Don't Wait for Everybody Chloe Humbert

Notes & Transcript: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/influencers-and-direct-marketing
Skepchick - Big Oil Bought my Favorite Science Influencer, by Rebecca Watson, January 26, 2023
U.S. SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION - Press Release SEC Charges Kim Kardashian for Unlawfully Touting Crypto Security FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 2022-183 Washington D.C., Oct. 3, 2022
Mashable - 12 people are behind most of the anti-vaxxer disinformation you see on social media. The "Disinformation Dozen" are spreading anti-vaccination content throughout the internet. By Matt Binder  on March 24, 2021
Insider - Facebook groups with thousands of members are organizing armies of fake product reviewers, Amazon says in lawsuit. Samantha Delouya Jul 19, 2022
Tech Won’t Save Us podcast - 23 06 08 [#171] The Influencer Industry Is Built on Precarity Emily Hund
The Weaponisation of Everything: A Field Guide to the New Way of War by Mark Galeotti - Feb 2023
Transcript:
I'm Chloe Humbert, and I'm not waiting for everybody. Influencers and Direct Marketing. Rebecca Watson had a video on how an influencer on TikTok, a science influencer, appears to be now promoting propane, which is a fossil fuel. Rebecca Watson: “But if you search for information on the damage caused by propane, you'll find pretty much nothing but press releases from the propane industry under different names bragging about how burning it isn't as bad as burning diesel. And that, I'm sad to say, is what Calandrelli’s video is. It's propaganda wholly funded by the Propane Education and Research Council, or PERC, a fossil fuel industry group that the New York Times recently exposed as an ethically and maybe legally shady operation that's currently spending millions of dollars to hire influencers on TikTok, YouTube, and even cable TV to sow misinformation about zero emission energy.” Chloe Humbert:  In October of 2022, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the SEC, put out a press release. Quote, The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Kim Kardashian for touting on social media a crypto asset security offered and sold by Ethereum Max without disclosing the payment she received for the promotion. Kardashian agreed to settle the charges, pay 1.26 million in penalties, disgorgement and interest, and cooperate with the commission's ongoing investigation. The SEC's order finds that Kardashian failed to disclose that she was paid $250,000 to publish a post on her Instagram account about EMAX tokens, the crypto asset security being offered by Ethereum Max. Kardashian's post contained a link to the Ethereum Max website which provided instructions for potential investors to purchase EMAX tokens. This case is a reminder that when celebrities or influencers endorse investment opportunities including crypto asset securities, it doesn't mean that those investment products are right for all investors, said SEC Chair Gary Gensler. How this is important is that Kim Kardashian has quite a bit of money, fame. She has lawyers, I'm sure, all sorts of advisors, agents, whatever. And it's against the law to promote something without disclosing that you're receiving payment for it. And if she didn't disclose, I mean, she got caught. She was paid $250,000. Do you think that the government has enough money to go after every mid-level influencer for every $200 that they're receiving for promoting something and not disclosing that? Not saying your favorite influencers are doing that, but when an influencer of any level is promoting a product, it’s not unreasonable to question if they have financial motives for doing so. So it's not always as clear as an affiliate link. Affiliate links are, you know, pretty obvious and they happen a lot and unfortunately a lot of people don't know about affiliate links. At least that's obvious, they're not hiding it per se, but in some of these cases, people just take money and they promote stuff and they don't disclose. And some o

Notes & Transcript: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/troll-farms-sock-puppets-and-botnets
The Internet of Fakes — PR Tactics, Troll Farms, Sock Puppets, Botnets, Influencers, Operatives, & Chaos Agents. Persuasion, advertising, sales, target marketing, propaganda, agent provocateurs, and cognitive warfare, is the true reality of the media landscape. CHLOE HUMBERT SEP 14, 2023
People argue that surely it’s not deliberate, that it’s just regular weird people being foolish, or that it’s just a few bad actors, or that it’s all a big coincidence. Some demand proof, and once given evidence, demand more proof, and people sometimes still demand to know - but why? Claim wrongly this is just speculation. Even with tons of scientific publications, academic lectures, military documentation, and trade news detailing it all. The problem is that people don’t want to believe this information attack is happening, or especially that we may have been fooled by something. Because we all have been fooled by disinformation, marketing, and PR, at some point, and none of us want to think about that too much. And that’s a big part of why it works so well.
