Charles Hugh Smith — What's Driving Social Discord: Russian Social Media Meddling or Soaring Wealth/Power Inequality?

There are two competing explanatory narratives battling for mind-share in the U.S.:

1. The nation's social discord is the direct result of Russian social media meddling-- what I call the Boris and Natasha Narrative of evil Russian masterminds controlling a vast conspiracy of social media advertising, fake-news outlets and trolls that have created artificial divides in the body politic, or exacerbated minor cracks into chasms.

2. The nation's social discord is the direct result of soaring wealth/power inequality-- the vast expansion of the wealth and power of the nation's financial elites and their protected class of technocrat enablers and enforcers (the few) at the expense of the unprotected many....

Don't fall for it. The nation's elites are desperate to misdirect us from the financial and power divide that has enriched and empowered them at the expense of the unprotected many. Every story and every broadcast about Russian influence is another brick in a Great Media Wall designed to block our view of the grim reality of American life in a society defined by vast inequality.

Always start an inquiry with this question: cui bono, to whose benefit? Who benefits from us buying the Boris and Natasha Narrative?

oftwominds
What's Driving Social Discord: Russian Social Media Meddling or Soaring Wealth/Power Inequality?
Charles Hugh Smith