“Once, censorship worked by blocking crucial pieces of information,” writes Tufecki. Now, “censorship works by drowning us in too much undifferentiated information, crippling our ability to focus.”101 A large part of the deluge of falsehoods about the coronavirus pandemic—much of it also spreading pro-Trump conspiracy theories and calling for an early end to quarantines—was driven by online trolls and bots.102 As in China and Turkey, the relentless conspiracies and waves of falsehoods that back them (remember “Pizzagate” or “Obamagate,” anyone?) are not intended to be convincing as much as
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