Freedom of Mind Resource Center podcast - Beware the Metaverse: Dr. Rand Waltzman discusses Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the Internet 
Rand Waltzman: “In a cognitive attack the whole point is that the target shouldn’t know they’re being attacked in order for it to be really effective. So that's the whole trick to keep the target unaware because if the target becomes aware that they’re being attacked in this way, just by them becoming aware it significantly reduces the effect of the attack.”
DarkReading.com - The Rise Of Social Media Botnets. In the social Internet, building a legion of interconnected bots -- all accessible from a single computer -- is quicker and easier than ever before. By James C. Foster, Founder & CEO, ZeroFOX, July 07, 2015 
Cyber criminals use social media botnets to disseminate malicious links, collect intelligence on high profile targets, and spread influence. As opposed to traditional botnets, each social bot represents an automated social account rather than an infected computer. This means building a legion of interconnected bots is much quicker and easier than ever before, all accessible from a single computer. The person commanding the botnet, also known as a bot herder, generally has two options for building their botnet. The first is fairly ad hoc, simply registering as many accounts as possible to a program that allows the herder to post via the accounts as if they were logged in. The second approach is to create the botnet via a registered network application: the attacker makes a phony app, links a legion of accounts, and changes the setting to allow the app to post on behalf of the associated accounts. Via the app, the herder then has programmatic access to the full army of profiles. This is essentially how ISIS built their Dawn of Glad Tidings application, which acts as a centralized hub that posts en masse on behalf of all its users.
MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy April 19 - Filippo Menczer, Indiana University published Dec 21, 2022 
And then you see a bunch of accounts that are you know not quite as influential but they play a key role in amplifying the message and these are the red nodes that you see a little bit towards the periphery and the reason they're colored red is because they're likely automated. These are accounts that we you know, we have, I'll tell you more later about our machine learning tools to recognize social bots, and those are likely bots that just automatically retweet everything that comes from certain accounts.
Axios - The global business of professional trolling. By Sara Fischer, Apr 13, 2021 
Professional political trolling is still a thriving underground industry around the world, despite crackdowns from the biggest tech firms. Why it matters: Coordinated online disinformation efforts offer

Notes, transcript, & links: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/accusation-in-a-mirror
 Blog of the American Philosophical Association (APA) Tone-Policing and the Assertion of Authority At its core, tone-policing is first an argumentative move sideways and then a stall. It first shifts the focus from the content of the conversation to the tone, language, or manner of discussion (as the quote above says) and then – unlike other interventions about tone – policing announces that the shift cannot be reversed until tone is addressed. The tone-policer doesn’t just declare that their interlocutor’s tone is inappropriate and heightened (usually because it is too hostile, adversarial, or aggressive, upset, or irrational). They insist that the conversation cannot continue until the speaker adjusts it. It often involves a further demand – implicit or explicit – that the interlocutor address their infraction with some apology or other gesture of accountability before things can proceed.
Risky Shift, a groupthink exploitable vulnerability. The group trolley cart wheels really do sometimes have a pull toward risk. CHLOE HUMBERT - MAR 19, 2023 Often someone in a position of esteem specifically calls for everyone in the group to be accepting and “non judgmental” toward the offenders, sometimes on the grounds of tone policing, where those with serious concerns are dismissed because they didn’t express their pain politely enough - which means not only are the offenders not required to make any changes, the aggrieved are actually expected to be the ones to do so in order to conform to the groupthink.
