• 04/06/2022
• By wizewebsite
• 566 Views

Babiš's government did not deal with disinformation. Volunteers are now fighting the lies at night<

It was October 21, 2020, and 130 people died of the coronavirus in Czech hospitals that day. At the same time, Aktuálně.cz pointed out that, according to experts, the government is completely losing the fight against misinformers who spread lies about covid on the Internet. And that it will cost human lives. "This is not about covid, but a tool of elites and multinational companies! The media is brainwashing and, alas, they are doing well. People, be awake and don't let them tell you lies," Roman Lyčka wrote on Facebook, for example, under photos of people connected to anesthesia machines - the resuscitation department of the hospital in Tábor.

Only shortly after the Aktuálně.cz text, the advisors of the then Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (ANO) began to devise ways to counter the lies about covid with experts. Babiš refused to solve the matter at the government office and ordered it to the Ministry of Health. But the preparations were disrupted by the resignation of Minister Roman Prymula (for ANO) after he violated his own anti-pandemic measures. The Czech Republic lacks a strategy to this day, the new government of Petr Fiala (ODS) claims to be preparing it.

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Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of views are being collected by internet videos of room painter Jakub Netík, who illegally sells deworming paste for horses to people as a cure for covid and talking about hanging journalists. Or Patrik Tušl, who chases medical workers in front of their homes. And also Jana Peterková, who spreads lies despite the fact that the court has already ordered her to apologize for it and pay compensation of a quarter of a million crowns.

These disinformers have debts, foreclosures and are trying to collect money from their fans for the "fight against covid-fascism". Viewers trust them and send money. At a time when the state is limiting itself to explaining the most common misinformation on the website of the Ministry of Health, some people have decided to take action against the lies themselves. They use the same tool as the disinformers, Facebook, to do this. Like, for example, Monika Špoulová with her friends.

In May 2020, Špoulová started a group on Facebook, which she calls the abbreviation KVZKJP - We comment on videos from the channels of Jan Peterková and other disinformers. It was by trying to convince the audience of a falsely convicted liar that her information was false that the women began.

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"Initially, I wrote comments under Peterková's videos and refuted what she said with the help of reliable authorities and facts. But no one responded to them. Then I found out that Peterková was hiding my posts, so I can see them just me. So I started a Facebook group for it. I originally thought I would do it for about a month," Špoulová describes.

When the women saw how many people believed in the Peters or Tušlos, they couldn't help it. Today, their group has four thousand people who more or less help in monitoring and refuting lies.

Internet scoundrels

According to Špoulová and other volunteers, a small group of misinformers is spreading lies and hatred about covid on the networks. But they can convince thousands of people, for example, that the government and doctors are trying to kill them, that they shouldn't get vaccinated and wear masks.

"I call them modern-day scumbags. They take advantage of confused people, put fear into their heads, and then demand money for allegedly fighting for them. Our goal is to make people understand that they are taking advantage of them. And also to it started to do something. We need to start talking about it," says Jitka Klusáčková, an accountant by profession, who moderates debates in the KVZKJP group.

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He alludes, for example, to Pavel Zítek, who tried to sell non-existent cryptocurrency to people back in 2019. Today they claim that there are razor blades in vaccines and that secret international forces are arresting all "traitors of the nation" and replacing them with doppelgangers. He himself is in the millions of foreclosures and collects money for his "fight against corona fascism".

His fans trust him, some of them watch his broadcast several times a day. In one year, people sent him more than 360,000 crowns to the transparent account of the Srdcem pro vlast association, which he controls. Often in small amounts. "From my pension, I can't do more," she wrote last August about Miluša R.'s donation of 100 crowns.

Zítko convinces people to stop watching Czech Television and Czech Radio and to send concession fees to him, which some do. He then withdraws tens of thousands of money from ATMs or uses them to fill up his Lexus car with a selling price of two million crowns.

"People are threatening to kill me"

The KVZKJP group is public, so anyone can find information in it. It also archives hundreds of videos of disinformers that people can confront with reality. Špoulová, for example, gets up at night to record a live broadcast, in case the disinformers delete the recording.

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"If you had told me two years ago that I would be editing videos, I would have replied that you were crazy," describes Špoulová. Each video carries a warning that it may contain misinformation. The work forced her to constantly educate herself on how to find corroborating information with her colleagues for each lie.

With friends who lead the group, they don't want to reveal much information about themselves. Their work did not go unnoticed by disinformers, and they started riling their audience against them. Activists receive threats of death and assault or phone calls from hidden numbers late at night. In waves. Often after one of the figures in the disinformation scene invites his followers to do so. "Peterková launched a campaign against me. People even threatened me with murder," says Špoulová.

"Last year, someone sent me text messages saying that a bunch of Ukrainians would come for me and drive me around the forest. It ended up with the misdemeanor commission," says another of the women.

Deputies and senators also felt the influence of disinformation this week. After a call from the channels spreading falsehoods, their viewers flooded the e-mail boxes of the legislators with protests against the upcoming amendment to the pandemic law. They consider this as the "end of freedom".

Help for teachers and carers of the elderly

Volunteers fight against lies in their spare time. Sometimes even eight hours a day, in the evenings and at night. The videos they record have become evidence for the police and courts. And also a resource for teachers.

"In August 2020, they needed to prepare lessons for the children, and instead they received phone calls from parents every day, frightened by what Jana Peterková was saying. That's why I made a video for the teachers that refuted the lies," recalled Špoulová.

