Photo: cartoonbarry.com
Lies, myths, propaganda and exaggerations sometimes unwittingly, and sometimes deliberately written dominate in the Greek blogs, reports an the article in Vima newspaper. Typical is the fact that after the inclusion of Greece in the support mechanism of the economic Troika, which saved the country from bankruptcy the organised "fight against the Memorandum" is held mostly on the Internet.
Dozens of blogs published without giving it a second thought the very popular electronic message distributed some time ago by a turner from Crete, which reads as follows: "The bankruptcy is a matter of days and it is planned for the 25th this month. It will be announced on Friday evening and presented as a forced decision from the Summit on the 25th of March. The weekend that follows is very convenient for the government to avoid reactions. State offices will not work and people will survive the first shock at their homes. The Prime Minister will send a message and will attempt to cramp the situation through our national holiday." This is part of the message written by a "banker," whose personal data remained in the dark. What was funny but also dangerous in this case was that the particular "news" was published in its full by regular news websites.
Backstage hits below the belt of political opponents, which spread in no time, are a common practice. For example, whenever the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport is preparing to carry out any reform the following story appears in the cyberspace immediately. About 40 years ago a young student in dentistry then, i.e., the today's Minister of Infrastructure and Transport Dimitris Repas sent a letter to the then dictator George Papadopoulos, which described the tensions in the Greek universities and stated "the ideology of each to stop poisoning their behaviour in the student circles in a time when the hot student problems await their solutions." It is assumed that the actual letter was published by the Ta Nea newspaper on the 11th of November 1972, but such a text does not exist in its archives. The Minister himself replied several times about this "news". It is clear that it will reappear the next time the Ministry takes a new legal initiative.
The Deputy Minister of Rural Development and Food Milena Apostolaki, who is still presented by the particular messages as an early retired at Olympic Airways, became a victim of the Internet "broken telephone" some time ago too. She denied this "news" many times, adding that she left the company many years ago, but this does not diminish the stubbornness of the distributors of "information".
A text has been circulating in the Greek virtual space for quite some months according to which, European special troops of the unofficial European Union of the European Gendarmerie EUROGENDFOR are expected to arrive in Greece to suppress the people’s uprisings in the country. The authors of the specific texts claim that the process of deployment of their members is strictly confidential and their goal is to quell the riots and uprisings in Europe and particularly in Greece. Interestingly, some people took this "news" seriously. One of them is the deputy from the far-right party LAOS Kyriakos Velopoulos who even raised a question on the topic in the Greek Parliament.
The text, which was published in blogs and "news websites", states that "this secret group called EUROGENDFOR is based in Italy and will hold its first major operation against the people of one European country on the 23rd of February, 2011." We recall that a Panhellenic strike was held then and there were serious clashes between the members of the extreme left groups and the police during the procession.
This chaotic bunch of writings that are sometimes true and sometimes the result of very lively imagination contain amazing things, especially during the days when media workers are on strike. It is often very difficult the original source of misinformation to be found, as its circulation in the Internet is huge. Thus, a series of "facts" that have been denied from the outset continue to be published and reproduced in different blogs.
Another myth that stems from "the paper era" and entered the Greek virtual space is a fictitious statement by the former USA Foreign Minister Henry Kissinger. "The Greeks are anarchists and hardly controllable. Therefore, we must attack them deep into their cultural roots. Maybe thus we will force them to resign. Of course, I mean to attack their language, religion, cultural and historical reserves, so we can neutralize their ability to grow, rise and prove they can win in order to overcome the obstacles to our important strategic plans on the Balkans, the Mediterranean and the Middle East." This statement, which was proved fake moved from the ordinary editions to the Internet. It continues to spread there and to be read by the three generations of readers that have grown up with it.