The so-called “social media” have boosted discussions on subjectivity production within digital culture, including debates concerning the dissemination of disinformation, popularly known as “fake news”. In Brazil, where around 66% of the population are social media users (Kemp, 2020), the production, circulation and consumption of contents by different agents via such platforms had a significant impact in 2018’s presidential elections’ outcome, in a context of democratic instability and political polarization.
More than just pointing out that “fake news” were in part responsible for the current president’s election, this panel seeks to address some of the following questions: What kinds of disinformation were and are propagated and by whom? What are the roles that platforms such as WhatsApp and Facebook play in this scenario? What consequences do they engender for individuals and institutions, before and after the pandemic? What strategies can be put into place, in a context of digital culture, to fight neo-fascism? In a broader sense we ask ourselves: How does the algorithmic mediation of digital platforms affect contemporary subjectivity, from our Global South perspective? What kind of human-machine future are we building?
