Research note: Bolsonaro's firehose: How Covid-19 disinformation on WhatsApp was used to fight a gov
Research note: Bolsonaro’s firehose: How Covid-19 disinformation on WhatsApp was used to fight a government political crisis in Brazil
Brazil has one of the highest rates of cases and deaths attributed to Covid-19 in the world. Two factors contributed to the high rates: the Brazilian government underestimated the pandemic and a large amount of disinformation was spread through social media. We found that disinformation about Covid-19 on WhatsApp was associated with political disinformation, mostly composed to support president Bolsonaro during the crisis he faced at the beginning of the pandemic. Our main finding implicates that disinformation on WhatsApp was connected to the far-right political discourse and framed Covid-19 as a political issue rather than a public health issue.
BY
FELIPE BONOW SOARES
Media, Discourse and Social Networks Research Lab (MIDIARS), Brazil
RAQUEL RECUERO
Center for Languages and Communication, Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil
TAIANE VOLCAN
Media, Discourse and Social Networks Research Lab (MIDIARS), Brazil
GIANE FAGUNDES
Center for Languages and Communication, Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil
GIÉLE SODRÉ
Journalism Department, Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil
. . .
Implications
In this study, we analyzed disinformation about Covid-19 on WhatsApp and its connection to the political debate in Brazil. Brazil was heavily hit by Covid-19, partially because of the different discourses from government authorities about the seriousness of the pandemic. From the beginning, for example, Brazil’s far-right president Jair Bolsonaro minimized Covid-19. He publicly called it a “little flu,” advocated for the end of measures such as social distancing and quarantine (which were put in place by state governors and mayors), and constantly appeared in public hugging his supporters without wearing a mask. The Health Minister at the time, Luiz Henrique Mandetta, on the other hand, strongly followed WHO recommendations, establishing measures of social distancing and publicly asking for people to use face masks to underline the seriousness of the pandemic. Most state governors and mayors supported Mandetta. In this context, two opposing discourses emerged: one reinforcing WHO recommendations about the seriousness of the situation and following scientific evidence, and another minimizing the pandemic (Sandy & Milhorance, 2020). Amidst this dispute, many people refused to wear masks, and multiple protests against the Covid-19 containment measures and social distancing protocols erupted, which were lead predominantly by Bolsonaro’s supporters. The pandemic quickly escalated in Brazil, with cases rapidly climbing from fewer than 100 cases in early March to more than 100,000 cases and over 8,000 deaths by early May. By the end of 2020, Brazil had one of the highest numbers of cases (over 7.5 million) and deaths (almost 200,000) in the world.1
Brazil’s case demonstrates how disinformation can undermine public health strategies used by authorities and create a context in which people may choose not to follow scientific evidence and recommendations due to their political views. Political groups on WhatsApp may have played a central role in promoting the defiance of Covid-19 guidelines and regulations, since they already had part in spreading disinformation during elections and other key political moments (Reis et al., 2020). WhatsApp is the most popular communication app in Brazil and an important space for users to find and share information (Resende et al., 2018). According to the Reuters Institute Digital News Reports (Newman et al., 2020), 48% of Brazilians use WhatsApp for news consumption. Similarly, Baptista et al. (2019) found that 57% of Brazilians consider WhatsApp an important or very important source of political information. WhatsApp is also a key channel for spreading false information (Newman et al., 2020), particularly because it can’t be traced or debunked publicly by fact-checkers.
The problem of disinformation and its connections to partisanship and, particularly, the far-right has been explored by researchers in different contexts. Hindman and Varash (2018) have shown that the far right and Russian trolls have created communication strategies for disseminating elections-related disinformation on social media in the United States. Pierri et al. (2019) have described similar strategies in Italy. Alves (2016, 2019) has also pointed out how Brazil’s far right has taken control of social media strategies to massively create and share disinformation and hate campaigns targeted at political adversaries.
In this article, we discuss disinformation about Covid-19 on WhatsApp in Brazil. In particular, we look at the topics and types of disinformation messages spread in political public groups on the app. Our findings imply that WhatsApp may have had a role in spreading disinformation about the disease through these groups, particularly by aligning untruthful content with political views. The disinformation spread may also have negatively influenced how people within the groups we monitored responded to the containment measures proposed by health authorities, particularly if these people were politically aligned with Bolsonaro. We understand disinformation as distorted, manipulated, or entirely false information that is created to mislead and achieve political gains (Benkler et al., 2018; Fallis, 2015). It is created intentionally to influence public opinion. Accordingly, disinformation is dangerous because it might negatively affect the public sphere (Tucker et al., 2018).
More:
https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/research-note-bolsonaros-firehose-how-covid-19-disinformation-on-whatsapp-was-used-to-fight-a-government-political-crisis-in-brazil/
