Former Vice President Al Gore said at the COP28 summit that social media is a threat to democracy.
Social media algorithms have “disrupted the balances that used to exist that made representative democracy work much better,” he said.
“A free self-governing people rely on a shared base of knowledge that serves as a basis for reasoning together collectively,” he explained, suggesting that non-mainstream sources may be destructive to democracy.
“These algorithms, they are the digital equivalent of AR-15s – they ought to be banned, they really ought to be banned!”
“When people are pulled down these rabbit holes…that’s where the echo chamber is,” Gore added. “If you spend too much time in the echo chamber what’s weaponized is another form of AI, not artificial intelligence, artificial insanity! I’m serious!”
Gore’s statement mirrors a proposal by Nikki Haley, who said, “When I get into office, the first thing we have to do is social media accounts, social media companies, they have to show America their algorithms. Let us see why they’re pushing what they’re pushing.”
She then called anonymous posting a “national security threat.”
“The second thing is every person on social media should be verified by their name,” Haley stated, noting, “It’s a national security threat.”
“When you do that, all of a sudden people have to stand by what they say and it gets rid of the Russian bots, the Iranian bots and the Chinese bots,” she explained. “And then you’re going to get some civility when people know their name is next to what they say, and they know their pastor and their family members are going to see it, it’s going to help our kids and it’s going to help our country.”
