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The Danger of ADOS: How Disinformation Campaigns Threaten Reparations and Pan-African Movements Through Digital Media

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The Danger of ADOS: How Disinformation Campaigns Threaten Reparations and Pan-African Movements Through Digital Media CODESRIA Bulletin, Nos 2&3, 2021 Page 53 The Danger of ADOS: How Disinformation Campaigns Threaten Reparations and Pan-African Movements through Digital Media isinformation is the the original homeland for African intentional spreading Americans, it would reject African Dof false information Jessica Ann Mitchell Aiwuyor identity, and most significantly, for manipulative purposes National Black Cultural it would reject Pan-Africanism (Fallis 2015). It has been used Information Trust (Carnell 2018). on digital media platforms by Washington DC, USA various campaigns, nationally Previously, a similar movement was and internationally, to attach launched in Louisville, Kentucky, false narratives to Black activist by businessman, Norris Shelton. movements. The false narratives present a potential threat to Pan- Shelton founded an organisation are then amplified by bots, fake Africanist movements for civil and called American Slaves Inc, in accounts and accounts using digital human rights. 2001. He also founded a political Black face (Freelon et al. 2020). party called Descendants of Disinformation campaigns are The creation of ADOS: American Slaves (DOAS) in 2012 also driven by online influencers Pushing nativism into the (Pohlman 2012). Much of the writings and rhetoric of Shelton’s or spokespersons and amplified by reparations movement manipulated followers. DOAS are similar to what is now The American Descendants of shared by Carnell and Moore. From 2016, the long-standing Slavery movement was founded in Additionally, Carnell and Moore US-based reparations movement 2016 by Antonio Moore, an attorney, maintain close ties to Louisville as has struggled with a targeted and Yvette Carnell, a social media their first ADOS conference site. disinformation campaign aimed commentator. Commonly referred at disempowering and derailing to by its acronym ADOS, Carnell For generations, African the long-standing reparations and Moore promoted the hashtag- Americans have called for movement. The American powered movement through their reparations that would repair the Descendants of Slavery (ADOS) weekly YouTube shows focusing centuries of violence, enslavement movement, branded as a new civil on African-American economic and racial injustice endured by rights and reparations advocacy issues. With each live broadcast Descendants of Africans Enslaved group, has used digital media reaching approximately 30,000- in the United States (DAEUS) platforms to spread disinformation, plus people, Carnell and Moore’s (Randall 2015). Two of the most attack US-based reparations new ‘identity’ spread quickly. notable reparationists in history activists, derail federal reparations include Callie House, leader of the legislation and promote right-wing Carnell and Moore promote ADOS National Ex-Slave Mutual Relief, anti-immigration policies (Drayton as a unique ethnic identifier for Bounty, and Pension Association, 2019; Media Matters 2019; Nkonde African Americans. They assert that and Audley Queen Mother Moore, et al. 2021). the term ADOS is a legal marker co-founder of the Republic of that would make reparations finally New Afrika and founder of the The implications of digital attainable in the United States due Reparations Committee for the media-amplified disinformation to its ‘specificity’ for the African- Descendants of American Slaves campaigns targeting Black activist American justice claim. The new (Perry 2010; Farmer 2019). movements are widespread and identifier would reject Africa as CODESRIA Bulletin, Nos 2&3, 2021 Page 54 The National Coalition of Blacks by N’COBRA and NAARC, 2020, Minneapolis police officers for Reparations in America through their national and local- arrested and killed an African- (N’COBRA) was founded in 1987 based advocacy. However, one American man named George after a convening of lawyers, of the greatest influences on the Floyd. Carnell placed partial blame activists and reparationists (Aiyetoro current mainstream conversation for his death on programmes that 2003). Raymond Jenkins (aka concerning reparations was Ta- support Somali refugees. Reparations Ray), co-founder of Nehisi Coates’s ‘The Case For In a live YouTube broadcast, N’COBRA, influenced the H.R.40 Reparations’, published by The Carnell stated: Commission to Study and Develop Atlantic in 2014. The new explosion Reparation Proposals for African- of interest concerning reparations You have to talk about what he Americans Act, introduced in 1989 helped garner mainstream appeal didn’t have and why he didn’t by US Representative (Rep.) John among the US media, coupled with have it. You have to talk about Conyers Jr. (Miller 