The Institute for Propaganda Analysis was set up before world war 2 to teach the American public about propaganda. Many academics and researchers from across the political spectrum sought to educate the people in the face of (mainly) foreign related propaganda. To understand how it works and inoculate against it and it was very popular.
Closing statement (1942): "The publication of dispassionate analyses of all kinds of propaganda, 'good' and 'bad', is easily misunderstood during a war emergency, and more important, the analyses could be misused for undesirable purposes by persons opposing the government’s effort."
In other words, the USA had a national program to educate the public about the dangers of propaganda, to see the signs and to resist it but they explicitly abolished it because they wanted to do propaganda themselves and they recognised that a population resistant to propaganda would hurt their own country.
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For today:
Propaganda works and is effective.
Everyone does it. Them and us.
There's a paradox: no one is immune to propaganda if they can't see themselves being influenced by it. By resisting propaganda you will resist your own thoughts and political in group and so it's dangerous psychologically and will hurt socially and politically.
Or maybe people really are being harmed by immigrants, the elites, and economic collapse, and vote for these politicians precisely because they're not as easy to manipulate as they used to be.
One thing I can't figure out here is that none of these are harming me, and yet I didn't believe I'm elite. I live in a 1000-sq-ft standard house, drive a 25-year-old car, and make $98k annually. A relative of mine lives in a house over twice as big with a giant lot worth over a million dollars and considers himself harmed.
Maybe he has a better idea of what his efforts/talents/luck rightfully merits, and you're just a sucker. Or maybe not, but you can't draw any kind of conclusion about how fairly you've gotten by by just looking at the results.
And the more I think about this, it's a really interesting perspective. My friend in the million dollar house probably prefers to be a not sucker victim. Could be a fundamental difference, there.
If you are capable of reading German, I would highly recommend the book "Talking to Ignoramuses" (Mit Ignoranten Sprechen) by Peter Modler. [0]
He proposes that people are generally split between 2 modes of communication and that in order to talk to each other you have to learn how the other sides communicates.
It's an interesting proposition and his points are something you can observe when watching debates with Trump and other candidates.
He specifically doesn't offer a way to deal with the surge in far right, but he does make great observations in how Trump and others like him behave and steer conversations. Academics especially like to argue with facts and and often cannot understand why people aren't responsive to what they consider obvious, but at the same time fail to understand that a lot of people don't respond to this kind of communication. At least not initially.
> Until people start thinking critically instead of emotionally, this science will keep delivering results for those who use it.
This is doubtless true, but I strongly dislike political articles that end with implicit appeals to moral evolution. There is no useful call to action, no suggestion of how said evolution could occur - and more importantly persist. It also individuates the response to collective phenomena.
'Pollution will worsen until people begin to take responsibility for their waste'.
'Literacy will decline until parents start to take their kids reading seriously'.
'The war will worsen until international institutions can find a way to work together'.
These appeals sound like they offer solutions, while failing to even offer useful explanations. The article above is wildly simplistic - missing significant important questions, let alone attempting to answer them. Here are a few.
'Why are such techniques more amenable to the right then the left?'
'Should and can the noble lie be employed in ethical demagoguery?'
'Can people be educated out of being easily manipulated, is there any research that demonstrates how, does this scale?'
'Do mass information campaigns help ameliorate misinformation?'
'If communications technology really is what facilitates authoritarian fear-mongering, can technology be used to prevent it? What are the trade offs?'
Fair points, and I appreciate the depth of your critique. You’re right—broad appeals to "moral evolution" can feel hollow without actionable solutions or a deeper analysis of the mechanics involved. My intention wasn’t to provide an exhaustive exploration but to spark a discussion, which your comment does beautifully.
Politically I am leaning very much to the left, yet these days I cannot visit Reddit without feeling like I’m getting manipulated by the constant scream of doom and gloom and all the bad things that will happen to me because of Trump’s win.
And how is the worst person in history.
That at the same time has dementia the past 5 years but also is the master mind behind the plan to destroy US.
That he is penniless and broke but yet part of the billionaire elite.
That is very easily manipulated by Putin flattery but at the same time is a paid Russian asset.
And just to be fair, things are as bad if not worse in r/conservative
Ps: Democrats you had 4 years after Jan 6 to make sure he never gets in power again, yet you fucked up royally. Stop screaming now, what happens is as much as your fault as his by allowing him to come to power again.
> Ps: Democrats you had 4 years after Jan 6 to make sure he never gets in power again, yet you fucked up royally. Stop screaming now, what happens is as much as your fault as his by allowing him to come to power again.
This. Four years and nothing to show for it. So stop screaming. One side is as responsible for the outcome as the other.
Just to clarify:
I don’t consider myself a Democrat (in the context of US elections). In fact, if I were American, I definitely wouldn’t have voted for Harris.
I referenced Trump and Meloni as case studies simply because they’re among the most recent examples. That said, I firmly believe two things:
1) The masses have an incredibly short memory.
2) It’s not just the right that engages in this kind of manipulation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Propaganda_Analy...
It was abolished.
Closing statement (1942): "The publication of dispassionate analyses of all kinds of propaganda, 'good' and 'bad', is easily misunderstood during a war emergency, and more important, the analyses could be misused for undesirable purposes by persons opposing the government’s effort."
In other words, the USA had a national program to educate the public about the dangers of propaganda, to see the signs and to resist it but they explicitly abolished it because they wanted to do propaganda themselves and they recognised that a population resistant to propaganda would hurt their own country.
----
For today:
Propaganda works and is effective.
Everyone does it. Them and us.
There's a paradox: no one is immune to propaganda if they can't see themselves being influenced by it. By resisting propaganda you will resist your own thoughts and political in group and so it's dangerous psychologically and will hurt socially and politically.