From the perspective of knowledge equals power, intentional misinformation, no matter by whom, could be regarded as abuse of power.

More people should educate those knowing less instead of ridiculing their ignorance. (Given the "knowing" really "know", but that's another topic.)

Edit:
Intentional misinformation meaning posting and spreading "fake news", willfully publishing or sharing false information through media of any kind, as organization or individual, not merely everyday lyingy which is sth different.

Edit 2:
Apparently it's "misinformation" not "disinformation" sorry.

Its a good idea but, we live in predatory times where everyone wants people to see what they want you to see. They stopped caring about the truth a long long time ago.

If you’re talking about lies you should know we as humans learn to lie before we learn to talk. It’s part of who we are and as crazy as it sounds is a necessary part of living in a group. It’s wrong to lie to hurt people but we lie all the time in many small ways just to exsists in a world with other people. You really don’t want to live in a world completely without lies.

Worse still, democracy relies on informed citizens. Distributing disinformation does not only hurt the individual affectwd by it, it hurts democracy itself.

I didn't mean lies I mean intentional disinformation as in posting and spreading "fake news", willfully publishing or sharing false information through media of any kind, as organization or individual. So yes, it involves lying but "lie" is too unspecific and general a term here.

Ahh okay.

Thx for asking tho, helped me phrasing my thought more clearly.

My pleasure. I love a good think.

I will say though fake news is older than real news. Most of our history is people making shit up.

It’s still wrong of course but I don’t think it going away in our life time. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try tho. It’s a long slow march to freedom.

It depends on how you want democracy to work. If you’re aiming for a fair society, sure. If you’re aiming for a dictatorship in disguise, disinformation, misdirection, propaganda, and straight-up lies are the foundation of your regime.

Mussolini pretty much wrote the book on converting a democracy to a dictatorship.

Seems like a pessimistic perspective, I'd like to note that public access to information has increased and become easier too. There are a lot of things you can learn if you really try. And also institutions that help you. It's a two edged sword though, but a lot can be learned merely by studying philosophy, logic principles and the scientific methods in order to decelop a mostly reliable bullshit detector.

Depends how you define lying. If you mean saying things that you know to be untrue then I would disagree that it's necessary.

I read a book about lying around 7 years ago and it was making the argument that it's only justifiable when used to prevent greater harm, the classic example there being Nazis on your door asking if you have Anne Frank in the attic. Other than that it's always wrong and often completely unnecessary. Applies to white lies as well.

The only single time I've lied since then was reflexively telling a beggar that I didn't have any cash. Again, completely unnecessary. In fact I've not lied for so long that lying doesn't even come to mind anymore as an option when handling a situation. People can tell that they're not going to like what I'm about to say next before I even say it because they can see me hesitate and carefully choose my words. They don't always like hearing it but not one person has cut ties because of it - rather the opposite. They now come to me when they want the truth.

Additional benefit of this is that it makes me carefully consider my own behaviour so that I don't need to lie about it later.

Again, not lying doesn't mean speaking everything that's on your mind. It simply means not saying things you know to be untrue.

That's called misinformation.

I can't tell if this comment is lying, misinformation, or disinformation

But what if it's really funny at the time?

informed citizens

Informed educated citizens. Deliberately removing critical thinking from the syllabus is much the same as gerrymandering, but with follow on effects for the economy (actually society, but due to lack of broad education, economy is all that matters now).

Representative democracy has problems. Consider alternatives. Random citizen election worked for centuries for the Athenians.

Worse still, democracy relies on informed citizens.

No it doesn't. This is literally the oldest anti-democracy argument; people are too stupid to rule themselves.

Citizens are entitled to vote because they're subject to the authority of the State. Dumb people still have to pay taxes and obey the police. A voter who chooses a candidate because Mars is in retrograde casts a ballot that is every bit as legitimate as the head of the political science department. "low information voter" is an argument for voterID, poll taxes, and literacy tests; it's voter suppression.

When in doubt, assume OP is a kraut.

I've been saying this for years. A healthy society protects it's idiots, saves them from predation like this. We point and laugh.

There is a pretty big difference between "citizens have a responsibility to educate themselves and governments have a responsibility tk enable that" and technofascism.

