Propaganda

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Propaganda is "any form of communication in support of national objectives designed to influence the opinions, emotions, attitudes, or behavior of any group in order to benefit the sponsor, either directly or indirectly". Governments have always tried to control people. Those in authority want control of the people’s hearts, minds and allegiances, and block or censor dissident voices. Probably every conflict is fought on at least two grounds: the battlefield and the minds of the people via propaganda. The “good guys” and the “bad guys” can often both be guilty of misleading their people with distortions, exaggerations, subjectivity, inaccuracy and even fabrications, in order to receive support and a sense of legitimacy. The good guise and the bad guise. Black and white. A fight for supremacy, for government. The king is dead, long live the king. We can learn how their game is played for how to deal with (counteract) these propaganda wars [1].

The term “propaganda” first came into common use in Europe as a result of Pope Gregory XV creating the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith. This was a commission of cardinals charged with spreading the faith and regulating church affairs in heathen lands. A College of Propaganda was set up to train priests for the missions. The word came into common use again when World War I began.

No matter the word used, the battle for our minds is as old as human history. The Greeks had games, theater, assembly, law courts, and festivals for propagandising ideas and beliefs. The conflict between kings and Parliament in England was a struggle in which propaganda was involved. Propaganda was one of the weapons used in the movement for American independence, and in the French Revolution.

In western nations, most people believe propaganda happens in other nations. Meanwhile the military-industrial-machine is rife with propaganda, and it is not always easy to detect, or when detected, to find the source of it, and exactly why it is done. Not impossible tho.

The Institute for Propaganda Analysis (IPA)

In 1936 Boston merchant Edward Filene helped establish the short-lived Institute for Propaganda Analysis which sought to educate Americans to recognize propaganda techniques and it's seven propaganda methods have become somewhat of a standard.

Bandwagon

The 'bandwagon' pumps up the value of 'joining the party'. Bandwagon is a fallacy, or mistake, in argumentation. Related to the emotional appeal in persuasion, or pathos, the 'bandwagon' approach involves convincing a readership that the majority of people agree with the writer's argument. This technique suggests that just because a large majority of people agree, the reader should, too. The bandwagon plays heavily on the human need for belonging, making the group a desirable place to be.

Commercial writers often make statements like "Over 5 million people have called…," adding the name of a company. This approach works because of the social pressure of majority opinion. Or an author states, "Everyone is doing whatever it takes to make himself happy. When you recognize that, you don't feel guilty for doing what everyone else is also doing." This approach works because the author argues that what everyone is doing is correct, equating popularity with truth. Review writers use it when they inform their audience that a book or a song has been number-one for several weeks, adding "Check it out." If the readers do not, they risk being left behind.

Card-stacking

Card-stacking (alias Ignoring the Counterevidence, One-Sided Assessment, Slanting and Suppressed Evidence) builds a highly-biased case for your position. In 'card-stacking', deliberate action is taken to bias an argument, with opposing evidence being buried or discredited, whilst the case for one's own position is exaggerated at every opportunity. Thus the testimonial of supporters is used, but not that of opponents. Coincidences and serendipity may be artificially created, making deliberate action seem like random occurrence. Things 'just seem to happen' whilst you are 'in town'.

It is by no means always fallacious to present a one-sided argument. It is not a defense attorney's job to present the evidence for a defendant's guilt, rather that is the job of the prosecutor, for example. Nor can we expect a salesman to list "what could possibly go wrong". Or politicians to give us all sides equally in an election campaign. As is usual with fallacies, we have to take the context of the argument into consideration. One-sidedness is fallacious in contexts where we have a right to demand objectivity. IMHO, two such contexts are news stories and scientific writing. Slanting in a news story or scientific production may lead the reader into drawing false conclusions, which means that the story is a boobytrap and the reader's reasoning is inadvertently fallacious. A one-sided lack of objectivity is a cardinal scholarly sin in my book.

Glittering Generalities

Glittering generalities uses power words to evoke emotions replacing rational argument and clear evidence. This is a combination of the generalisation fallacy where one thing is applied to others, hypnotic talk that puts people into a light trance (darkened rooms and flashing lights are tale-telling signs of that) and the use of nouns giving a sense of substance while lacking lacking substance.

Example: Ladies and Gentlemen, it is with the greatest pleasure that I welcome you to this most anonymous of operations. We are gathered here together on twitter on the brink of a worldwide challenge to which we must all rise in concert (raise fist), for all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good people do nothing, which I will never do and I know you will never accept.

Name-calling

'Name-calling' is for denigrating opponents.

Plain Folks

'Plain folks' makes a leader seem ordinary to increase trust and credibility.

Testimonial

The testimony of an independent person is seen as more trustworthy.

Transfer

Associate the leader with trusted others.

Sleeper effect

The impact of a persuasive message will generally tend to decrease over time. A sleeper effect takes place in a situation when effects of a persuasive message are stronger when more time passes.

Countermoves

Detecting stupid and deceptive propaganda is easy. Use critical thinking and reasoning skills. That is only useful for yourself tho. Know that it is next to impossible to convince anybody with reason. Everyone with strong ideologies, and that means the overwhelming majority of people, only wants to see, hear and read what they already believe.

You can try humour. Humour is the art of the incongruous. Seeing, hearing or reading something that conflicts with preconceptions is already incongruous, and the "normal" reaction seems to be to reject the new information. Humour provides a way for new information to get into the brain, where it may be considered. Also, note that authorities can not easily deal with not being taken serious.

Educating people to think critically for (at least partial) immunisation but I haven't seen a case where this has been tried at any institutional scale in educational services.

Sleeper effect

When making a decision based on specific evidence,deliberately recall the source and hence credibility of the data.

Related

News and watchdogs

Books

Fallacies

Sleeper Effect

Documentaries

References

  1. ↑ The Semantics of “Good” & “Evil” http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/robert-anton-wilson-the-semantics-of-good-evil
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