Vice President Ma'ruf Reminds The Challenges Of Religious Harmony Forums To Get Harder In The Digital Era That Is Flooded With Hoaxes

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MANADO - Vice President Ma'ruf Amin reminded all administrators of the Religious Harmony Forum (FKUB) in the province to have increasingly tough challenges in the digital era.

"The challenges facing the Religious Harmony Forum today do not mean they don't exist, in fact the challenges are getting tougher," said the Vice President at the opening of the 2021 FKUB International Harmony Week and VI National Conference in Manado, North Sulawesi, quoted by Antara, Friday, November 19.

In the midst of the current digital era, said the Vice President, the flow of unconfirmed information can spread very widely and quickly among the public.

"Currently we are entering a sophisticated digital era that allows information to spread quickly," he said.

Dissemination of such information can contain negative content, resulting in the emergence of inter-religious conflicts in the community.

"Some of the information is positive, but some is negative, including issues that can lead to conflict between religious communities, including through conspiratorial narratives and fake news, hoaxes," he explained.

The vice president said that fake news spreads much faster than news that has been confirmed. The vice president made an analogy for fake news to be like a geometric series, while confirmed news was an arithmetical series.

"Fake news is growing faster like a geometric series compared to news that is confirmatory, news straightening, which is like an arithmetical series," he said.

In addition, the Vice President also said that the development of digital-based information technology has a negative side with algorithm curation, which can lead community groups to believe in certain issues.

"The negative side of this digital-based information technology has an ability called algorithm curation, which leads a group of people to believe only the information supplied from their group as the truth, while other groups are guided by the truth that is believed by their own group," he explained.

Therefore, the Vice President reminded FKUB to continue to maintain community harmony in each region by increasing tolerance between religious believers.

"I appreciate the role and contribution of FKUB, as an effective medium in building harmony and at the same time resolving disputes or conflicts with religious backgrounds," said the Vice President.