Did Twitter ruin the election?
In the wake of a vague election result, Attorney-General George Brandis criticised social platforms such as Twitter for the “trivialisation of political discourse”. Dan Nolan argues that politicians are not only losing the media/PR war but only have themselves to blame.
The election results had barely been tabulated — a major swing against the Coalition — when George Brandis QC blamed the outcome on Twitter.
Apparently, the disastrous campaign would have sailed through perfectly if wasn’t for those damned tweets.
It’s definitely not the first time we’ve heard that complaint around Twitter, #AusVotes or #AusPol — namely, that it’s a vapid, insular, leftist, virtue-signalling echo-chamber.
The days of old when a minister could call up a newspaper columnist and have a yarn in their ear about ‘what really needs doing’, are long gone. The way information is disseminated now happens much more in real time — on platforms just like Twitter. The traditional gatekeepers are dead and dying — the new ‘gatekeepers’ are more like aggregators, places like Buzzfeed or platforms like Twitter’s own Moments.
They’re new outlets that understand the zeitgeist of the moment, rather than dictating to them how they should think or feel. It’s no longer Kerry O’Brien explaining the ins and outs of wonkish policy — the Libs even had a damn Snapchat election filter. This is not a new take, but it’s one that bears repeating.
But did Twitter really ruin the election?
Twitter absolutely can amplify trivialities (people voted for a dead gorilla, for fuck’s sake), but the social network generally reflects the mood of a technologically savvy and interested group of voters (which, in Australia, is damn near everyone). When it comes to what’s going on in the campaign, day-by-day, there are no alternative place to go — Twitter’s number one in real-time data, and when any news breaks it’s the only place worth being. If you want posts from your racist uncle about how halal is illegal, you go to Facebook. If you want news, analysis and jokes you go to Twitter.
Twitter during #AusVotes was an incredibly playful and humorous place, people trading jibes, memes freely flowing like the snags at the voting places and people using a cute bot — @auspolling (full disclosure, we built the critter) — to find where they could collect their democracy sausage.
The first thing you’ll notice when you check into Twitter, at least in Australia, is it’s where journalists communicate and share stories.
It’s also where news breaks, from the Bataclan attacks in Paris to the Orlando shooting to Harambe the Gorilla; the news all broke on Twitter. The public’s no longer listening to media institutions curating their info for them, but letting social media orgs like Facebook own their feed or curating their own news on Twitter.
Trends ebb and flow with the current political reality, gaffes as they happen, a failed policy launch, or the latest photo of a politician holding up a sign with writing on it, allowing it to be memed in perpetuity.
Twitter isn’t the be-all and end-all of political conversation but it is a major player in that space now. The media landscape has changed, and it’s up to everyone involved — politicians, publications and the public alike — to keep up with it.
Brandis has hit upon a point, though; politics is verging on the trivial and the sensational, but that’s been happening for years.
In Australia, the vast majority of the democratic project is concluded and now we’re effectively in a managerial mode. There’s not much in terms of difference between the two major parties except for how that managerial tier of governance is structured, and how much of it is outsourced to either consulting companies or unions.
Politics and political speech, like media, are competing with vastly more interesting (and rewarding) forms of entertainment. Something that tends to lend to cutting through with individuals is having a cohesive argument that you stick to from the beginning of the campaign.
Another element rarely touched upon, people do want change for change’s sake. Both parties don’t really have extended bases anymore (alliance with capital seems to have ossified and union membership has drastically declined) – parties are fighting a PR war.
It’s basically what Daniel Boorstin’s book ‘The Image’ warned would be the most horrific outcomes of the intersection of PR and democracy, but there you go.
Blaming Twitter for the triviality of the election campaign is like blaming boomers for Brexit — it’s a suggestion that there is a disconnect between the political elite and the democratic populace.
The Australian electorate wasn’t just going to lie back and think of Malcolm. It’s becoming increasingly clear there was no plan or strategy other than celebrity. People have an affection for what’s authentic and what’s honest (or at least has some semblance of appearing to be).
Those parties and political operators who fail to grasp that will find themselves getting comprehensively dacked – 140 characters at a time.
Dan Nolan is co-founder and engineering lead at Aussie app development start-up Proxima
You make some good points Dan. Politician culpability / blame /celebrity right at the top of my list. But isn’t it also the case where people should just shut up for 20 minutes and listen… rather than .. “this is what I think..” I know they represent us, and let’s face it, there are some Group One wombats involved in public life.. but I also think at some point they should be allowed to do their job. Case in point: how many tweets during Q and A last night – 30-40K – in an hour?… “This is what I think…”. Another way of looking at it – If we cared, or you were properly “qualified”…..you’d probably be on the panel. Ricky Gervais: “Just because you have an opinion, doesn’t mean it’s valuable or anybody should have to listen to it..”
