These accounts were pretty perplexing until this article spelled out what should have been obvious to me.
CNN/MSNBC/Fox news. They are all looking for easy stories with numbers they can quote. Twitter provides that justification. I hear their talking heads say things like "X has been tweeted 10,000 times" as if that means anything. They rely on twitter because they don't do real reporting anymore. I'd bet good money they don't have anyone on staff fluent in the relevant languages. Twitter+Google translate has replaced all the actual reporters.
Why realize you've been fooled and exploited by people who don't really care about you, have excused their crimes, and then feel shitty because you don't dare to oppose them -- when you can just project all that on those who do oppose them? Then not seeing a silly and cheap slogan as silly and cheap becomes just another test of obedience, to excel at and be proud of. The Naked Emperor isn't just a story, it happens all the time. Identification with aggressors and projection of their bad qualities on their victims and those who oppose them is very common, or as Arno Gruen wrote, "the ubiquity of this phenomenon determines the course of human history".
https://www.reddit.com/r/FreeHongKongNow/comments/cya5z9/bas...
Who with a pulse would buy that? Those who are afraid of the responsibilities that come with not buying it. The continued violence is the lifeblood, not the propaganda; minus the movement, it all seems very banal and ridiculous, like Eichmann on trial.
Likewise, who would be so silly to think a downvote is an argument? Yet it's religiously done, and I wouldn't be suprised if to some people something being greyed out signals that it is not an okay opinion to have. Done consistently, it helps. It still needs to violence and the lies, the destruction of facts, but it's a useful addition to them.
> Who's being convinced by statements like that?
Perhaps, "convince" is the wrong verb to use for targets of disinformation campaigns?
The fact is "enough" people are susceptible to this stuff. It is worth doing because, sadly, critical thinking is rapidly becoming an educational luxury reserved for the elite. I don't know where all this will end up, but it's going to be ugly.