Devil's advocate: what if the "troll army" is actually a whole army of people from that country who are brainwashed to believe the party line? Is that not "authentic" if they really believe it?

not if they're being paid to produce the content (wumao pawns are). if they're NOT being paid, i would guess you are right, but frankly we should have disconnected china from the free world a long time ago and only given them logistics software. it's frustrating that they shut the west out but constantly try and infect the west with their backwards ideas