After Vanessa Guillén's tragic death, her story was used to fuel disinformation and hate online
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This episode talks about sexual assault, murder, and suicide. There Are No Girls on the Internet as a production of I Heart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet. Vanessa Gien was a twenty year old soldier in the U. S. Army. She loved sports. She played soccer and liked to jog. In April, she went missing from the Fort Hood military base in Texas. On her remains were confirmed to have been found. Here's her sister talking to ABC News. She was taking away from me the most horrible way, Yet they take it if it was a joke. My sister's no choke. My sister to human means just like me, her, all of us. Aaron David Robinson, another soldier, killed himself as police for trying to take him into custody for her murder. Before she eyed, Gian told her mother that she was being sexually harassed. Forthood is one of the highest rates of murder, sexual assault, and harassment in the army. Online, many other soldiers used what happen to her to come forward to share their own stories about sexual harassment in the military, using the call I Am Vanessa Gien. Her family is demanding changes and how the military handles sexual harassment complaints, and protesters around the country amplified her family's demands for answers and change. Gian's death is a terrible tragedy, and for as many people used her death to highlight important conversations about how our country's institutions fail the very people who fight for our country, others used it to fuel hate and confusion. Online researchers and digital activists are seeing the way her tragic story is being used to feel disinformation in Latin X online spaces. Because her killer was believed to be a black man, Big Facebook pages began promoting stories about Vaness's death as a way to sew divisions between Latin X communities and Black Lives Matter advocates. Unfortunately, when it comes to how disinformation spreads online, this isn't at all uncommon. Bad actors pick up on sensitive or emotionally charged topics involving wedge issues like race and use them to spread fear, confusion, and suspicion among each other. They often exploit existing fractures between communities to pit marginalized groups against each other. But because we don't actually spend a lot of time talking about marginalized communities in general, let alone how our identities shape the online experience. We aren't talking about the big threat this tactic presents, and it's a problem. So the first time that actually became aware of how targeted are folks are was in two sixteen when I saw someone on my Facebook posted a picture of an ICE agent or someone who looked like an ICE agent with sort of the eyes, um, you know, acronymy the back of his jacket arresting someone at what looked like was a polling location and um, it was something along the lines, and someone had posted it said be careful everyone, ICE is you know, around the voting locations, and you know, when I looked at it closely, I was like, well, this looks this picture looks photoshopped. But that was sort of the first time that I saw something that I was like, huh, they're actually somebody's actually thinking this true and kind of knows the nerves in the of the community in terms of the figure the figures that exist in our communities, even though we all know that, you know, undocumented people are not going to go vote, but the message that we're trying to send is like, you know, immigration is doing raids around voting locations. You know, therefore people might just be fearful of going because you know, some folks are living in mixed status families and so on and so forth. So I was sort of the first time that I saw something and it just made me pause and think about the level of disinformation that was spreading targeting the Latino community. Vanessa Cardinas is a long time activist and policy expert. She's seen the way that disinformation online plays on our community sphere to create confusion, but when she saw the way again stories being used online, she was shocked. So that was actually really shocking, UM, because obviously the Vanessa Gillian case has touched such a nerve in the community in the sense of you know, this the soldier that you know has dedicated her life for a country. So I guess I would say, you know, probably like two weeks, well maybe like a little bit right after they identify the suspect of the case, you know, I would say dates after it I started seeing some of these um pictures in me is about UM pretty much about the you know, the the suspected killer, and just driving this message of you know, black and brown tensions and just amplifying the sort of the message or you know, where where is the Black Lives Matter movement when it comes to a Latino that has been killed by a black person. So that was again really eye opening. But I also feel it was at least for me, by then, I was already just I've been aware more of sort of disinformation that's been spreading, so I was not surprised. But again, I think it just speaks to the level of this strategy that's out there about amplifying fear, distrust and just creating wedges between these communities, which I think we're going to see morals and there are these bad actors are really using every opportunity they can to to actually, you know, create this wedges. Facebook groups with big followings and reach made posts about Gien's death asking why the Latin Next community should support Black Lives Matter when a black man killed one of their own. The intention is pretty clear. Rather than amplifying her important story and her family's calls for justice and change, is an attempt to use her story