She lied about elderly deaths after vaccinations. They have to apologize and pay a quarter of a million in compensation

Lawyers are also part of the group. Thanks to this, the volunteers were able to advise and help the operators of the home for the elderly in Měšice u Prahy. It was about him that Peterková spread the lie that several seniors died here after being vaccinated against the coronavirus. In January, the court ordered Peterková to apologize and pay a quarter of a million in damages. Not legally yet. She is also being prosecuted by the police for spreading the alarmist message, and faces up to eight years in prison.

Peterková first acknowledged the mistake. But in other videos, she began to claim that it was a conspiracy against her and to encourage fans to send her contributions to fight the state. She wants to run for president.

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Activists also backed up a video from YouTube in which Peterková interviewed unvaccinated people directly in their apartments. The police already have it. "Unfortunately, seniors are more susceptible to trusting misinformation, it is more difficult for them to distinguish substantiated information from false information," said Katarzyna Anna Porubská, head of the care service in Měšice.

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She also recalled the questions of seniors who heard about the false information. Some refused treatment or help with personal hygiene. According to her, the videos were hateful.

"Our employees were afraid to drive company cars with our company's logo on them. They were worried about their safety. They had psychological problems. Even today, a year after Ms. Peterková's campaign, we have to explain to some seniors that it was false information," Porubská pointed out .

"The disinformation crowd isn't stupid, just confused"

Other volunteers named themselves Illumicat. In an exaggerated way, they refer to the illuminati and the world conspiracy, which, according to many misinformers, is behind the coronavirus pandemic.

"Our goal is to infiltrate disinformation groups and disprove lies with verified information. We don't want to discredit people who believe them. We try to find common ground with them," explains David, a project manager in the construction industry who did not want to give his full name. . "We are used to being threatened with death, lynching and hanging for treason," he adds.

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She appears on Facebook under the nickname Sahibek Svobodný and answers hundreds of private messages daily with her colleagues. He estimates that they have already managed to convince several thousand people that they believed the lies.

He himself knows how easily a person falls for lies. At the beginning of the epidemic, he experienced covid with a very mild course and spread misinformation himself. "I shared, for example, that covid is a fraud, a game of great powers and the like. Just nonsense," he told Hospodářský novinín.

He spread lies, now he fights against them

But David got infected a second time, with a severe course of the disease and long consequences. And he thought about what he had spread before. He also noticed that some people started persecuting the medics. With a group of four friends, he therefore began to refute lies on the Internet. Gradually, others joined him, and today he has approximately four hundred colleagues.

Why do people fear the end of the world, chemtrails or covid vaccination?

David and his colleagues see most of those who believe misinformation as victims. Therefore, they debate with lonely people, for whom disinfomers are often the only ones who keep in touch with them. Volunteers liken it to the relationship between a "guru" and their sect. The audience does not question the words of disinformers even because they would lose their social contacts.

For example, an Illumicat member convinced a woman to take her relative with serious covid complications to the hospital instead of home treatment with horse paste, the effectiveness of which has not been confirmed by any substantiated study. The same woman also contracted covid herself and wanted to go to work. Activists talked her out of that too.

"In December, I convinced one of the disinformers not to take part in the pursuit of Messrs. Kubek and Flégr in front of their houses. I had a long discussion with him that such aggressive actions lead nowhere," says Kateřina Koch, who talks to the Czechs on social networks from Great Britain. It alludes to the actions directed against the president of the Czech Medical Chamber, Milan Kubek, and the evolutionary biologist Jaroslav Flégr. The man has not attended these events since.

Tušl was charged by the police this week with dangerous stalking and faces up to a year in prison. "According to the findings of criminal investigators, the motive is to obtain financial donations from his supporters," said Prague police spokesman Jan Daněk.

"Blocked for Terms of Use Violation"

Volunteers say they often interact with people who are just confused and don't know where to turn for help or valid information. But die-hard supporters of disinformation are hard to convince, according to them. "Often only personal experience helps - a serious course of illness or the death of a loved one," reports David from Illumicat.

He and other activists know the stories of people who followed the advice of disinformers instead of treatment and then died. But they cannot estimate how many such cases there are. The recent story of folk singer Hana Horká, who refused vaccination and did not protect herself in a family with infected people, resonated in the media around the world. She got infected and died. Her son blames disinformation precisely for this.

Activists also manage to block disinformation sites and profiles. After constant attention to Zítka's activities, for example, Facebook canceled one of the channels. However, disinformers tend to have more profiles and alternate them according to the one that is not currently blocked. For the American giant, the Czech Republic is only a small market, and what violates the rules of the network is mostly decided by algorithms without human intervention. Often randomly.

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Kateřina Koch also points out that after months of "massage" with lies, people can be scared and frustrated. He refers to the case of pensioner Jaromír Balda, who believed that migrants were a danger to the Czech Republic and cut down trees on the tracks so that a train would crash into them. The court sent him to prison for terrorism.

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Disinformers today see a similar threat in coronavirus vaccines. "You've poisoned my whole family with that fucking bioweapon, that f***ing sajrite. There's no one left to protect. That's why I curse all you criminals and murderers!" it stands, for example, in a mass-sent threat signed by AR, which Aktuálně.cz journalists also received.

Volunteers doubt that their work will end with the pandemic. He already sees that some disinformation groups are focusing on a possible Russian-Ukrainian conflict. And they agree that the state should help with their efforts.