2009). a new-found enthusiasm among Somalians being placed in [sic] Black Americans. and the refugees being placed According to activist-lawyer and there, and they’re [sic] being N’COBRA co-founder, Adjoa A. The ADOS movement was founded resettled with money and he Aiyetoro: two years later as a Black isolationist not having any. You have to ideology that uses the reparations talk about the generational Through its various chapters, issue to promote anti-immigrant wealth that we are missing N’COBRA got state and local policies, nativism and birtherism, because that is what defines legislatures to pass resolutions and disconnect African Americans him even being there in the to support Conyers’ bill, from the global African world. moment where he was killed submitted each Congressional by police. (Carnell 2020) session in the House of According to journalist Farrah Representatives Judiciary Stockman, at the first ADOS Similarly, Moore in a now-deleted Committee, usually designated conference: video stated: H.R. 40. The varied resolutions He was using a $20 counterfeit usually cited the work of The audience was told that they bill because he didn’t get his N’COBRA. The coalition should trace their origins to reparations. I’m gone go into developed legislative, litigative, American slavery, not Africa. the whole ... what they do for direct action, and economic They were told that their ancestors refugees. Minneapolis, not development strategies to fuel had built the country with slave even the federal government. the train and increase the speed labor and that the country owed Minneapolis and how inviting with which it was moving to them a debt. They were told that they are to refugees. And its destination—reparations. they should demand reparations, what they did to lock Black (Aiyetoro 2001) and withhold their votes in 2020 people out of neighborhoods unless the Democratic nominee for a hundred years. Black Following Rep. Conyers’s retire- outlined a specific economic plan people meaning ADOS Black ment, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of for ADOS. (Stockman 2019) Texas became the sponsor of H.R. people. (Moore 2020a) 40 and the key legislator advocating Historically, the US reparations Moore and Carnell’s xenophobic for its passage (Congress.gov 2019). movement has been part of a global rhetoric ignited an influx of social As the struggle for reparations movement with support from the media accounts using the hashtag continued, the National African African diaspora (CARICOM #ADOS while viciously attacking American Reparations Commission Reparations 2016). Yet, ADOS Black immigrants, activists and (NAARC) was established in 2015, rhetoric aims to fracture any sense politicians who rejected their convened by activist-scholar Dr of kinship among the various Black/ message. One such social media Ron Daniels. African diasporic communities. account referred to Rep. Sheila Carnell and Moore refer to Jackson Lee as a ‘sneaky African/ Co-opting the movement: collective Black identities in the Caribbean immigrant masquerading Xenophobia, disinformation United States as a ‘flat Blackness’ as a native born Black American’ and project takeover that they label as harmful to ADOS (ADOS Watch 2019). Additionally, (Moore 2020b). In their videos, Much of the current grassroots Carnell and Moore frequently ignite Carnell and Moore fan the flames of reparations movement has been online debates over Black movie anti-Black xenophobia. On 25 May sustained by decades of activism roles and received international CODESRIA Bulletin, Nos 2&3, 2021 Page 55 press for their condemnation In 2019, Carnell and Moore immigration policies. A few of of British-born actress Cynthia shared their plans to take over the Tanton-affiliated organisations Erivo, of Nigerian heritage, for the reparations movement. They are the Federation for American her portrayal of Harriet Tubman publicly called for a project Immigration Reform (FAIR), (EurWeb 2019). These arguments takeover, encouraging their Center for Immigration Studies are tools for gaining media attention followers to join established Black (CIS) and NumbersUSA. PFIR’s and getting free access to millions organisations, like the NAACP and former executive director also of readers or viewers. Urban League local chapters, and worked for FAIR and maintained spread the ADOS ideology from close ties (Zaitchik 2010). Black nativism is not a new within (Russ 2019). occurrence. In response to an To gain buy-in from African influx of white immigrants in the Simultaneously, Carnell and Americans, PFIR and its affiliates early 1900s, African Americans Moore sought to discredit existing create front groups attempting sometimes embraced nativism to reparations organisations. They to appeal to Black economic advocate for employment inclusion spread disinformation about concerns. These initiatives are and prioritisation in the face of both N’COBRA and
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