to so mistrust and animosity between marginalized communities. Why, researchers say it has to do with the upcoming election. A Cobra Lacona is the disinformation research lead at ecky Slabs, a group that works to build an active Latino electorate. His team saw pretty much the same thing she did, that Gian's story was being used to criticize Black Lives Matter and the protests that followed the death of unarmed black people like George Floyd by police. We started seeing conservative on X accounts, including you know, Spanish language pages, trying to build racial tension between black and LATINX communities after they found her body and her death was confirmed, and so we saw conservative Latin X actors starting to criticize Black Lives Matter for not protesting her death and for staying silent. And you know, after they found her body, the man who was linked to her murder killed himself either the same day or the next day, and so we saw conservative Latin X accounts promoting you know, race blindness around gain by amplifying the fact that the killer was a black man and that you know, they started promoting all Lives Matter narratives and things like that. So we saw you know, different memes comparing the black man who killed thee into the white police officer and essentially saying, you know, promoting an arave that race has nothing to do with Floyd's killing. Or we also saw bad actors, you know, asking why Latinos weren't We're protesting for BLM, but weren't protesting for other Latinos like Manessa. And so you know, there was a lot of racial tension building early on once you know, reports came once reports came out and they found her body. So do you think the people who were running these accounts actually cared about sharing gian story? I mean, I think they're definitely trying to make it like a wedge issue. And we often see even in just in other narratives, bad actors trying to you know, seek to inflame pre existing tensions within in between communities. So you know, part of their goal is to depress votes and more progressive communities, including the LATINEX community, And so if they can build a wedge between black and line X voters, that can you know, potentially drive some of those people to Trump in November. But I think one big problem here is that, you know, within the LATINX community, we've kind of failed to confront the anti blackness that exists in our own community, and I think the far right definitely takes advantage of that to stoke racial tension. So, you know, one thing is important that we start acknowledging the anti blackness that exists in our community and show unity. Um. And you know, we should especially be doing this because again, like black and LITEX are not mutually exclusive, you know, the far right and many people in the LATX community tend to ignore the after latin X community, and so especially they're right, you know, the right is effectively excluding them from the from their narratives and we should ignore. And I don't think we should be ignoring that. So like going back to Van Vanessa's death specifically, um, you know, I think with an increase and attention on Black Lives Matter and even you know, brands responding to current moments of racial justice, we see a lot of bad actors looking for opportunities to create division among communities of color. Let's take a quick break center back. Facebook is a big part of how this all goes down. For instance, the pro Trump Facebook group The Conservative Choice has over a hundred thousand followers, and many of their posts are dedicated to criticizing black celebrities like Colin caprett black Lives Matter and calls for racial justice. One post even accuses Facebook, the company itself, of supporting racism by telling people to avoid Latino businesses because of an initiative highlighting black owned business Similarly, online protesters calls for businesses to hire more black people get twisted into them calling for businesses not to hire Latinos. Many of the other posts on the page our videos or images depicting violent attacks on Latinos or Latino owned businesses by black people to drive home the idea that the Latin X community shouldn't trust or support the Black community like a cobo. Vanessa also sees the ways that anti blackness and the erasure of Afro latin X identities have presented fractures and tensions and communities of color that bad actors can exploit online. So, Vanessa, what kind of content have you seen online being used to so division within communities of color? Yes, so we're seeing a lot of um the stories for example, UM of black men violently attacking Latino men, you know, very graphic valent post pictures. Um. That's one thing, and and I should say something also bridge and that is that we know that there are black people in the Latino community, Like we have a rich history of Afro you know, of African descent in the community, whether it's the Caribbean or pro and I'm from Bolivia and even and even in Bolivia we have Bolivians who are of African descent. So you know. But but the way this um um discurrent disinformation efforts, you know, what they're trying to do is just you know, make us look like the other right, like separate us. So you do have sort of, like I was saying, this really graphic posts just amplifying violence that is incurred. That is how they describe it or in how they posted you know, by black men. There's also a lot of content out there about painting the Black Lives Movement about you know, that is violent. Um they have a lot of content that's showing, for example that the Black Lives Movement protesters are destroying churches or burning bibles. So really going at sort of you know, some of the themes of you know, Latino community. It's very you