourself, you know, scrolling at a slower pace, finding then interesting articles and pieces of content and people to follow and connect with, then you may frankly start wondering other things.
00:31:46.980You know, you can maybe get better at spotting when a headline lacks context.
00:31:52.460You know, I've gotten to the point where it doesn't happen overnight, but, you know, you can sort of be scrolling and you read a piece of content and you're like, huh, I would normally be really upset by that.
00:32:03.740Why would I be upset? Like, could I explore what the underlying reason would be?
00:32:09.460And when you slow down like that to ask deeper questions, not just about my own reaction, but about the piece of content you're seeing, I actually think we all are training ourselves to have a kind of media literacy and digital literacy that everyone's going to need in the future.
00:32:27.860I mean, the internet isn't going away.
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00:34:02.000If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.
00:34:08.440This is Prose Society, the weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for thought daughters,
00:34:14.580pop culture obsessives, and anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:34:20.620I'm Eli Rallo, and every week we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and the conversations everyone can't stop having.
00:34:27.740I'm going to have to look up this story.
00:34:30.880From best-selling authors and your favorite book talk creators to the latest pop culture moments, nothing is off the table.
00:34:37.280It's like if you can hide some real messages inside compelling characters, then that is a Trojan horse.
00:34:45.180Whether you're looking for literary deep dives, smart pop culture conversations, or a community of readers who love to think a little too much, you're in the right place.
00:34:54.360Listen to Pro Society on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:36:09.840I believe that the only way that some of these platforms will meaningfully, you know, rethink the role they've had in spreading misinformation and hate is if we make it unprofitable, right?
00:36:21.100And so, like, if it hurts your bottom line to traffic in hate and violent rhetoric and disinformation, that's the only way that I think that some of these companies will stop trafficking in it, I guess.
00:36:33.020And I think that the way to do that can be so individual.
00:36:36.960Like, I'm not going to engage with it.
00:38:13.960And just do the thing that we're already doing a little bit, you know, question what we're seeing, wonder if there are ways that we want to explore or learn more about something if we know that it's misleading.
00:38:28.180Yeah, even so you mentioned like when you share something based on a headline, that thing that Twitter has now, which I think is a great tool, but sometimes I feel kind of dragged by it where it's like, do you want to read the article before you retweet it?
00:38:39.800How many times have you not read it, Bridget?
00:38:41.640Be honest, because I, every time, haven't read it.
00:38:45.660Yes, and it honestly is a good reminder.
00:38:48.820And when I get it, I'm like, oh, come on.
00:38:51.580I'm retweeting an article by somebody that I know.
00:39:05.980So you want to switch gears a little bit.
00:39:07.860As we're seeing right now, elected officials are being held accountable for their role in either supporting or inciting the insurrection.
00:39:14.040Trump was obviously kicked off social media platforms.
00:39:16.640Senator Josh Hawley's book was briefly dropped by its publisher.
00:39:19.660And kind of along the same lines of free speech online, I've seen a lot of people asking questions about what is commonly known as, quote, cancel culture.
00:39:27.700So what are your thoughts on so-called cancel culture as a free speech attorney?
00:39:43.060And part of what I think is difficult is that cancel culture often seems to imply that you're going to be in a way canceled from an existing platform, you know, like from your base, which also then to me suggests that you have a base to be canceled from.
00:39:59.320You know, you don't talk about canceling someone who isn't very well known. And I think there's this interesting power dynamic within the paradigm of thinking that there's a cancel culture. I think it's more interesting to weigh what's at stake here.
00:40:14.820You know, when we think about someone like Donald Trump, was he canceled? I honestly think that he was legitimately taken off the Internet because of the real world harm his words online have. And that is not cancel culture.
00:40:29.360That is like a very deep, difficult balance where all of us, whether it is regulators, policymakers, platform people, everyday users like you and me, like what are his words doing to our world?
00:40:45.900It is a drastically dangerous step when he spreads lies, when he sows discord, when he promotes hate, all of the different ways that I think the platforms may be in being late.
00:41:00.920Somehow, if I had to guess, we're thinking that it would not be that bad, not be that bad.
00:41:06.160And somehow the insurrection was that crack, that like breaking point where people realized, oh, online issues have real world harms, which has happened before.
00:41:14.840We've seen it when there are mass shootings. We've seen it when there are acts of terrorism and other types of bombings. And what's fascinating in that moment is that I'm like, is that cancel culture? I don't think that is. I think that that is a private company taking necessary actions to limit or triage the type of real world harm that's happening.
00:41:36.260I think it was absolutely too late. And I always think that it was too late. At the same time,
00:41:42.900Donald Trump is a public figure and was an elected official who was leading this country.
00:41:48.300And so there is also this interest in hearing sort of unedited what he says. And so from a
00:41:58.080free expression perspective, I always wonder, what is the most speech we can have with the least harm?
00:42:03.360I think we passed the harm point, frankly, some time ago. But there is definitely, I think we have to stay committed to having access, all of us, to various forms of expression. Because free expression rights aren't just Donald Trump's right to say what he wants. We all have free expression rights to access what various people are saying.
00:42:25.640I have the right to then hear what you are saying. You have the right to hear what I am saying.
