It seems to the parties that more they disseminate information, more to their benefit
A friend of mine noticed correctly that in contemporary information wars, the consumers, the users are tried to be suppressed by the quantity. The parties spreading the news one after the other do not give a chance to verify them. One news is not yet “swallowed,” the next is presented, and in this flow of news, it seems to them that the one who holds the attention of the users wins.
Recent events related to Malaysian plane crash are the proof of it. There have been too many cases like this, including in our, Armenian reality. Naturally, in this case, too, no one would want to become a cause of an international scale incident; a tragic mistake took place, an accident, which caused death of nearly 300 people. In other, more peaceful conditions, any state would confess its guilt, would console the relatives of victims, would give compensation and would punish the guilty.
But, alas, a war is waged in Eastern Ukraine, and there are serious doubts that the “Boeing 777” was not crashed by the state, but a group of people, who can be called just rebels or unjust terrorists, it changes nothing. In short, nobody will “own up” for the happened tragedy, and therefore, information war is escalated around it.
In these days, hundreds, if not thousands of professional and self-taught “experts” have made their hypotheses on this accident. Unusual versions were suggested, starting with the fact that the plane was transporting already dead passengers, ending with the fact that since there were as HIV-AIDS specialists among the passengers, the accident was made by the world medical mafia.
But most important, of course, is the speed of publishing the rumors and the versions. For instances, Ukraine’s security agencies have published a recording where two people, presumably, pro-Russia rebels, are talking about the plane crash. Russian security agencies acted with a publication, by which the recording is false and edited from various conversations on other topics. Do we have the time and opportunity to verify which of the allegations is true, and which is false? Or, we are in advance governed by our preconception and with our already formed sympathies or antipathies, therefore, we select from this flow only the news that confirm our biased attitude.
But the aforementioned “audio episode” already seems to be forgotten, because the experts, advocates and politicians are uninterruptedly speaking. If a rumor or a hypothesis is refuted, then a few seconds later pops-up another rumor or hypothesis, and there is no more time available to discuss and evaluate the previous ones. And it seems to the parties that more they “fill in” the heads of people with information confirming their views, the greater is the possibility of their campaign to “win”.
Most interesting, of course, are the “experts”. I do not know any Russian “expert” who would say that the plane was possibly hit by their country’s armed forces or by the Donetsk pro-Russia rebels. I do not know of any Western or Ukrainian expert, who would say that it is not excluded that the Ukrainian army is guilty. Eventually, their “expertize analyzes” are also reminiscent of the campaign. Maybe they are not true experts?
The same mechanism is operating in Armenia’s internal political arena, when the government and opposition propagandists are trying to cover up a lie with another lie. Of course, the torrent with its intensity yields the one of “Russian-Ukrainian.” We are a small republic.
ARAM ABRAHAMYAN
