Manufacturing Chaos offers a survey on the recent rise of disinformation from a global perspective, looking at how changes in the way we receive information and connect with one another have influenced such events as Brexit, COVID-19, the 2016 election, Qanon, "deepfakes" and artificial intelligence, and more.
Once a site of what many considered to be utopic potential, the primacy of social media platforms on the internet has rapidly turned it into a ready vehicle for disinformation. The film examines how the convergence of rising inequality, our increasing reliance on the online world, combined with new tools for manipulation, has enabled the creation of parallel realities with dramatic social consequences. People living within the same community can now perceive the world in vastly different ways, depending on where they hang out online. The power to manipulate narratives and herd people toward falsehood raises the stakes so high that peace and cooperation are becoming increasingly fragile, the goal of disinformation.
Manufacturing Chaos reveals how similar ideas, words, and memes are being employed to draw people towards white-nationalism across the world as algorithms are primed to push conflict in order to increase screen time. The disinformation specialists featured in the documentary offer a historical perspective on the rise of such movements, how the increasing privatization of the commons has led to a resurgence of far-right ideologies, and stress the need for a unified global response.
FEATURED IN THE FILM
- Dr. Sanjana Hattotuwa, Research Fellow, The Disinformation Project
- Dr. Kate Hannah, Director, The Disinformation Project
- David Farrier, Journalist / Filmmaker
- Byron C. Clark, Video Essayist / Writer
- Marc Daalder, Senior Political Reporter, Newsroom NZ
- Lisa Ellis, Director of Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Programme, University of Otago
FILMMAKER'S STATEMENT: "The internet can be used for good or bad. It can be everything you love and everything you despise. Social media companies learned pretty quickly that we engage more with content that enrages us or shocks us or annoys us or pushes our buttons more in a negative space than in a positive space.
I was hearing from people that I knew, stories and some sort of crazy ideas about the world and what was going on. I was like, 'Where did you get that? Where are you hearing that?' I just started to become more and more aware of misinformation. Then I started looking into what was behind it all and where this is all coming from. That's when I ended up getting in touch with Sanjana. After talking to him, I thought, 'There is an entire documentary in this world.'
One of the things [I hope viewers will take away] is just to have an awareness of what's going on. I think one of the biggest things to start is the conversation. Start becoming a more critical content consumer."
— Justin Pemberton
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