NOW THAT’S WHAT I THINK……
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30-40,000 Tweets isn’t that much when you think 600,000+ watched it. Either most people sat there and watched it with a few people tweeting ad nauseum, or 1 in 15-20 people tweeted once in the night. That still leeds plenty of time to sit back and listen.
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Gorillas and humans have 98.4% of their DNA in common.
Given the election just concluded, many of the candidates, the losers blame-game, and the re-emergence of Hanson (no, not the band), I suspect that gorillas may have passed us in the intelligence stakes.
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We are certainly in a much more informed age. Far more people than ever before can dig a little deeper and uncover the b*llshit and lies (ahem: ‘spin’) a lot easier.
Tony Abbott lost this election. His legacy was the reason Turnbull’s team didn’t pick up the votes. Abbott lied and the electorate remembered and knows that whilst Turnbull is a fresh face and some would say a centrist, he is part of the same mob.
Bipartisanship isn’t a bad thing in my mind. It’s democracy. Having Murdoch’s reach smearing and scaremongering is not democratic in the slightest and the LNP are firmly tarred with Murdoch bile.
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Brandis is making the same silly argument made by other conservatives who either don’t “get” social media or feel threatened by it. On the night of the last Victorian election, outgoing Deputy Premier Peter Ryan was critical of social media because, wait for it, it allowed ALP and minor party candidates to communicate directly with voters! He actually said that social media didn’t give his side of politics “clear air” to “get our message out”. This seems to be a common view on the conservative side. Take Barnaby Joyce as a case in point who seems to use Twitter as just another broadcast medium. There are exceptions, of course. For all his faults Tony Abbott did use Twitter to answer #AskTony questions directly from voters, usually when he had a spare half hour while waiting to board a plane. But all that stopped when he became PM and all his social media was then very carefully managed.
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Brandis is talking nonsense again. The Coalition ripped the integrity out of Australian political discourse once they stumbled the “Hanson factor” and rode the wave 10 years. In addition the mainstream media has been complicit by playing the silly games. Vacuous sensationalist “journalism” that was once the domain current affairs programs and talk radio stations has replaced real journalism. In any event Twitter is not a leftist platform rather a casual scroll through #ausvotes and #auspol reveals as many ludicrous tweets supporting the Coalition and seeking to diminish Labor and the Greens any the other. Sadly what Brandis once again reveals is that the Coalition has no patience for a free exchange of ideas or the electorate seeking to inform themselves. That has been further reinforced by the Coalitions attack on the ABC. Just today the hugely successful The Drum online has been cut. The Drum has been a forum for a diverse range of opinions and new writers plus every piece provides a moderated comments section that is as informative as many of the pieces. To terminate a new media innovation on the ABC makes no sense unless you read it in the context of it being constantly attacked by News Corp operatives and others for years. We need to all stand up for free and open informed discourse otherwise we will have nothing but spin.
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Twitter did not ruin the election, the result with which we find ourselves, is down to a number of failures.
The people are sick and tired of the main political parties and the people in them, for that reason they voted for independents and crazy people. Palmer ( who belongs on both sides of the previous description) left a pool which ran into a stream and headed for Pauline Hanson and others.
Shorten, who knows no other way but the old union bully tricks, did damage to the polling, by riding his race on a wild horse pumped up on a drug called political paranoia, lying out loud, and waving a banner emblazoned “Crusader Bill Will Save You.”
Ineptitude and fear of loss stifled the prime minister, and muffled his party, preventing any real policies or even ideas from emerging to encourage votes, and delivering the current hollow victory, which, if he is anything approaching the leader or the politician he so desperately wishes to be seem as, he will now take hold of and steer to success, but this will take hard work.
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Actually Turnbull lost the election because he alienated the Liberal base because he deposed Abbott who they voted for and doesn’t share many of their conservative values. He then failed to appeal to the other side as well because why would the vote for Labor lite when the could vote for Labor?
I say this as a liberal supporter who was alienated Turnbull.
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If Abbott had still been at the helm we would have a Labor majority government today. The acerbic nature of the far right in the LNP is killing the party. Malcolm is a perfect leader for a conservative party in 2016. GetUp did well to get a few of the nutjobs out, however there are astill a few to go.
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I genuinely believe that some Independents and the Greens attract votes because they are being fair dinkum. Most in the two big parties are not fair dinkum.
Perhaps all the fair dinkum pollies should pool together, creating the ‘Fair Dinkum Party’.
I’d vote for it, because I am sure that their policies would be well thought out, for the long term and would not benefit billionaires.
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