Would you like to take a trip to the Mirror World? Voices For Freedom outlet Reality Check Radio are offering to take us there when they interview white supremacist Michael Benz on Wednesday (the date of publishing this piece).
In her book Doppelganger, Naomi Klein uses the phrase “Mirror World” to describe how conspiracy theorists often reflect real world concerns but in a distorted way.
Last year we took a tour through a local part of the Mirror World when we reviewed the film River Of Freedom.
The Mirror World is not new. Abusers have used the same manipulation tactic for centuries, to gaslight and confuse their victims. You might know the acronym DARVO: Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender. A good example is currently on display at RCR. Paul Brennan calls guest Mike Benz a ‘disinformation expert’. He certainly would be an expert in the Mirror World, because in that world Benz is an exact reflection of what he is not.
In reality Benz is a disinfo spreader. As the pseudonymous “Frame Game” he touted white supremacy, antisemitism and racist conspiracy theories like the Great Replacement.
Frame Game AKA Mike Benz said he was a white identitarian against diversity and urged white viewers to “unite under the banner of race.” He also seems to have a sideline in Holocaust revisionism.
We have warned before about the extremist voices RCR is choosing to platform, like Martin Sellner.
In their quest to maintain engagement and keep their audience aroused, VFF and RCR are moving from antivax scaremongering and COVID denial into even more harmful territory.
Benz was a Trump administration official who emerged as a ‘prominent attacker of disinformation researchers and fact checkers.’ And now he is claiming to be a ‘disinformation expert’. It’s not hard to see Benz’ double life as “Frame Game” explaining his desire to discredit those who seek to combat disinformation.
In a “sneak peek” RCR shared Sunday Benz supports now convicted felon Donald Trump, and uses disinformation to make Trump the victim. Benz uses the ‘rigged election’ narrative. “They can’t win at polls, so they’re winning it using prosecutors financed by George Soros to control the election. The New York trial was rigged.”
VFF founder Alia Bland was an early promoter of US election disinformation so perhaps it’s no surprise that RCR continues to these ideas long after they have been found baseless in US courts:
(images via @bobbymiller202 on Twitter)
Benz goes on to claim that in the upcoming US election voting machines will be rigged and that ‘they” will get illegal immigrants to vote, and ‘they’ will orchestrate a ‘domestic colour revolution’ to sway the vote. Benz then tells RCR listeners that the “US election will be determined by the deep state, not the people.”
A disinformation ‘expert’ spreading disinformation is accusing real disinformation experts of spreading disinformation, then claiming to be the victim of censorship and corruption. DARVO much?