know, faith center, and so they're trying to sort of agreeing to go at this pressure point and hit those nerves where the community on things that the community cares about we are on the alien case. There's there's been a lot of content out there amplifying that her that that the alleged killer was black, and promoting the all Lives Matter narrative and questioning how come the black Lives movement doesn't show up for Latinos when Latinos are being killed and so on and so forth. So that's the type of content we're seeing now and UM and again we know that every time there's a flashpoint or every time there's something that's happening just you know, a national the national level or even at the local level. I mean, there was a there were some posts I think it was, UM, I want to say in Luisiana about just about the Black Lives Matter movement. UM. I think that there was a demand that, you know, all businesses should hire people of color. And but then how they were how the bots or the sort of the disinformation but actors were trying to frame it was that the black Lives movement, we're forcing Latino business owners to hire, not to hire you know, non Latinos, so things like that, right, So they're trying to again press this UM this this really um specific issues in the community where they know that it hits a nerve and just just amplify those. And we know we're gonna be getting more of those as things get just more heated as we come closer to the election. We all truly blessed at the same time to have a leader like President Trump, who is a builder bad actors online sees on conversations that require sensitivity or nuance to talk about, just like they had no problem seizing on Gian's death to push harmful narratives online. After Goya CEO faced backlash for praising Trump earlier this year, some accounts purporting to belong to Latino social media users used it to spread accusations of a mob of PC bullies attacking a hard working community of color. But Wind Black Polente, a group that trains voters to identify disinformation, found that some of the accounts pushing this narrative were actually bots online. The Goya controversy appeared to boil down to Black Lives Matter versus the Latin next community. Ashley Bryant works with Wind Black Polente, and she says social media platforms aren't doing enough to curb the spread of this kind of disinformation. We just experienced a couple of weeks ago when the Goya CEO you know, decided to share his support for Trump, UM and that came a controversy in itself, but also unleashed a right wing operation around UM, you know, trying to really disparage the true message. You know, Julian Castro and UM AOC you know, really stepped up and and shared you know, if you share the values of Trump, you are not supporting our community. And UM, you know, we saw a bot be unleashed on Facebook within you know, a couple of hours, and it took a couple of days before Facebook was able to actually remove these um you know, fake comments, fake agents. UM, and our operations saw it within a day, right, And so it's just you know, there's hundreds of people in their in their organization that are allegedly focused on this, but yet we were able to identify that these were boughts and just under a couple of hours. And so you know, it really is um disheartening to see that these companies aren't really ready to step up into this moment. This isn't a partisan issue, right, Misinformation and disinformation is not a political issue. It is literally to suppress entire communities that need to exercise their right to vote, and if these tech companies don't see it that way, you really have to question what their purposes are. But that's also saw the way that conversations around Goya oversimplified the narrative online. But she says the narratives pushing division, even when Trump himself picks up on it, probably won't resonate much with most folks in the Latin next community. I mean, I think they're trying really hard to sort of make the connection. Obviously, even the Trump administration right picked up on it, um, getting Ivanka to post that ridiculous UM tweet with her holding um a kind of Goya being. Again, I think they're just sort of trying to amplify the wedges and just really indicates of Goya. You know, I think that the average let you know, who's you know again, losing their jobs because of COVID and just trying to figure out how they're going to survive this pandemic. This is not something that resonates with them. UM. But I do think again, there's online there's just this effort to say, you know, Democrats are against business owners, Democrats are trying to shut this down when we know that that's you know that that was not the case. I mean, people have the thing that people had issue with, where the comments of the going a president who again is supporting Trump, and Trump we know is driving a very dic divisive and just really anti Latino agenda. So that that's the point. And I think part of this again there is this information effort is just to confuse the truth, right, it's to just to to take attention from the real issues and just focusing on sort of the specific narratives that benefits them. And it goes along to sort of their their overall frame that Democrats are socialists. The Democrats, you know, don't believe in the Democrats, you know, are just just driving a socialist agenda and they don't want anyone to be successful. So so again it just goes off to the broader narratives that are trying to push. Once an official Trump Facebook page or even Trump himself signal boosts these narratives, they can spread far and wide. Sometimes it's not even helpful to know where it's coming from, because anything that's getting a lot of engagement, it's going to circulate