To say that I am disappointed by the verdict of the court on two Reuters’ journalists would be an understatement.
Like everyone, I go to social media when I feel strong emotions to see if people I follow share the same feelings. But this time, instead of going to the little Twitter circle-jerk of journalists and aid workers, I decided to log into my fake Facebook account to see the reactions of the Buddhist fascists I am following.
Predictably …. the military supporters are happy as shown in this photo.
(A post about the judge’s verdict in a pro-military group. The post has over 900 likes.)
Facebook reactions help you to break down the responses. This is what they reacted as of the night of 3rd September.
Good thing three people are sad like us even in the military supporters’ group although 40-something are cuntish and the majority probably are happy with the decision evidenced by their comments. For the sake of sanity, I won’t translate these individual comments to English. Most of them said the sentence is too light calling for death penalty.
But don’t take their responses as public opinion for two reasons. First, this is Burmese equivalent of the 4chan’s /pol/ minus dank memes. Second, with Facebook announcing they have discovered a covert Myanmar military propaganda campaign, we cannot deny the possibility of the military’s trolls jacking up the number of likes and comments.
Let’s check the news pages.
The top comments under the Eleven’s posts are quite negative with some saying they are traitors trading their country’s image for some $.
I know what you are going to ask. Are they trolls?
This is a question that has been on my mind for a while.
(Screengrab of comments under Eleven’s post)
To know whether someone is a troll, I am using two assumptions here. They must have authentic Burmese names and they must have at least one photo of themselves or a group photo uploaded to Facebook like everyone of us.
All of the Facebook users at top five comments have real Burmese names. But the ones at comment no. 3 and 4 did not post a photo of themselves on Facebook. Given the addictive and narcissistic selfie culture and the high possibility that they are using Facebook on a phone which has a camera, it is quite unusual for someone to have no photos of themselves unless they are using Facebook for a different reason such as to be trolls.
Top comments under the VOA’s post presented a more likely possibility of fake accounts.
(Screengrab from VOA’s post)
The Facebook users at comment no. 1, 2 and 3 don’t have authentic names while none of them have a single photo of themselves.
Mizzima’s Facebook post share similarities.
(Screengrab of comments under the Mizzima’s post)
The users at comment no. 2, 4 and 5 don’t go by with authentic Burmese names while 1, 4 and 5 don’t have personal photos either in profile or in Facebook’s photo albums.
(a post from Irrawaddy Burmese)
Hold on, this guy called “Myan Mar” is in Mizzima’s comment sections. It might be that some people are intentionally commenting under news pages related to Reuters’ journalists? With limited resources and time, I cannot conclude comprehensively yet. But the possibility of a concerted effort to change the public opinion about the journalists cannot be ignored.
Reading comments under the posts of Eleven, VOA, Mizzima and Irrawaddy shed some light that some Facebook accounts might be trying to change public opinion. It would be also interesting to see if there are more accounts like Myan Mar who keep commenting under news related to Reuters journalists. But the question of who is liking these comments so that they appear on the top remains. It could be just ordinary people liking the most controversial comments or it could be the effort of a troll farm.
Hopefully, I will be able to address these questions in my next articles.
Note from the author: I am still experimenting with this blog and there are a lot of room for improvements. If you have any suggestions or comments, I would love to hear from you. Please do contact me. I am looking to do more research on Burmese social media and your inputs will be really appreciated.
Myochit Monitor 