Alternative Reality

During his presidency, Donald Trump has made countless claims that were fictitious or demonstrably false. Thanks to Twitter, he was able to send his messages to his followers unchecked and un- filtered. His press spokeswoman coined the term Alternative Facts for this. He fended off criticism by simply claiming that it was not him but everyone else who was lying and telling fake news – es- pecially the much-hated mainstream media. However, this spread of misinformation and conspiracy theories has contributed to large sections of the US population losing trust in the established media and state institutions. The consequences to this day are a polarization and division of society into increasingly irreconcilable factions, with an increase in hatred and agitation.