pretty far. You know, like Trump, for example, is the biggest amplifier of this info and it allows other bad actors to follow him, which can you know, really increase conversations around certain topics. But you know, when it comes to a lot in x spaces. There's a network of conservative lat X Facebook groups that are part of this movement called Lexi, and they tend to work together and you know, coordinated tax across their network of pages. So the luxA movement itself, it gained prominence in eighteen as you know, an effort to help Latino's exit the Democratic Party or the left and kind of embrace more conservative values. Uh there's actually another one called lex It which is a little more popular, and it's kind of like equivalent for the black community and trying to push more black people to embrace conservative values. But the network of lex It Facebook pages, they have a wide range in their audiences, so like depending on certain Facebook pages, some have hundreds of thousands of followers, others have tens of thousands of followers. But they frequently share you know, misleading and factually incorrect narratives and they tend to coordinate within each other, but also with the Latinos for Trump network, which is an official like Latin X page for the for the Trump campaign. So you know, when they're able to coordinate with each other, they're able to you know, push narratives to more feeds and allow more people to see it. You might expect to see messages about people on the left being godless socialists who hate hard working business owners from a Facebook page that is explicitly advocating for Trump. But a Cobo says that pages that appear to be nonpartisan can sometimes present an even bigger threat when it comes to this out of harmful narratives online. Yeah, so I think the reality is that we often see less partisan LANTICX pages help spread disinformation, especially around conversations that either resonate with the Latin X community or conversations in the mainstream media. And the real problem is that these nonpartisan spaces they often become more dangerous in the far right spaces because they appear to be more trustworthy messengers and people tend to believe or trust what these pages are promoting. So, I mean, even around narratives around being it reached less partisan Lantic spaces. And for example, I saw one Facebook page that was intended to bring you know, Mexicans together and it has hundreds of thousands of followers, and they're typically posting you know, more cultural type things, but they started posting narratives around being that period to try to build tension within the Latics community. And again, so like when they do that, these people who are following these pages, they start believing in some of these messages because you know, they're not in those pages for partisan reasons. So these less partisan online spaces that are created where people feel like there are a part of a community, but then this information comes in, it's like the stuff around like the stuff around in they're they're more likely to believe this these narratives. One of our concerns as we look at how this information is spreading is the fact that we're seeing some of this content migrate from very partisan pages to nonpartisan pages. Especially around the Venessa Gilian case and her murder and all of that. We saw, for example, a lot of Mexican organizing pages, you know that hometown associations and people who really were following the case super closely to start picking up some of these right and and they have you know, thousands of retweets, and and that's the concern, right and and again it's because it is. I think that also the message for us, for progressives is that it is so important to magnify our message, our message of solidarity, our message of supporting each other's movements, our message of you know that we're all in this together. And I think that is the real that's the real challenge for us, because we're not going to be able to you know, what's happening on the on the right, or in the circles or among these bad actors. We're not really going to be able to minimize that. What we can do is inoculate ourselves and our community against it, and that is by building trust affirmatively and intentionally and elevating trusted voices so that when somebody sees this, you know, disposed, they are like, wait, but you know, I saw some but some another post from someone in my community that I respect and I know, and they are posting positive content that it speaks about unity. So I think for us that's the challenge, and how are we magnifying the positive vision and the positive content um to actually inoculate ourselves and inoculate our communities from this content. And it's not easy. I'm not saying, you know, and I think progressives right now we have our hands full. But I think that's the challenge, um that we need to uh create content, amplify content, not go down the rabbit hole. You know. One of the actually the hardest things about this information that we often share with progressive is don't amplify it because and that is actually harder than it sounds, because sometimes people, in the effort not to amplify it, they actually retweet it, you know, because there's or they reposted because they're trying to debunk the claim. But just by really you know, retweeting about it or reposting, you're actually, even if you're saying this is not true, you are in fact getting more eyes on that post. And that's you know, that's the problem. More after this quick break, let's get right back to it. Talking about disinformation online is difficult, and because of the nature of algorithms, when you try to respond to correct the record, you could actually be accidentally amplifying it