Also there are way older arguments against democracy. Like "I am more capable of physical violence than you, so why should care about your silly little ballot?", "the gods blessed me with the authority to rule", or even the classic "we don't have time to let the masses squabble- we need a unilateral decision maker who can make quick decisions".

disinformation on purpose

lol

sorry going to have to downvote as I can't see how anyone would think elsewise. EDITED - my bad. upvoted. thought this was in unpopular opinions.

May I inquire as per the reason of your loling? Why lol and what about? Care to elaborate?

Yeah, sorry, English is not my native language.

No I was talking about me since I was the OP of the comments we were talking about.

I was bored at work.

Well it depends on the gravity of the misinformation right? Is it just a small prank or are you substantially influencing someone's world view? How grave are the consequences of the misinformation for the affected? How much distress does the misinformation cause them? I suppose there's always differences in degree.

Like the thing about the swedish scientists finding out a person ate like 20-50 Spiders in their lifetime while asleep, bc of spiders crawling into our mouths, which turned out to be fake news that was supposed to show how much easier misinformation spread if you just put the claim in that "scientists found out". Still many ppl believe it though.

So is it harmful to people who have severe arachnophobia? Is it just a funny experiment?

So if someone asks “how are you doing” on the street you answer truthfully? If someone cooks you a meal do you tell them it wasn’t good?

A lie by omission I still count. If you know what answer is the truth and you don’t say it in order to not share the truth, that’s deceitful .

All my opinion of course, well not mine I also read it in a book somewhere along the line.

"Disinformation on purpose" is like saying "PIN number" lol

Disinformation is on purpose by definition.

Personally, I like extending the metaphor.

• Sharing information you have no good reason to believe is gross negligence (in this case, the power being your ability to get things in front of people). If you haven't read the article and checked for common sense, don't post it.
• Upvoting a post based on the title without looking at the source is a minor version of the same.
• Giving non-primary sources when the primary source is right there is a form of gatekeeping. Give me the court ruling pdf!

On your second edit, disinformation is the correct term for what you're discussing. Disinformation is purposefully wrong or misleading information. Misinformation is still correct, but it's more broad. It's just generally incorrect information, without intent being a requirement.

I'm actually unsure about that. People share incorrect information all the time for various reasons.

You are missing the point. I am not talking about voter supression, I am talking about democracy leading to good outcomes for its people. There is a reason why people keep voting against their own interests and why the swampiest swamp creature won the 2016 US election with the slogan "drain the swamp", and that reason is systemic misinformation. Fox News is so far removed from the truth that they can put up the defense that "No reasonable viewer believes them" and get away with that.

It should be illegal to have the government or any entity with power deceive or lie to you. Using the best of psychology to manipulate people should absolutely be a serious crime. Instead, corporations and governments do this everyday with impunity.

Misinformation is merely wrong. Disinformation is wrong and created or spread with intent to deceive.

Someone telling you you eat spiders in your sleep is spreading misinformation. Messaging about the 2020 black lives matter protests being violent riots was disinformation

That's "misinformation".

Mis- and dis- are different.

This is why fraud is illegal.

Like this

I have no issue telling people I'm not doing good if that is the truth. The meal example I can't say. Telling the truth there would be the right thing to do according to my principles but a situation like that almost never occurs - at least it hasn't for me over the past 7 years or so. Therefor I can't say that I absolutely would.

However, I've answered truthfully to even more uncomfortable questions than that in the past - regarding people's appearance for example - so from that perspective I see no reason why I wouldn't.

I'm unsure how I feel about a lie by omission. For me the point has always been not to actively deceive people by telling them something that's not true. I'm not obligated to tell everything that's on my mind. I can also just say that I don't want to answer. However if I evade answering the thing they are asking by dancing around it then that would count as deception.

Would you want to be lied to if your guest didn't like the food you served to them at all?

Right. But disinformation can be reshared by people who think it's accurate, and that doesn't make it mere misinformation.

Even intelligent and educated people don't know everything about everything.

I can tell you as someone with a higher degree, I only know a lot about the area I studied.

I don't know more about any other topic than the average joe.

So no matter who you are, you have big gaping holes of knowledge.

We are all at risk when misinformation is spread.