After days of covering anti-vaccination and anti-lockdown protests in Melbourne, one thing became clear after I spoke to protesters and their supporters.
Most of them say they are thoroughly engaged with their own communication and messaging loop.
And the community at large has theirs, in the form of mainstream media.
Two silos of information that rarely cross over.
Protests started this week after Victoria's government first mandated COVID-19 vaccines for construction workers, and then shut the building industry down for two weeks.
To many Victorians, the demonstrations felt menacing.
Thousands of mostly men marched through the city and shut down a major Melbourne bridge on Tuesday.
AAP: James Ross
)And, on Wednesday, protesters made their stand against police at the Shrine of Remembrance.
What started with large numbers of angry construction workers has been largely subsumed by anti-vaccination and anti-lockdown activists.
And online groups are filled with messages espousing right-wing, extremist rhetoric.
The decision to use the shrine to protest against mandatory vaccinations and COVID-19 lockdowns outraged veterans and many in the community.
Living in their own information universe
However, many protesters and their supporters do not see it that way.
That is because they are in their own information universe.
Through social media, app messaging groups and online livestreams, they have had a very different experience of this week's protests.
In that world, they saw police actions this week as close to outright tyranny.
The legitimate right of protest has been squelched, they say, and people are being forced to live in a society divided between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated.
Protesters say their views are being silenced.
However, these views are represented in the so-called mainstream media, but carefully and with context.
So they avoid mainstream media and turn to livestreams when protests are taking place.
Groups coalescing around protests
Rukshan Fernando broadcasts a stream that typically attracts tens of thousands of viewers.
He sees himself as a chronicler, but he does broadcast far-right posts and tweets and has a large, far-right following.
"I think it's really important that people see unedited continuous video," he said.
"When you see it in this manner you can make up your mind."
This week, when protesters were scrambling to evade police and assemble in Melbourne's CBD, many turned to Mr Fernando's livestream to see what was happening.
But it is apparent from the comments that scroll in his livestream that not all of those watching are in Australia.
Many appear to be located in the US and the UK.
Although there are many who rely exclusively on his and other similar content, he himself does not believe that is healthy.
"I always tell people, my audience … they shouldn't look at me, or anyone, as a single source of truth. They should consume my content, they should consume mainstream media content, and use that to make up their mind," he said.
"The ordinary people of this state, the ordinary people on the street, they don't have a platform. And in many ways, doing livestreams … provides a platform for these people."
Belinda Barnet, a senior lecturer in media and communication at Swinburne University, said Mr Fernando's livestreams were not purely "raw and unfiltered, on-the-ground information".
"It is accompanied by a narration, so he's kind of narrating the events, and he's also choosing what to film and what not to film," Dr Barnet said.
"So, for example, in the recent riots he was quite big on filming police ostensibly being aggressive but didn't seem to want to film the protesters being aggressive back.
"So there's a selectivity in what he chooses to convey to people."
She said it was also important to note that, despite the impression of a "journalistic cape", Mr Fernando was not performing the journalistic duty of applying critical thinking to the evidence and weighing it up.
"He's doing a very uncritical kind of feed of one side of the story," she said.
Many joining protests have switched off mainstream news
Nonetheless, it's clear Mr Fernando's livestreams have provided a platform for several groups that have coalesced around these protests.
Some of those on the streets of Melbourne were openly hostile to journalists.
Others do not believe COVID-19 is really a major public health emergency.
Some say the ongoing public health orders are part of an international plot.
"[They] are about democracy versus medical tyranny," says a protest supporter who runs a website accused of promoting numerous conspiracies.
I met a young woman who called herself Estelle at the Shrine of Remembrance on Wednesday.
In her view, the coverage of the protests and the subsequent condemnation from many in the community were just more failings of mainstream journalism.
"I think that the media narrative that most people are seeing is [very] small," she said.
"If you are scared, you haven't seen the whole picture. You're seeing a little lens that the media are wanting to portray."
Estelle has turned almost exclusively to online outlets aligned with the protest.
"People don't do this unless they're desperate," she said, looking at the crowd at the shrine.
"This is a city in real crisis and it's not being discussed."
We've seen it in the US, but it's happening here too
Many would argue that is very much being discussed on the ABC and other mainstream media outlets.
But the thing is, there's a good chance Estelle and others who support these protests aren't reading, watching or listening.
They are in their own silo.
It is not just mainstream journalism they do not engage with. They are distrustful of a lot of official information, too, from governments and health officials.
This is the environment in which their silo has been built, constructed of strong opinions and misinformation.
And yes, the rest of us do not get much exposure to that other world. Two closed loops, with less and less overlap.
We have all seen it in America. More and more, it is happening here, too.
Additional reporting by Joseph Dunstan
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMicWh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmFiYy5uZXQuYXUvbmV3cy8yMDIxLTA5LTI2L2FudGktbG9ja2Rvd24tY292aWQtcHJvdGVzdHMtbWVsYm91cm5lLW1haW5zdHJlYW0tbWVkaWEtZGlzdHJ1c3QvMTAwNDkwMTQ40gEoaHR0cHM6Ly9hbXAuYWJjLm5ldC5hdS9hcnRpY2xlLzEwMDQ5MDE0OA?oc=5
2021-09-25 19:51:35Z
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