  National Institute for Public Policy - Information Series - Issue No. 556 June 12, 2023 - Information Operations against the United States: Defensive Actions are Needed by John A. Gentry Former Soviet intelligence agent and CPUSA member Louis Budenz, who renounced communism in 1945, said the Soviets and the CPUSA long had two race-based goals: 1) exacerbating racial tensions to the point of generating race-based civil war; and/or (2) creation of a geographically large black separatist state in what is now the American south as a way to literally fragment the United States. The modern “diversity, equity, and inclusion” agenda, which is indisputably divisive in the United States, appears to serve past Soviet (and now Russian) interests, but is not remotely consistent with past Soviet or current Russian domestic policies.
 MEDPageToday: Who's Really the Victim Here? — It's time to end DARVO behavior in the healthcare workplace by Resa E. Lewiss, MD, David G. Smith, PhD, Shikha Jain, MD, W. Brad Johnson, PhD, and Jennifer Freyd, PhD Perpetrators use DARVO because it works. In one study researchers found that targets of DARVO were more likely to blame themselves. Self-blame is associated with self-silencing. In another study, researchers found that observers of DARVO tended to doubt the credibility of the true victim, believing the perpetrator instead. There is not yet systematic data on what makes certain institutions and certain people more likely to DARVO. Yet, there appear to be relevant characteristics associated with other types of harassment, and the field of medicine checks all the boxes: high prestige, male-dominated institutions and industries, hierarchical leadership structures, inadequate safeguards for employees and trainees, and a climate which tolerates harassment.
 Insider - If you've ever lashed out against your abuser, it doesn't make you abusive — here's why. Written by Ashley Laderer; edited by Samantha Crozier - Sep 30, 2022  Why the term 'reactive abuse' is dangerous. Abuse experts argue that the term "reactive abuse," while widely used, is harmful and dangerous for the victim because it labels both parties as mutual abusers. Therefore, it suggests that the victim is suddenly part of the problem as opposed to someone who is sticking up for themselves, Wingfield says. "There is nothing mutual ab

Notes & transcript: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/public-comments-to-cdc-hicpac
Writing Letters to Elected Representatives, a guide. Letters to politicians are some of the easiest and most effective actions many neglect. CHLOE HUMBERT - JAN 24, 2023
Write to the elected representatives that represent you. These are the elected officials that are on the ballot for your district. Don’t waste time writing to elected representatives in other states or in other places. Politicians care about their own constituents — people who are eligible to potentially vote for them, and who they are elected to represent. Representatives disregard contact attempts from people who are not in their district. Writing to government agencies, outside their prescribed application or public comment processes, is also not typically helpful. Writing anonymous letters or posting anonymous comments on social media are also generally not effective. Representatives care about what their actual verifiable constituents care about.
Indivisible Guide: How Your Member of Congress Thinks, and How to Use That to Save Democracy
This constant reelection pressure means that MoCs are enormously sensitive to their image in the district or state, and they will work very hard to avoid signs of public dissent or disapproval.
Tell Congress: CDC Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) needs public oversight.
There is a dangerous new government policy being proposed which could harm healthcare workers and patients across the country. Instead of strengthening infection control policies in healthcare settings to protect workers and patients from infectious diseases, the CDC is planning future guidance which could lower healthcare infection control standards.
CDC HICPAC (Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee)
HICPAC meets up to 8 times a year at CDC in Atlanta, Georgia. Meetings are open to the public and time for public comments is allotted on the agenda. See the Meeting Information page for planed meeting dates and registration information.
Liv Grace Public Comment at the CDC HICPAC Meeting - Aug. 22, 2023
Annals of Internal Medicine - Ideas and Opinions June 2023 Universal Masking in Health Care Settings: A Pandemic Strategy Whose Time Has Come and Gone, For Now - FREE - Erica S. Shenoy, MD, PhD, Hilary M. Babcock, MD, MPH, Karen B. Brust, MD, Michael S. Calderwood, MD, MPH, Shira Doron, MD, Anurag N. Malani, MD, Sharon B. Wright, MD, MPH, and Westyn Branch-Elliman, MD, MMSc 
Maintaining masking requirements for HCP during all direct clinical encounters may marginally reduce the risk for transmission from HCP to patient or from patient to HCP. Those potential incremental benefits, however, need to be weighed against increasingly recognized costs. Masking impedes communication, a barrier that is distributed unequally across patient populations, such as those for whom English is not their preferred language and those who are hard-of-hearing and rely on lip reading and other nonverbal cues.
