The paper focuses on the discourse analysis on Twitter by examining Donald Trump’s account where he has posted misinformation about global warming. The main aim is to understand how to scrutinise the effects and consequences of his tweets.

Introduction

This paper introduces one of the self-proclaimed climate experts; Donald Trump. In fact, it is ironic that Donald Trump thinks that he knows anything about global warming to such an extent that he can make the decision as to what is factual truth or what is not. The bigger problem is that this is not the only time that he has spread misinformation about himself knowing something about a subject during a crucial time. Throughout his presidential campaigning in 2016 the former US President, Trump,  was additionally involved in spreading misinformation on the social media platform Twitter (Osborne, 2016). 

Before that, Trump has as well created posts on social media platforms regarding global warming and the outcome is usually that he shared bogus facts about the subject that denies scientific evidence. This means that Trump’s tweets are either about global warming or tweets about his private life, his job career, his success, and global disputes which he has very little knowledge of. These tweets seem to be filled with lies and have been multiple times proven to be not valid when they are fact-checked (Johnstone, 2007). For example, he relishes spreading misinformation about climate change and sharing controversial conspiracy theories about this subject. Even though climate change has been proven through investigation by scientific research, he seems to reject this evidence completely (Figure 1). Another issue that becomes a consequence is that his tweets are widely shared or retweeted and liked while his followers increase throughout his platform. 

Trump's responsibility should not be to mislead his followers, but he seems to not care about factual truth or think about the consequences of his posts. Instead, he feels inspired to share unsolicited advice about subjects he knows very little about and through that he fuels the spread of misinformation on Twitter. It impacts the social discourse on social media platforms like Twitter and other channels. In the future, the extent of misinformation about climate change appearing on Twitter and other platforms has to be prevented, but it seems that this problem can not be avoided. It is important to address the different parts of the issues of sharing controversial misinformation that can impact our lives (Franta, 2021). Specifically by looking back at his posts from ten years ago. It is expected that these effects and consequences of his posts should have changed his manner of addressing the public online. 

However, it is evident that it has not changed. He posted forged facts about the news labelling it fake news, throughout his presidential campaigning in 2016. Even though most of the facts in his posts have been debunked, he carried on to lie while being President of the United States (Osborne, 2016). This in turn verifies the fact that he will not stop. It is therefore vital to look into his past tweets especially the one from the 6th of November 2012, to see how Trump is increasing misinformation on Twitter by analysing the social discourse online (Figure 1). The analysis deals with the subject matter of conspiracies about climate change and how it impacts Donald Trump to increase misinformation on Twitter.
 

The Multimodality, Indexicality And Intertextuality In Trump's Tweets Denying Climate Change

Analysis can be made through multimodality, indexicality and intertextuality. It explains the multiple modes of Trump's tweets. There is a text, metadata and uptake metrics to be considered. A multimodal approach is applied by looking at how meaning is made in social life and how they interact with each other. This analytical method takes into account the multiple modalities. Multimodality is a tool that helps to interpret and make sense of the qualitative data that is examined in this article that consists of a textual modality (Juffermans, 2013). 

On a smaller scale, it has somewhat of a social context to it too. Two other additional tools are indexicality and intertextuality. These help to approach the multimodal approach. The explicit focus is on understanding the social meaning of the examined data, the social roles, norms and identities. These are suggested by different semiotic signs. In this case, Indexicality is a handy instrument that refers to the ‘interdependence of text in relation to one another (as well as to the culture at large)’ and ‘intertextuality produces meaning’ (Nordquist 2020). It allows for the semiotic units to index - point to - more than just their denotational meaning. 

How is climate misinformation on Twitter increasing through celebrities sharing misleading facts: Additional insight into Trump's actions online

Powerful people play an essential part in online discourse. Their posts are influential and viewed by many. This means that information is spreading fast and successfully when it is posted by celebrities.  But this can also have consequences when misleading facts are spreading fast by famous individuals posting false claims or them making up facts. For example, when misinformation entails climate denial and is shared online the consequences can impact society's livelihood. Because on the contrary if a less famous person posts this, only close family members and related people to this person would view the post. 

However, if a former president, for instance, Trump posts anything it is viewed at least more than 10,000 times. Let's not forget about the continuing discussions about his post on social media platforms in the News. This happens anytime Trump posts something controversial on a social media platform. In other words, it becomes a weekly spectacle that has larger consequences and influence on us if he posts misleading facts about global warming than if this is posted by a regular person with a social media account that has a standard following amount on there. When a famous person tweets conspiracy theories about global warming the results could be that more people want to start denying the changing climate to fit in with like-minded people similar to Trump’s groups or fanbase. 

