Wilford L.

Medina
Viral Disinformation

Even though it was said many times on the social media sites where I am always
in, i.e., Twitter and Facebook, disinformation is the number one tool that made Marcos
win the Presidential elections. This webinar delved deeper into what exact disinformation
has been disseminated to put the son of a dictator back in power.
Prof. Diosa Labiste from Tsek.PH, a collaborative fact-checking project for the
2022 Philippines' elections, explained that the opposition candidates, mainly Robredo and
Pangilinan, have been the disinformation target, making the mass think they aren't
competent enough. For instance, Robredo has been called "madumb," a play on the word
madam and dumb, throughout the election campaign by the Marcos supporters despite
her credentials saying otherwise. While the opposition camp is fed negative information,
those in favor of Marcos-Duterte are showered with compliments and nothing but high
praise. One of the ways is how the work is done by several internet trolls that is paid to
do the dirty work of creating disinformation. This strategy launched the Marcoses back in
power, as the mass thought that all his dictator father did before was good for the
Philippines' citizens. It is sad because it is not the mass' fault, but these greedy and
corrupt politicians are taking advantage of our fellow citizens.
 Trolls, trolls, trolls!

Trolls are the number one soldiers deployed on the battlefield by politicians during
election season. Little did I know that there are different tiers of trolls as the trolls that I
knew of are the ones that are spamming comments and sharing misinformation on the
internet. It is safe to say that I have learned a lot regarding this topic in this podcast by
Jonathan Ong and Kat Ventura.
It is deeply saddening that some of the people hired to work as a "troll" are not
even aware that they will be taking that type of job. As the guest on the podcast explains,
the contractor didn't tell him in the interview who his client would be for the job. Had he
known about it, he said he would immediately turn it down. However, as a fresh graduate
desperately looking for a job, he still went for it even after knowing who he would be
working for. As a change of heart, he resigned after he couldn't take what he was doing
anymore. This podcast cemented my decision not to handle much money in exchange
for something that would go against my morals. I hope many more people who
accidentally stumble working as a troll just for the large sums knew about this podcast
sooner to make them rethink their decisions.