A-Infos (en) Brazil, OSL: The international far right and big tech (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

The 2022 elections did not put an end to the Bolsonarist threat in 
Brazil, in the same way that Biden's election in 2020 did not defeat 
Trumpism. Throughout 2023 and now, in 2024, we have seen an 
international organization mobilize to defend Jair Bolsonaro and his 
reactionary political program. The governments of Bukele (El Salvador), 
Milei (Argentina), Netanyahu (Israel) and Orbán (Hungary), each in their 
own way, acted to give impetus to Bolsonarism and destabilize Brazilian 
bourgeois democracy. More recently, South African billionaire Elon Musk 
began a political crusade against the STF and the Lula-Alckmin 
Government, being promptly supported by a legion of right-wing 
politicians, intellectuals and groups: from the Portuguese André Ventura 
to the Russian Aleksandr Dugin, passing through by the Spanish party Vox 
and the Polish right-wing vehicle Visegrád. In Brazil, the movements of 
the owner of

The extreme right cannot be understood as an "outlier" or as a series of 
particular cases. There is a truly global articulation - sponsored by 
big businesspeople, governments and religious fundamentalist groups - to 
promote military coups, autocracies and regime closures. This movement 
gained momentum after the 2008 financial crisis and is closely linked to 
the neoliberal economic and social formation, seeking to distract the 
popular classes from the effects of capitalism - such as inequality and 
unemployment - with hate speeches against women, the LGBT+ community and 
populations marginalized ethnic-racial groups.

DIGITAL COLONIALISM HAS A MATERIAL BASIS: MUSK'S INTERESTS IN LATIN AMERICA

Musk is a colonialist, a billionaire capitalist whose fortune comes from 
the diamond mines of Apartheid South Africa. His interest in Latin 
America is mainly economically motivated. The billionaire covets South 
American lithium reserves, essential for the production of his electric 
cars. Lithium, also called "white oil", is one of the strategic minerals 
for the production of high-tech batteries. To give you an idea, 84% of 
global lithium consumption in 2023 was already used in batteries. The 
so-called "lithium triangle" (bringing together Argentina, Bolivia and 
Chile) is one of the strategic reserves of this ore in the world and 
Musk and company's digital colonialism therefore has strong material bases.

In November 2019, Evo Morales suffered a coup in Bolivia supported by 
the USA and was ousted from the presidency, among other reasons, for 
having opposed the multinational exploitation of Bolivia's mineral 
reserves, and for having defended fairer forms of division of 
exploration. Asked at the time if he had a role in the coup, Musk 
tweeted: "Let's coup whoever we want! Deal with it." Tesla and other 
mining companies have shown avid interest in Bolivian lithium. Still 
keeping an eye on these mineral reserves, Musk also personally welcomed 
the election of Milei and his government. In 2022 Musk came to Brazil 
(which has the 7th lithium reserve in the world) and met Bolsonaro in 
person.

All these movements prove that behind the discourse of "freedom of 
expression" imperialist economic and political interests are hidden. 
These interests of Musk and big tech are associated with the 
strengthening of far-right organizations and political groups, whose 
surrender and submission to imperialism can facilitate the delivery of 
the valuable natural resources needed by these companies.

BIG TECH AND THE NEW OLIGOPOLY

Since the election of Donald Trump in 2016, the open and explicit 
political actions of large technology companies have been exposed. The 
control of algorithms through large platforms can politically 
destabilize a given country, as it is linked to the US intelligence 
services and the Silicon Valley business environment. Facebook was 
instrumentalized to favor the extreme right through the collection of 
user data, on the one hand, and the propagation of fake news, on the 
other. This pattern started to be repeated continuously in countless 
countries and on several different social networks. After the 
Bolsonarist uproar on January 8, 2022, a weak attempt to regulate 
digital media was quickly nullified by a counter-offensive by Big Techs. 
Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp), Telegram, Alphabet (Google, 
YouTube) and Tiktok (an exception, linked to China) came together to 
prevent the bill against fake news from being approved.

Contrary to what many seem to believe, social networks are not neutral. 
They are inscribed in the context of a neoliberal phase of capitalism, 
where economic and social policies deepen misery, income concentration 
and social differences. The logic of networks, operated by big tech, 
intensifies the production of individualistic social values, stimulating 
competition, disputes over differences of opinion and the "war of all 
against all" within the oppressed classes. They also spread the idea of 
collective and individual entrepreneurship as values of this new subject 
living in this neoliberal phase, incapable of organizing collectively.

