Bill Gates, bogeyman of virus conspiracy theorists
19 May, 2020
False claims targeting billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates are gaining traction online since the start of the coronavirus outbreak, with experts warning they could hamper efforts to curb the virus.
Doctored photos and fabricated news articles crafted by conspiracy theorists -- shared a large number of times on social media platforms and messaging apps, in a variety of languages -- have gone so far as accusing the Microsoft founder of fabricating the outbreak.
Gates, who has pledged $250 million to efforts to fight the pandemic, is the latest in a string of online targets regardless of the World Health Organization's efforts to fight what it called an "infodemic" -- misinformation fanned by panic and confusion about the virus.
Lately, 5G networks and Hungarian-American billionaire George Soros are also blamed for creating COVID-19, which has killed more than 315,000 people around the world.
"Bill Gates has always been a target of specific conspiracy communities," said Rory Smith, research manager initially Draft, a non-profit that delivers research and training for journalists.
Gates -- whose eponymous foundation has spent vast amounts of dollars enhancing healthcare in developing countries in the last 20 years -- is becoming "a kind of abstract boogeyman", said Whitney Phillips, an assistant professor at New York's Syracuse University, where she teaches digital ethics.
A video accusing Gates of wanting "to remove 15 percent of the populace" through vaccination and electronic microchips has racked up practically two million views on YouTube.
Similar allegations "exploded" between January and April, Smith told AFP.
Exploiting the crisis
Since the start of crisis, AFP Fact Check has debunked a large number of anti-Gates rumors circulating on platforms like Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram in languages including English, French, Spanish, Polish and Czech.
A number of accusations, including posts claiming that the FBI arrested Gates for biological terrorism or that he supports a Western plot to poison Africans, share a common thread.
They accuse the tycoon of exploiting the crisis, whether it's to "control people" or generate income from selling vaccines.
"These conspiracies are powerful enough to operate a vehicle down institutional trust around health organizations, and as a result, possibly lower vaccination rates, which is worrying," Smith said.
Gates' vocal criticism folks President Donald Trump and support for vaccine development made him "the perfect scapegoat for an emergency that emerges on the intersection of technology and (medical) science," Kinga Polynczuk-Alenius, a social sciences researcher at Finland's University of Helsinki, wrote in a university weblog post.
It is not the very first time Gates has found himself susceptible to conspiracy theorists. When Zika virus broke out in 2015 in Brazil, he was one of the powerful Western figures blamed for the condition.
Other rumors declare that he's secretly a lizard, a vintage favorite among online trolls.
"He hasn't become conspiracists' favorite target, he has been (a common target) for years," Sylvain Delouvee, a social psychology researcher at France's University of Rennes, told AFP.
Predicted the pandemic
The recent explosion in false claims could possibly be explained as a coping mechanism through the global crisis, Smith said.
"Folks are constantly looking for information to make sense out of the reality, and having these conspiracies offers a convenient method of having power over your position," he said.
The pandemic has also provided fertile breeding ground for attacks on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, particularly by anti-vaccine campaigners whose influential online existence had been brewing years before the virus emerged.
The charity's humanitarian work in Africa, where misinformation about Gates is particularly present, and financial support of the World Health Organization -- it's the agency's second-largest donor -- have fed rumors of dark secrets and ploys for power.
Several widely shared posts indicate photographs of Gates attending a "coronavirus conference" in 2015. Conclusion? He predicted the pandemic.
In reality, he was meeting with a study institute that had filed for a patent to potentially be used for a vaccine against a different kind of coronavirus that impacts animals.
Like many scientists, Gates had already warned of an imminent pandemic in the years prior to the novel coronavirus outbreak.
Conspiracies creeping into mainstream
Gates has also come under attack from celebrities.
Conservative U.S. television set host Laura Ingraham claimed in an interview that Gates was developing "tracking mechanisms". She was referring to a widely misinterpreted Reddit post by the billionaire about "digital certificates" to show who has recovered, been tested or -- eventually -- vaccinated.
Robert Kennedy Jr, the anti-Trump, anti-vaccine nephew of the former American president John F Kennedy, has accused the philanthropist of dictating global health policies.
Meanwhile, French "Chocolat" actress Juliette Binoche sparked controversy when she posted an Instagram post blasting Gates and calling for the rejection of "a microchip implant for all".
Debunking misinformation is "not about saying that many people are a good guy", said Delouvee at France's University of Rennes, pointing to privacy concerns around the race to build coronavirus tracking apps and governments' make use of medical data.
The Gates Foundation has come under fire in publications such as The Lancet medical journal, which accused it of too little transparency over its financial investments.
Source: japantoday.com
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