© Screenshot/ Twitter by Blean-Tsige Tsige Tamirat

Figure 1. Donald Trump's tweets from 10 years ago about climate change and the consequences impact us until today.

As well as that, it relates to the increase in misinformation on social media platforms. One specific post that caught a lot of attention was the one tweet from 2012 (Figure 1). Donald Trump posted on Twitter a conspiracy theory that claims that global warming is not real. It is apparently a concept created to be used as a tool to undermine Trump’s beloved America (Nader, 2017). The parties mentioned in the post involve opposing countries China and the USA that have a genuinely successful and peaceful trade relationship (Zhu, 2006). 

Naturally, this fact is deemed to be true except in the eyes of Trump. Trump truly believes this until now that the China - USA trade seems to be a hoax which he made clear in a more recent public announcement covered by the Guardian, in 2019. He urged ‘US companies to stop doing business with China’ because they have killed up to 100,000 Americans through imports of fentanyl and apparently they have stolen ‘hundred[s] of billions in intellectual property’ (Rushe, 2019). Here again, it seems to be evident that because of Trump's dislike of China's trade relationship with the USA, his response is to share invalid facts about it through a media platform like Twitter. There is no factual truth in what he is saying about China. It is the same principle when he does this online with his tweets on Twitter that are about climate change. There is no valid point in his posts as well as the one from 2012, Figure 1. 

The Consequences And Effects Of Trump Tweets

The problem surrounding Trump's tweets is that the message carries misinformation. Therefore, at first, it is important to distinguish between facts and information that is no longer a fact. As the example demonstrated in Figure 1, Trump is creating a narrative in which he claims that China has created the concept of global warming. At the same time, his claim is insinuating the fact that global warming does not exist, since Trump describes it as a made-up concept. The multimodality is suggested to be the essence of this notion, which is Trump denying climate change and consequently sharing lies on Twitter (Juffermans, 2012). Moreover, multimodality here presents the sights and the little different meanings behind this post. This post has multimodality and it is therefore vital that ‘we have to look into the wider social and historical patterns’ (Blommaert 2005, pg. 123).

This message in the form of a tweet conveys misinformation since it has been proven multiple times that global warming exists to the point where ‘even a one- or two-degree rise in the global temperature can have catastrophic consequences’ (Sagan, 1980; pg. 663 - 668, Franta, 2021). Even international institutions like the United Nations support this claim and maintain the fact that ‘we must answer the planet’s distress signal with action-ambitious, credible climate action’ (Borenstein, 2022). However, the meaning that is conveyed in Trump’s tweet in Figure 1, insinuates a cynical belief about the UN's scientific evidence about climate change. This means that the indexicality of what has been tweeted indicates that there is no evidence of global warming (Blommaert, 2005). Trump believes that China is making up the whole entire ordeal surrounding climate change. 

Another option to approach an understanding of the outcome of misinformation is to examine that meaning-making has societal and moral value. These factors acknowledge what intertextuality entails, which is that the ramifications of this discourse will continue on in society and might be continuously brought up in other conversations (Diggit Magazine, 2022). The constraints are historical, political, social and cultural to what can be done in interaction. The semiotic functions face globalization - this means that society takes on different interpretations when they all look at the same post, like Trump's tweets. Conspiracy theories as demonstrated in this Trump's tweet, are a type of discourse that would expect interpretation of public events. 

Conclusion

In conclusion, this case study is not the only example of a powerful person who has spread misinformation on a social media platform. Nonetheless, it might be important to note what untrue facts people believe about climate change, to tackle the common beliefs of climate deniers. Through discourse analysis, the interactions between Trump’s tweets, including the story and the meaning behind his posts, has somewhat allowed the public to understand how misinformation is spread online. 

Trump’s tweet evinces the fact that he has spread misinformation beforehand about other topics. He continuously does this by using conspiracy theories, to showcase that his beliefs are correct. He takes different social, historical, political and cultural meanings behind these conspiracy theories and fuels them by posting untrue stories on Twitter. The consequences, as they have been put forward here, indicate that Trump has brought on a social, discursive meaning to conspiracy theories. That is because he was appointed as President of the US, and thus, has great responsibilities. However, Trump has chosen a path in which he proposes to deny any scientific research that has been made, even partially the ones conducted by his own country. The outcome points to a problem, which is that this new social meaning has already been adopted widely in climate deniers' discourse and will most likely increase in the future. 

References

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