In addition to the private and class interests of their owners, their 
fundamental structure, algorithms, tend to favor publications of a 
sensationalist nature and rapid dissemination, which means that the more 
distorted and simplified the information, the better. Thus, initiatives 
like Brasil Paralelo and pages that promote right-wing conspiracy 
theories have more reach and repercussion than progressive YouTubers or 
left-wing influencers on the old Twitter. Furthermore, social networks, 
applications and other initiatives require a large infrastructure to 
operate, which implies an equally large capital investment. In a context 
in which the working class and the revolutionary left are disorganized 
and under offensive, the monopoly belongs to the dominant classes, 
whether the bourgeoisie or the state bureaucracy.

In this way, unless the correlation of forces changes, every 
propagandistic initiative on the part of the revolutionary wing of the 
left - websites, videos, images, etc. - will continue to have limited 
reach. This does not mean denying or invalidating any publicity and 
propaganda initiatives, but understanding that our ability to intervene 
does not depend on our will, on voluntarism, but on the real process of 
the class struggle, which is material.

TRADITIONAL MEDIA AND OLD OLIGOPOLY

It should also not be forgotten that traditional media still has its 
influence on the propagation of bourgeois ideology, in particular Rede 
Globo. Formed by radio and television channels, magazines and 
newspapers, this oligopoly was behind the co-option of the popular 
uprising of June 2013, the 2016 parliamentary coup, Operation Lava-Jato 
and the neoliberal measures of the Temer and Bolsonaro governments, such 
as unrestricted outsourcing, labor reform and pension reform. All of 
this with the support and connivance of the Judiciary, the Public 
Ministry and Congress.

The relationship between traditional media and Bolsonarism was dubious. 
Some groups, such as Record, SBT and Jovem Pan, openly embarked on the 
coup, promoting reactionary speeches, revisionism about the military 
period and scientific denialism. Others, such as Globo and written press 
outlets ( Veja, Folha, Estadão), adopted a policy of critical support or 
damage containment: they made some criticisms of the Bolsonaro 
government while supporting Paulo Guedes' economic plan.

This second group's criticism of Bolsonarist absurdities made the new 
Lula-Alckmin government and part of the party left believe in the 
possibility of an alliance - of a new conciliation between antagonistic 
classes. This media sector became one of the guarantors of a new liberal 
pact, in a version with social elements, led by the PT and part of the 
institutional left, which includes PCdoB, PDT and, more recently, PSOL.

Giving up a minimally left-wing program and approving liberal and 
right-wing projects, such as the New Spending Ceiling ("fiscal 
framework") and the privatization of prisons, Lula became the public 
face of a "broad front" alongside the Globo, by Geraldo Alckmin, Simone 
Tebet and Alexandre de Moraes - who, it is worth remembering, have 
always been linked to financial monopolies, agribusiness and police 
violence in the outskirts. On an international scale, the Federal 
Government began to get closer and closer to names from the 
pseudo-progressive face of imperialism, such as Biden and Macron, under 
the banner of democracy and human rights. It is these same "democratic 
governments" that currently profit from the war between Russia and 
Ukraine and Israel's genocide against the Palestinian people.

BUILDING PEOPLE POWER AND REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE

We, at the Libertarian Socialist Organization (OSL), assert that one 
cannot have any trust in bourgeois institutions. Throughout history, 
military and fascist dictatorships came to power with the support and 
connivance of these same bourgeois institutions and imperialism, which 
were supposed to defend liberal democracy. It is through popular 
organization and class struggle that fascism and coupism are stopped, 
and not through behind-the-scenes agreements and the old bourgeois 
political game.

We understand that the fight against the extreme right, the 
capitalist-statist system and imperialism involves the independence of 
the working class, and this independence also involves controlling news 
and information.

We have no hope that laws or legal interpretations will be enough for a 
true democratization of the media in Brazil. The popular classes must, 
when necessary, build their own means of communication, such as 
community radio, popular newspapers, podcasts, etc. and, when possible, 
act to directly affect existing means of disseminating knowledge.

As long as there is no strong popular, anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist 
movement that seeks and guides the radical democratization of the media, 
there will be no possibility of having "freedom of expression", but 
rather, the freedom of expression of the national and/or international 
bourgeoisie . Along with the relentless fight against the dominance of 
big techs, we need to advance in the social control of national media, 
which are dominated by oligopolies of national elites or lackeys of 
imperialism.

  Libertarian Socialist Organization
OSL April 15, 2024

https://socialismolibertario.net/2024/04/15/a-extrema-direita-internacional-e-as-big-techs/
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