So warns a recent document released by 16 organizations, among them the Arns Commission for the Defense of Human Rights, which supports complaints related to violations of fundamental guarantees in Brazil.
Among other groups, the document is also signed by the Association of Judges for Democracy, Conectas Human Rights, the Brazilian Press Association and the Brazilian Public Security Forum.
The signatories warn that, by gaining space in the electoral campaign, “disinformation hinders public debate on the most relevant issues for the country”. They also recognize that carrying out a scrutiny in the midst of the intense flow of disinformation “has imposed an enormous challenge to the Electoral Justice”.
Scholars assure that this voluminous misleading discursive production, mainly in social media, follows the trend of peaks in the circulation of URLs (locator to search for content on the Web) in election years, but remains persistent in other events.
They highlight the pernicious effects disseminating fraudulent statements, as it questions the legitimacy of the electoral process, weakens the health of democracy and creates distrust in the authorities.
At a glance, the most shared links generally republish old contents easily accessible online, gestures or clothing of candidates, as well as the diffusion of incomplete fractions of an audiovisual in which the candidate exposes an explicit idea, however, in the complete material reveals the opposite.
A sample of desinformation
For example, Minister Paulo de Tarso Sanseverino, from the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), ordered on October 24 to remove a fake news published in a coordinated manner by Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, Congresswoman Carla Zambelli and Councilman Nikolas Ferreira, in addition to other supporters of the ultra-right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro, candidate for reelection from the Liberal Party.
The fake news was published on Twitter and claimed that former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, candidate of the Workers’ Party, wore a cap with the acronym CPX, which would mean “cupincha” (accomplice), or ally of a criminal gang.
In fact, the acronym is just an abbreviation referring to the Complexo do Alemão, a community in Rio de Janeiro, visited by the former trade union leader during the campaign. Control agencies showed that the term CPX on the cap is used by residents and official agencies to refer to that community.
“It is forced to recognize that the propagation of such contents, without any evidentiary support, has the potential to interfere negatively in the will of the voter,” the TSE magistrate underlined.
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