When Ferdinand Marcos was deposed by a People Power Revolution in 1986, the Filipino people vowed that the Marcos family and martial law would “never again” be allowed to return. After nearly four decades, with the landslide victory of Ferdinand's son “BongBong” Marcos Jr., the Philippines is set to witness the return of the Marcos family to Malacañang, the presidential residence in Manila. Many outraged citizens, who have taken to the streets to protest, have been pointing to the Marcoses’ blatant online disinformation campaigns and historical whitewashing that have characterised the family’s comeback blueprint. With democracy on the line, it is imperative that the country and major tech companies take proactive steps to address the problem of online disinformation that is unfolding on a global scale. 

A BRUTAL DICTATORSHIP

President Ferdinand Marcos ruled as a dictator for 14 years before being exiled with his family to Hawaii. The Marcos regime was responsible for the Philippines' debt crises, staggering unemployment levels, growing cronyism, and “lost decades of development”. Under Marcos’ martial law, the Philippines was further plagued with human right abuses, which included sexual crimes, torture, and forceful arrests of opposition supporters and leaders. Although the victims of martial law have been recognised and compensated since then, members of the Marcos family and their followers continue to deny his atrocities. 

Bongbong Marcos followed his father to exile and returned to the Philippines in 1991. Marcos Jr. has declared that he wishes to be “judged by his actions” rather than those of his family, yet he has engaged his father's legacy in his campaign, with the slogan “together we shall rise again,” echoing Ferdinand’s past promises to make the Philippines “great again”. 

WEAPONISING ONLINE MEDIA  

The Philippines has 92.5 million social media users, many of whom use it for daily activities and others for more nefarious purposes. Disinformation and historical distortion have become endemic in the online world, making it difficult for most users to distinguish between what is real and what is fake. Rodrigo Duterte’s electoral campaigns in 2016 and 2019 benefited from internet trolls, internet-based propaganda, and disinformation, revealing the increasingly pervasive nature of online media in the country’s political landscape. Online media became a hotbed for widespread disinformation and historical whitewashing once again, as followers of Marcos coordinated extensively across multiple social media platforms such as YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook to actively disseminate disinformation about the Marcos family and opposition leaders such as Leni Robredo. 

The Marcoses are not new to historical disinformation, as it has been revealed that the Marcoses' online revisionism initiative stretches back to the 2000s, when the family was active on Friendster, Flickr, and other presently discontinued platforms. This online revisionism is centered on glorifying the Marcos family's history, by portraying President Marcos as a charismatic leader who led the country to new heights, rather than a venal kleptocrat who violated human rights. These narratives have been regurgitated by internet trolls and propaganda networks on social media platforms in the years leading up to the recent elections, particularly since 2014, when Marcos Jr.’s aspirations to become president became conspicuous. The Philippines has become a victim of a “troll farm” problem, in which political strategists employ “troll farms,” which swamp social media sites with messages from fake profiles presenting false facts as objective truth to sway elections. Troll farms have been paid hefty sums of money to execute such operations, ranging from P2,500 to nearly a million pesos, depending on the amount of engagement they generate on their posts. 

In a study on the prevalence of disinformation during recent elections, researchers discovered that the majority of disinformation online, also in the traditional media, that involved negative messaging was directed towards the main opposition leader Robredo, whereas Marcos Jr. was mostly portrayed positively. Posts on election cheating also surfaced, claiming that Robredo would use electoral fraud to claim victory over Marcos. While Facebook was the primary platform for disinformation and misinformation it was interconnected with other social media sites and cross-posting such disinformation. Platforms where historical revisionism and glorified narratives of the Marcos family have been simmering were YouTube and TikTok. Researchers discovered an increasing amount of pro-Marcos videos across YouTube in 2020, tagged under news, politics, or educational content, which focus on denying the atrocities committed under Marcos’ martial law. Despite complaints to remove such videos, YouTube has failed to do so, allowing these videos and their channel owners to gain larger followings on the platform. Similarly, on TikTok many videos have accumulated millions of likes and views depicting the martial law era as a golden age, romanticising the family's past, and swooning over the Marcoses' vintage aesthetics. Trolls use TikTok to run thousands of anonymous profiles that post pro-Marcos content from Facebook and YouTube at the same time, and when one profile posts a new video, it is instantly circulated as others react with views or shares, triggering TikTok's algorithm to push these videos into other users' feeds. 

IMPLICATIONS FOR PHILIPPINES’ DEMOCRACY 

Maria Ressa, the founder of the acclaimed Filipino new website Rappler, has remarked that “you cannot have integrity of elections if you [do not] have integrity of facts”. Indeed, the proliferation of disinformation and whitewashing on online platforms poses a critical threat to Philippines’ democracy, because “unwarranted, unregulated, and downright unethical uses of social media” can adversely affect public opinion, voting patterns, and political outcomes. The online claims of poll irregularities or electoral fraud also compromise the credibility of the Philippines’ Commission on Elections and the electoral system. It is particularly concerning that platforms like TikTok, which predominantly target younger audiences, are so rampant with misleading information, since it can poison the youth’s developing minds and debilitate the country's democracy by bringing more dictators to power in the future. Of course, the problem of online disinformation is not unique to the Philippines; countries such as the United States have been victims as well. During the 2016 American elections, social media platforms were rife with voter disinformation and misinformation campaigns, in which social media influencers propagated inaccurate information with the intent of undermining citizens’ rights to vote.  

What can then be done to combat this escalating problem of online disinformation? To begin, greater accountability and improved fact-checking mechanisms from tech companies are necessary. Rather than focusing solely on profits generated by likes, shares, and views, companies should operate for the public interest to protect democracy. Furthermore, more national initiatives aimed at teaching media literacy in educational institutions will benefit the Philippines, as well as other countries, in the long run. 

Raisha is a final year student at the University of Nottingham (Malaysia campus), majoring in Politics, History, and International Relations. She is particularly passionate about women's rights, feminism, and social media activism.

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