because you're giving it more engagement. It's also important to keep in mind that this isn't just stuff happening online. Disinformation has real consequences because it translates to real world behavior and right now, with the Latin X community representing a growing and important voting block, it has big implications for the upcoming election. A Cobo says, this kind of disinformation is meant to push Latin X voters to either vote for Trump or to not vote at all, like that phony picture of immigration arrests outside of polling places that Vanessa mentioned earlier. This is kind of personal for me. I've seen the way dangerous disinformation has impacts on my own community. Communities of color have good reason to be skeptical of our political and medical institutions, institutions that historically we can't always trust. But COVID has just made everything worse. I see memes spreading false information about COVID and the election being shared about people that I love, and it just makes me feel so frustrated. Yeah, you talked earlier about the importance of inoculating your community against this information, and I really felt that. You know, my people are black, were from the South. When it comes to things like voting, it is not always as easy as just going to vote. You know, in these states, there are voter ide laws and other kinds of barriers to just going and casting your ballot. So I really see a lot of disinformation being spread around voting and particularly now with COVID. I've seen a lot of elders in my own community posting things that I know where rooted in this very real fear around COVID, and they they I understand where it comes from. You know, COVID has ravaged black and brown community. So these so these books are like, their concerns are very valid. It's been a frustrating challenge to acknowledge and validate these very real fears in my own community, while also not letting people that I care about give over to fear and spread harmful, in correct information because they're fearful. It's been a challenge. No, and I and I am so um connect with you on the point, and I can totally relate. Um. You know, I am first generation. Most of my family or like my aunts and uncles, they came here when they're adults, so they are just you know, this is a I think it's really important for us to realize that this is a very difficult moment. It is a very confusing moment, you know. And I think especially the older generation, they're just like they just don't know what's happening. You know, and they're they're fearful for the future. And there you know, they see what's happening, you know, in our country with Trump, they see COVID, they see their employment gains being a race, they see their incomes being a race, and they are help you know, we're the communities that are feeling the brunt of the impact of the pandemic. Now on top of that you add this whole you know, the the new process of vote by mail. Right, it's it's a new process for a lot of folks that they're not familiar how to you know, request a ballot they have they have never voted by mail, many of them. And then the other the other piece of this is even for young people like oh yeah, they don't carry around the book of stamps like some of us did. Right, So when you think about it, you know, it really presents a lot of challenges and that's why, you know, I think that again part of our challenge, just progressives is you know, how are we what what voter education efforts are we implementing even in this era of COVID when everything has to be done virtually. I think that's going to force us to innovate. But also to have those conversations that we've been putting off, because I do believe that the best way to inoculate people is to just have an honest conversation. And you're not going to be able to convince your aunt or uncle the first in the first time, but I think just started to have those conversations about what's happening in our country, you know, why, why their their voice is so important, UM and and how this process is changing, and just repeating that message over and over again. I think it's one of the most effective strategies and and and again. I like I said earlier, the best way to inoculate yourself is like when you have a trusted messenger, when you have someone who's in the community who people go to for information. Those are I think, um, those are the people that are going to help us, UM face this really on slaw of this information because they are the ones that the community listens to. And that's why we need to empower those folks with the tools that they need, an information that they need, and you know, just help drive that message in that positiveness and message that I was speaking about earlier. M. So, what can everyday people do to help curb the spread of disinformation and misinformation, particularly in marginalized communities. Yeah, well, the first thing I would say is just really be careful about what you're amplifying online and what might seem harmless to you, Um, it's probably not harmless, right, So just really always be mindful of your sources and the message that the messages that you're posting. So that would be the very first thing. The second thing is, you know, it's informing your also, especially when we talk about voting and because we know that's actually going to be a big target of the attacks and the disinformation moving forward, especially as we get closer to election, and especially because the new processes around both by mail, So really informing yourself themselves about the the deadlines and the requirements on voting absentee or voting by mail, so that you can share that information um with your community and your loved ones. And and then the third thing is again