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The turmoil in the 2020 US election was largely caused by supporters of the losing party (Trump) insisting that the election was fraudulent, which became the catalyst for the Capitol riots. Although numerous contradictory evidence later made the “voter fraud theory” untenable, only 22% of Trump supporters admitted that Biden was legitimately elected. After Trump lost multiple voter fraud lawsuits, 40% of Trump supporters still didn’t believe the election was legitimate in any case.
In the 2024 Taiwan general election, Ko Wenzhe, who was accused of having many young supporters, ultimately lost by 3.69 million votes, finishing in third place. This differed significantly from the estimate of the “internal reference survey” before the People’s Party election. Ko Wenzhe’s supporters were surprised by the result. The unacceptable feeling is understandable, but just as in the US election, the strong sense of loss among Trump supporters soon turned into rejection of election work. On the Taiwanese side, Ke Auch Wenzhe’s mother said in an interview after the election: “…Ke Wenzhe has many people in Kaohsiung, Tainan and other places who fully support him. Why are there so few votes? I feel very strange. I really have doubts.” I don’t know what I suspect… There are so many people, but why are there so few voices? This is an inexplicable thing.” The above statement of course refers to the “problem” of this vote.
At the same time, Alisasha, an internet celebrity who supports Ke Wenzhe, also released several videos monitoring the vote. She also exposed “seven major voting doubts” and posted: “I really can’t help but lose because of the vote.” This was a direct accusation of voter fraud (though he later apologized for his “inappropriate choice of words in the vote”) .
There is no doubt that the 2020 US election campaign will be bitter, and apparent allegations of voter fraud are still unusual for the United States, which has centuries of electoral experience. What’s even more perverse is that even if the judicial authorities in several states intervene and reject the election fraud allegations, they cannot fully convince Trump’s supporters. This raises another question: “The belief that the election was fraudulent is probably not just a fringe phenomenon.”
Further analysis of American society revealed that there is still a very strong phenomenon of “resistance to reason” among Trump supporters, that is, they do not believe in it, although the theory of election fraud has been questioned by ample evidence yet More puzzling (Harvard Kennedy College study) is that “those who are more politically knowledgeable and follow election news more closely” are also more likely to believe that voter fraud is widespread.
That same year, one of the conclusions of the Indiana University False Election Narratives study was that “younger groups (ages 18 to 43) are more likely than older groups (ages 43 to 85) to believe false election narratives” (14 percentage points higher). The survey results from the two universities mentioned above differ from what we have intuitively assumed in the past.
The reason that “highly educated” and “young people” are more likely to believe in voter fraud and less willing to accept the results of judicial investigations (rejection of voter fraud) is because American society also wants to know why. One way to explore the reasons is that some media outlets have actually started exploring “how TikTok is shaping current politics.”
In recent years, TikTok has not only become an important venue for political parodies, but has almost become a platform for shaping political ideologies. The main users of TikTok meet the two characteristics of “highly educated” and “young people”. The New York Times once described TikTok in a report: “It has played a major role in organizing large-scale false registration activities” and “its unique and rich audiovisual language is often interesting and confusing.”
The reason the American media is particularly concerned about TikTok’s impact on politics is because TikTok is not only successful in providing young people with a creative space for collective political expression, but also a hub for a variety of discrimination, conspiracy theories, and Misinformation is . The characteristic of young TikTok users discussing political issues is that they are very good at effectively conveying highly “personalized political messages.” While their narratives are widespread, they also clearly represent the belief that “Generation Z is changing the world” and “changing our world.” Generation has such a strong mentality.
This time, Alisasha said: “I really can’t lose because of the vote” and “exposed the seven most suspicious voting videos.” I believe that she used her online communication skills to individually introduce them to Ke Wenzhe support group, which may also include Ke Wenzhe’s mother belongs. , leaving them in serious doubt that “there was something wrong with that vote.”
One of the interpretations of this election is that the Democratic Progressive Party lost a large number of young votes. If we look at polls and research about who suspects voter fraud in the US election, opposition to rational phenomena (for elections), and well-educated young people using TikTok as a political narrative outlet, it should be noted that they want to win support the younger generation, and then improve communication technologies such as IG, YT and even Douyin (the Chinese version of TikTok), producing a large number of short videos and live broadcasts. In this way we may only see the “technical.” “level” and the psychological level of young people who use contemporary communication media (or the psychology “created” by them). Maybe it’s the real blind spot.
If the national vision and hope project proposed by Lai Qingde cannot be summarized in Douyin’s short-term narrative, no matter how it is divided into categories, does not that also explain why Ke Wenzhe’s political standpoint is always only to create “golden sentences” consciously and dramatic Devein. This is how his young votes were managed, and he even created a support structure that believes only in Ke Wenzhe and nothing else. So even if a party or politician follows his method, what kind of different “young supporters” will emerge? There is still no clear answer to this question, but it is necessary to think about it carefully.
※The author is the main author of “Shangbao”
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