False Flags

            A false flag is any political or military action that appears to be carried out by a group of people who isn’t actually responsible for said action. These political causes are used to hide someone’s true beliefs or meaning behind their actions. In old times, a false flag, would be a literal flag flown on a ship sailing under false colors to hide which country it came from or who they were actually fighting for. The name false flag stuck for any false political or military action carried out in general. A current day example of a false flag would be the Jewish headstones that were found desecrated with pro-Trump slogans spray-painted on stone slabs in a Jewish cemetery. Noah Arbit, the founding chair of the Michigan Democratic Jewish Caucus, told Fox News, “This is the main cemetery for Jewish people in the city of Grand Rapids”. The person responsible for this action wanted to carry it out in a place where they knew was highly populated of the Jewish community and would also be super offensive at the same time. This would be viewed as a false flag because there is no evidence of Trump being anti-semetic but having his campaign slogans and name plastered all over a Jewish cemetery could give people the wrong impression which in turn could turn the Jewish community against him.  

             False flags could affect society as a whole and give them the wrong ideas about a certain person or group if they didn’t know what they were viewing was a false flag. For instance, if pictures of the vandalized cemetery went around in the Jewish community with no context, they would assume that Trump and his supporters have a hatred towards the Jews and might not have voted for him in the election. Clearly whoever the president of the United States is affects society as a whole. False flags are dangerous because they could be aimed at any group of people at any age or at any given time. I remember in middle school, I had two best friends Marla and Caroline. Someone made an Instagram account pretending to be me and Marla called “@wehate_caroline”. Marla and I didn’t make this account, but whoever made it wanted Caroline to feel like we hated her and as though she lost her two best friends. Although that isn’t a political or military act, it is very easy for someone to make an account pretending to be someone that they’re not and hating a specific politician, important person, or a group of people. Social Media definitely makes it easier for false information presented by false flags to get passed around. 

             People post political pictures and videos on the internet all the time with no content to create the wrong impression of a certain situation. For instance, I saw multiple videos on Twitter of policeman tear gassing what appeared to be peaceful protestors during the BLM protests. When I found access to the full video, it showed that these particular protestors were not being peaceful and were rioting, looting, beating up the homeless, and taking their anger out on innocent people. This video was used to paint the beliefs and meaning behind the police officers’ actions in a different light, when at the end of the day they were just doing their job. No matter how upset someone is over any injustice, rioting and looting are illegal and there are consequences to breaking the law.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/false-flag

https://www.foxnews.com/us/headstones-vandalized-trump-michigan

https://junior.scholastic.com/issues/2017-18/090417/fighting-fake-news.html#1080L