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    France’s ‘French Response’ uses memes and sarcasm to fight disinformation on X
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    France’s ‘French Response’ uses memes and sarcasm to fight disinformation on X

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    1. Wagamaga on

      Through posts combining provocation, humour and irony, the “French Response” account has taken potshots at trolls, but also top-level politicians. It is part of a wider strategy led by Paris to combat disinformation, ministry told Euronews.
      France’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has ramped up its fight against disinformation with “French Response”, an official X account which replies to trolls and fake news with humour, irony and provocation.

      The account has amassed more than 180,000 followers since its creation in September, taking aim at disinformation peddled by pro-Russian users and US accounts. Meanwhile, White House-aligned accounts have increasingly targeted France on X in recent months.

      According to ministry spokesman Pascal Confavreux, France has decided to shake up its strategy to actively combat disinformation.

      “The intuition was that you can’t win the information war if you don’t fight the battle. So we had to raise our voice,” Confavreux told Euronews.

    2. ed8907 on

      I always remember a phrase said by Michelle Obama: “when they go low, we go high”.

      I love Michelle Obama but you cannot go high with these people who are just the lowest of the low. You need to use their own dirty tactics against them.

    5. ManBitesRats on

      It’s laughable because the gouvernement and the wider regime (so including the media for exemple) is a large source of disinformation. Just in the last week the minister of foreign affair made a statement propagating a fake news about a UN special rapporteur. It take about 2 min to find the video online to see that she didn’t say what they are blaming her for. The French gouvernement is just annoyed because this is disinformation they do not control.

    8. AlastorZola on

      I’ve listened to an interview a few years back from the guys in the secret services whose job it is to respond to disinformation.

      They established that the best answer to disinformation is to make people laugh at it. It’s the easiest way to match the virality of fake news without reinforcing them by repeating the false claims.

      The problem was you’d have to teach the military and security dudes to actually be funny and get the zeitgeist. I’m not joking. That was the final conclusion.

    9. Imaginary_Prompt_597 on

      As the comment on the article says: “Fight fire with fire. Bravo.”

      Not challenging trolls and politicians on social media when they post disinformation makes it seem like the majority of users agree with them.

      It is great to finally see opposition to disinformation by official institutions. Especially as it comes with some humour.

    10. Kageru on

      Sounds good… But you will always be fighting an uphill battle when the platform and its owner is an active supporter of disinformation and quite willing to weaponise the algorithm.

    11. PoiHolloi2020 on

      Some of their posts have been great. Unfortunate that government shitposting is necessary but that’s the world we apparently now live in.

    12. SeveralLadder on

      I bet the movies they’ll make to honor the veterans of The great Meme-Wars will be devastating.

      But yeah, we have passed our pearl harbor-moment and need to fight back until we secure our digital borders

    13. Any-Original-6113 on

      Ronald Reagan effectively used jokes ridiculing Soviet communism to help bring down the Soviet Union.

      Soviet bureaucrats had nothing to counter them with, because the jokes reflected Soviet reality and were easily understood by the average Soviet person.

    14. Mediocre_Daikon6935 on

      The idea that the French can meme is hilarious. 

      They can’t cook. Australia, California, Italy both make better Red Wines. Pennsylvania certainly makes better white wines (though I would caution against their reds). They are not known for their humor, & has no contributed meaningfully to political discourse or human Enlightenment since August of 1792.

      Their one contribution to humanity was loose men and women, in an age of global sexual repression, and that has long passed.

    16. AdminEating_Dragon on

      Spain needs to copy that – they are the no.1 target of the Epstein Government and their Russian sponsored troll army.

    20. yaderkuvboloto on

      makes sense, the nazis and commies use memes to convert internet dwellers into scumbags, so apparently they’re susceptible to it, which means we should also use memes to try to make them normal again