00:42:29.980And in some parts of the world, part of what we have to keep in mind is Facebook, Twitter. That's
00:42:35.040all the Internet. That's all people have. That's the only connection they have to what's happening
00:42:39.140politically. We are seeing right now in Myanmar with the Internet being shut down, that is a
00:42:44.040political tactic to silence dissidence and dissent. And so it's a difficult question to answer when
00:42:51.300there are questions implicated in that larger one around who is speaking, what is the effect
00:42:57.160offline, is it damaging when in total it seems to tip the scales towards violence and hate.
00:43:06.760I have to say, in general, I hate conversations about, quote, cancel culture because the concept
00:43:12.660just seems so disingenuous. When people talk about the importance of being willing to engage
00:43:17.460ideas one might not agree with, it always somehow seems like marginalized people are0.91
00:43:22.360the ones expected to be doing the engaging.
00:43:25.080And arguing with people who are hell bent on misunderstanding you is exhausting.
00:43:29.280And if you aren't even able to talk about something with a shared set of guiding facts,
00:43:33.260the sky is blue, two plus two is four, Trump lost the election, then it can really get
00:43:38.900When the election happened in November and Biden won, there was, I think rightly,
00:43:47.460a kind of exhaustion. You know, people were so tired of fighting and eager to disengage completely
00:43:55.200from what might be different. And I'm with a lot of those people. I think it's really exhausting
00:44:02.200work to try to engage with people who disagree. And you have to always know that ultimately,
00:44:09.740you know, a lot of conversations will not be productive. And it isn't on you or me to do the
00:44:15.400labor of teaching someone. Like, someone else's teachable moment isn't necessarily my job.
00:44:21.080At the same time, I think, like, the crisis and the basic human crisis we're in of how divided we
00:44:26.640are merits a very serious examination that we all need to sit with, of, like, what is it where we
00:44:32.500are interested in disengaging all the time with anything different? And that permeates all of us.
00:44:39.020And so I think the thesis is, you know, why are we driven to do things that divide us? And then how can we overcome our own instincts to actually broker conversation, to find an entry point, even if it's little and even if it only happens for a couple of minutes?
00:44:57.360Like, that is the beginning of being able to find what I think is the antidote to disinformation, where we have a shared basis of facts.
00:45:06.300Even if you and I disagree on policies, like, we can both look at a set of facts and say, yeah, that's what we're basing our opinion on.
00:45:14.120And we may differ than on what we think needs to happen, but we can agree on certain things.
00:45:18.400And we have absolutely not reached that point of being able to agree on basic facts.
00:45:23.760Yeah, that's exactly where I want to get us to.
00:45:25.500You know, we can disagree, but we are all on the same page about some basic facts.
00:46:02.640And it seems like such a low bar, but that's where I want to get us to, a place where we have a shared reality.
00:46:07.760I mean, it should be a low bar, but honestly, there's also just like so much bigotry and hate that a lot of those kinds of civil discussions are not grounded in mutual humanity.
00:46:18.820So, you know, my civil rights background is like, how do we have the most for the most people? And how do we maintain and protect basic rights for people who have traditionally and historically been marginalized in every institution?
00:46:34.180So there's this other piece that informs the work I do and how I think about mis- and disinformation, because I know that it affects different communities differently. Black and brown people are targeted with disinformation so that they are disenfranchised and believe their voice doesn't matter.
00:46:50.580So sort of in the middle of all of it, I'm like, I still very much have eyes wide open that some of us will be affected, targeted and marginalized in more specific and acute ways that have massive effects on democracy.
00:47:05.260So I don't want to sit here like Pollyanna, you know, oh, it's all going to be great if we could just find moments of like factual shared belief, because some of that assumes that other people will believe you and I matter as much as anyone else.
00:47:20.100And the reality is a lot of people don't think that. But some are movable. Some are people where
00:47:28.340you engage and they are not like hateful people interested in less for certain people. And that's
00:47:37.120the moment where I'm hoping to reach at least some pockets of the United States. So you sound pretty
00:47:42.040hopeful? Oh, Bridget. I actually have a lot of hope. I mean, when I was younger, I don't want
00:47:51.280to get too misty-eyed, but I would work in the South with people like John Lewis and civil rights
00:47:57.020figures. And they always said that change takes a lifetime. It takes many lifetimes. And this
00:48:03.600intractable issue of how we connect is one of the biggest issues, I think, of our lifetime.
00:48:09.400And it's very slow. So I am hopeful in the sense that I see every day more and more people interested in doing this work. I see movement lawyers, I see amazing researchers finding data, you know, and trying to find ways to triage the way the internet is making us all bleed.
00:48:55.520And then Penn America has trainings around media literacy and disinformation defense almost weekly. And that all is on Penn.org. Our next series is going to focus on Black and Latino mistrust around the vaccination process and try to help walk people through why hesitancy is OK, why it's OK to question, you know, is the vaccine good?
00:49:21.660Should I get it? And so we'll be doing a series around like disinformation and COVID later this0.64
00:49:28.860month. And then we're also going to be doing work on how community organizers can embed messaging
00:49:34.900in their work with communities. We really want to empower people to feel like they know how to
00:49:39.900talk about these issues when someone comes to them. So more to come, Penn.org, you can check it all out.
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00:50:05.320Disinformed is brought to you by There Are No Girls on the Internet.
00:50:08.020It's a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative.
00:50:10.900Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer.
00:50:13.040Tari Harrison is our supervising producer and engineer.
00:50:16.020Michael Amato is our contributing producer.