you know, just trying to amplify a positive message, a message of unity and solidarity. I think if we all we we do that, we will go it will go a long way. Because right now, but actors are trying to amplify fear. Therefore we need to amplify a positive message, a positive vision for a movement and for our country moving forward. Ashley's team when Black Polante is taking this message to heart. Rather than waiting for tech leaders like Mark Zuckerberg to do the right thing and curb the spread of harmful disinformation on their platforms, her team is established a disinformation war room to train Black and Latin X voters and other grassroots advocacy organizations to spot disinformation themselves, and provides messaging tools to counter with accurate information without amplifying it. Our strategy is really teaching people that we don't want to amplify the misinformation right that is counterproductive. But what we do want to do is put in the space counter narratives while also educating folks. And so we have a daily war room where we bring our team together to go over analysis, go over our research briefs, and so it really adds another level of authenticity because it's not just you know, our campaign that's trying to come in and talk to folks, but we're working with these organizations that have created a sense of community with with their not just their online audiences, but you know, the citizens within their regions. UM and we're able to really spread this message of like, look, this is how you identify. These people are trolls, They are bought. They are not trying to appeal to you in any way beyond trying to mislead you. And you should know this. And the only way to fight back is to register and vote. Loosely translated, the slang term polente means to go forward, and Ashley's team at Wind Black Polente are working to help communities of color go forward stronger in solidarity. You know, I can't help, but notice that your organization has two names, Wind Black and Polente. You know, we see these narratives being pushed by bad actors that there lots the next community in the black community, we can't work together. We have to be living in fear of each other. We have to be suspicious of each other. Not only there's this framework obviously erase the fact that there are plenty of acro Latino's out there, but it's also just not true. And I guess my question is how do we get to a place where we can present the truth that our communities are stronger together? Absolutely, And I mean you to have my answer. And in the last um in your last sentence, because simply that's the truth. We are stronger together and they know that, UM, and so they want to do anything to divide these two communities. And and you know, it's it's simply just discussing quite honestly. I mean we most recently we're seeing this misinformation around. You know, the Black Lives Matter movement did put out a letter that was that was UM kind of describing some of their demands, and we're seeing a lot of right wing operatives that are bowling it down, taking out a lot of the context with within the letter and sharing that the Black Lives Matter movement are are against immigrants or UM, they are you know, doing muffia tactics, if if you will, which is simply just not the truth. And they're spreading these untruths in a very broad manner, UM. And so you know, it's really important for us, and I'm glad that you underscored the polone because we do have a Latin X focus and and because we want to bring our two communities together in this fight. There's so many critical issues um that both communities share, right, but also neither of these communities are monolithic, and it's it's it's really almost um embarrassing to see that a lot of these operatives think of our communities as such, and so they're doing these tactics to really, you know, it's almost like this distributed racism um to really put these two communities against each other. And so we're really building a sense of let's educate uh, Black voters, Latin X voters, Let's educate folks on what are the issues that really matter to us. Who are the leaders in this space that are supporting our issues, are supporting our values, and then also recognizing that again we're not monolithic. We need to speak to voters as individuals and we're not just pitting everyone and you know, against each other. We're working under an administration right now that is trying to divide this country at every turn, and so it's really important that as we are mobilizing and reaching voters that at every step of the way, we are trying to unite folks under one goal, which is to make sure that we have a democracy that represents our communities, that represents our issues, and that is going to fight to actually move our communities forward. Vanessa Gien deserved better, and today she deserves better than having her story fuel mistrust and hate in our communities, and we too, deserve better than being fed the myth that our communities can only exist in conflict with one another. Our oppression, like our freedom, is all linked, and until we're all free, none of us is free. To make sure that you and your community have the right information you need to vote, go to vote dot org. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or just want to say hi, You can reach us at Hello at tang godi dot com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangdi dot com. There Are No Girls on the Internet was created by me Bridget Tod. It's a production of I Heart Radio and Unboss creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer, Terry Harrison as our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from I Heeart Radio, check out the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.