Teams Human - Anti-mask Woke-washing. The moral distortion of social justice. CHLOE HUMBERT - AUG 31, 2023
This woke-washing tactic is being used to promote anti-mask arguments and gin up opposition to N95 use in healthcare settings. Erica Shenoy might just be vain and maybe wants people to see her face, but she claimed in an Annals of Internal Medicine op-ed that dropping masking for infection control in healthcare is needed so that patients would be able to lip read - the innuendo being that masking is somehow discriminatory toward the hard of hearing. This is astonishingly foolish woke-washing since lip reading only has a 30% to 40% accuracy rate. Even trained professional lip readers only attain perhaps 60% accuracy. Doctors should surely never depend on lip reading for receiving critical medical advice with such a large potential for miscommunication.
National Deaf Children's Society - Lip Reading 
Lip-reading on its own isn

Notes, transcript, & links: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/stop-falling-for-the-myth-of-panicked-public 
This commentary is related to my essay: Dear Public Officials: Stop falling for the myth of an irrational panicked public. By Chloe Humbert, Aug 25 2023
And it started initially as me writing a hopped up letter to the county. And then I sent a pal a voicemail. (This is exactly what my voicemails sound like! You’re welcome!)
References:
Commentary: Elite Panic vs. the Resilient Populace by James B. Meigs, MAY 2020  When authorities believe their own citizens will become dangerous, they begin to focus on controlling the public, rather than on addressing the disaster itself. They clamp down on information, restrict freedom of movement, and devote unnecessary energy to enforcing laws they assume are about to be broken. These strategies don’t just waste resources, one study notes; they also “undermine the public’s capacity for resilient behaviors.” In other words, nervous officials can actively impede the ordinary people trying to help themselves and their neighbors. As in war, the first casualty in disasters is often the truth. One symptom of elite panic is the belief that too much information, or the wrong kind of information, will send citizens reeling.
Toxic Sludge is Good for You 2002 In today’s corporate culture major PR firms promote crisis management as a necessary business expense. Whenever something bad happens to a corporation, often its first move is not to deal with the actual problem, but to manage the negative perception caused by that problem. 
PA Homepage - West Nile cases have risen in Lackawanna County. by: Emily Allegrucci, Posted: Aug 18, 2023 “We want them to be aware, we don’t want them to panic. It's the delicate line that we walk. We want people to know that this is in the area, and that’s why we trap. We trap to find out if it is in the area so people are aware and they could take precautions,” added Genovese.
Bodies of Covid-19 victims are still stored in refrigerated trucks in NYC - By Mirna Alsharif and Ray Sanchez, CNN - Updated 5:05 PM EDT, Fri May 7, 2021
And Voila, An Anti-Mask Twitter Rando by Chloe Humbert on Medium, Apr 7 2023 I came across a particularly aggressive anti-mask account on twitter in early 2021. He made a ridiculous capitalist fever dream argument to justify duping people into unmasking and getting sick, and maybe dying, for business interests. It seemed so blatantly ridiculous. Tweet from @reubenR80027912 dated 1019 am May 7, 2021 says Main Street is Very simple. Do 3 things PSA campaigns that you won’t die if vaxxed. Remind people kids aren’t a risk. Remove masks everywhere so people don’t constantly live in fear. Voila. Roaring economy. Spending is about freedom from fear. Quote-tweet from same account on February 22, 2021 says There’s something to the Mad Men pilot and covid. Telling people they’re more likely to die in a car accident than covid doesn’t matter. Nor do vax stats. Happiness is freedom from fear, a billboard that screams whatever you’re doing is ok @ DKThomp
Jason M - @JasonM98282978 - 11:06 AM · Aug 9, 2023 Dear Mr ******, Your fellow residents have once again drawn attention to the fact that against your strata council’s wishes and previous advice, you are continuing to wear a mask while attending common areas of the **** tower. We, along with your fellow residents, feel this creates an unnecessary atmosphere of fear within the building. The Covid 19 pandemic has been declared over by the World Health Organization, and the virus has become far less dangerous, akin to the common cold. There is no reason to continue wearing a mask. If anxiety is a motivator, we suggest speaking to a professional about this. We ask again that you refrain from wearing a mask in common areas. This includes the lobby, the garbage/recycling room, the mail room, the elevators, and anywhere else where you may encounter your neighbours. We

This commentary is based on the essay: Don’t wait for everybody before speaking up. By Chloe Humbert, Aug 8 2023
Notes, Transcript, & Links: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/dont-wait-for-everybody-before-speaking#details
Pluralistic ignorance From Wikipedia In social psychology, pluralistic ignorance refers to a situation in which the minority position on a given topic is wrongly perceived to be the majority position or where the majority position is wrongly perceived to be the minority position.
MSNBC (YOUTUBE) Miles Taylor’s new book warns against the dangers of a ‘next Trump’ Jul 22, 2023 I spent a lot of time talking to our nation’s democracy Scholars people like Larry Diamond at Stanford and Jonathan height at NYU people I consider sort of democracy doctors and when they parse through the data one of the really alarming things is you see that it’s not just senior Republicans who are saying one thing in private about Donald Trump and the Maga movement that it’s a disaster and a threat and then saying another thing in public that self-censorship is happening nationwide so surveys show that the majority of Americans now misrepresent their public opinions when they’re talking to other people and keep their actual opinions private now what was worrying Jonathan is the one cohort that doesn’t keep their opinions private was people on the far political extremes especially the far right so extremists are willing to tell you what they really think but the moderate majority of Americans are not and how do we overcome that self-censorship well it sounds really pedestrian it sounds like a kindergarten lesson but it’s that we just start speaking out when more people speak out it lowers the price of dissent for everyone else and really in my mind that’s the only way we can Safeguard our democracy is make sure we’re not self-censoring the truth
Commemorating Earth Day with a Little Legislative History Jonathan Coppess Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics University of Illinois April 22, 2022 farmdoc daily (12):55 Forged in the wake of an oil spill and by the flames of a burning river, history demarks the origins of the modern environmental on the first Earth Day, April 22, 1970, amid the troubles and turmoil of the Vietnam War at the end of the tumultuous 1960s.  Within the first four years of its existence, the movement achieved an unparalleled, impressive legislative and political trifecta.  The National Environmental Protection Act (1970), the Clean Air Act (1970), and the Clean Water Act (1972) were all enacted by strong, bipartisan votes across two congresses.  In addition, President Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970 with Congressional acquiescence.
Jane Mayer, Dark Money. The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, January 2016 “In developing regulations the EPA was directed to weigh only one concern: public health. The costs to industry were explicitly deemed irrelevant.”
American Lung Association – New Poll: Voters Overwhelmingly Support Stricter Limits on Smog American Lung Association calls on Administration to reverse proposed changes to weaken the standards that protect health of all Americans. April 24, 2018 5 percent of voters support EPA enforcing its updated stricter limits on smog, with a notable 56 percent of all voters strongly supporting. Support for stricter limits on smog outweighs opposition among Democrats, Republicans, and independent voters alike. Nearly all Democrats support enforcing the stricter limits (94% support/4% oppose), independent voters support enforcing the limits by more than five-to-one (77% support/15% oppose), and more Republicans support (49%) than oppose (39%) enforcing the limits. After hearing arguments from both sides of the debate, not only do two-thirds of voters express support (66%), nearly half of voters still express strong support for enforcing these stricter standards