Isn’t propaganda just a form of persuasion? What about propaganda separates it from advertising or interpersonal communication?
Edit: Not all propaganda involves lying. For some reason, we seem to be more comfortable with a person lying to us than we are with viewing a propaganda poster that uses verifiable facts.
Edit 2: Another interesting note is that in some countries, propaganda is not viewed negatively like it is in English speaking countries.
Because most folks don’t like being manipulated?
I think this is a big part of it. We expect companies to lie in their advertisements, but we trust our government institutions, so government propaganda feels like a betrayal of trust.
Especially by the people we’re supposed to be represented by.
Manufactured consent involves turning around the democratic process.
Well i hope you dont like marketing or any story that has a moral or message.
its a disingenuous form of persuasion.
youre explicitly leaving out facts or distorting the argument to your case. so its lie by omission at best, and outright lying at worst.
Don’t most forms of persuasion leave out inconvenient facts or distort the argument to their case?
no
Some, not most. Propaganda and advertising are one sided conversations - you either see through the bullshit, or you find yourself agreeing with it.
Effective and rational persuasion involves a back and forth conversation, which is far too time consuming for practically anyone to bother with these days. Since everyone has to have an opinion on everything, they’ll usually find someone saying what sounds right to them and recite the same talking points. When you’re engaging in that sort of persuasion, you don’t really need to worry about giant holes in your arguments.
often it is better to directly acknowledge where your side has trouble. You can then address those areas on your terms before they find out, possibly from a source that won’t show you why your side is better despite those issues.
Misinformation is bad for both the population and for journalism. If it was true, honest reporting, it wouldn’t be “propaganda”. It’s in the definition.
not true, plenty of propaganda is about true things. Plenty of allied propagands during ww2 describes very real and negative truths about the axis powers. That does not make it not propaganda.
What about propaganda separates it from advertising or interpersonal communication?
The degree of lie and the consequences of the lie.
Advertisements can be misleading, but if they go too far can be subject to false advertisement laws. No such check is there for a government participating in propaganda. That government also has the ability to wage war and generally oppress people rather than just sell products.
Propaganda can also be a label applied to 1) true information presented in a certain way, and 2) the same types of information presented about subjects other than the government.
I’ll leave others to address point 1, but I think point 2 is interesting. Propaganda can be about economic systems, for example, such as capitalism, which exists outside the realm of government. Propaganda can be about industries, for example when the oil industry tries to mislead us about global warming. I think the common theme is that propaganda has to be about broad, powerful systems having, as you pointed out, serious consequences when they tell you something.
That’s an interesting take. It’s the lack of regulations that separates propaganda.
I also don’t think it’s like a bright line that propaganda is necessarily the worst form of dishonesty. The subject matter and intent is huge. If a US president runs ads with cherry picked economy data, you could argue that’s propaganda. But that isn’t necessarily worse than say a Pharma exec who pushes through and misleading advertises a potentially harmful drug. The exec could potentially get in trouble for this, but you could easily argue his actions were worse.
The potential harm is generally pretty high when we think of propaganda. And governments willing to participate in more flagrant propaganda are likely going to be willing to participate in other unsavory behavior. And use propaganda to affect it.
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It’s not just persuasion, it’s disingenuous persuasion. It’s persuasion with a hidden agenda.
So, if I were to tell you apples were better than oranges because they have more fiber, that’s a persuasion and it’s objectively true (5g vs. 3g).
If I were to tell you that apples were better than oranges because some oranges contain parasitic wasps and you can’t tell which ones do and which ones don’t until you open one.
Well, that’s disingenous. And if it turned out I worked for the Washington Apple Commission, and did not disclose that, that would be propaganda.
Propaganda does not have to have a hidden agenda. Literally the “I want you” uncle Sam poster is propaganda. That agenda was pretty obvious, there was no question who was behind it and it was pretty clear why it was commissioned in the first place.
There has been propaganda encouraging car-pooling, reusing materials, conserving electricity, promoting employment etc, and many of them even had credits as to who the message was coming from.
Propaganda is not inherently evil, but it’s important to understand the context and where it’s coming from.
I think this is true from the original definition of the word. But decades of one side calling out the other sides propaganda in harsh and negative lighting leaves a negative connotation to the word. Which results in each side avoiding the word for their own messaging and using the word for their opponents messaging. Which further reinforces the negative perception of the word and over decades of people doing this it has left a lot of people thinking it only ever applies to negative or deceptive messaging. And I think this was more impactful in places like the US where there were a lot of political people using the word in a negative way - such as in the big red scare campaign in attacking communist ideas by calling it communist propaganda and similar messaging.
Which is shown by various comments in this post thinking it only applies to negative or deceptive messaging. So I would argue the meaning of the word has or is still changing - as words naturally do over time due to how people use them. Which I think goes a way to answering the OPs question, some places used the word more negatively which gives the people that live in those areas a more negative view on the word. While others have not and so people there have a more neutral take on the word.
Most propaganda is clear and direct about what it is.
Before the more modern definition took hold propaganda was not a term that held any real negative connotations. It was really just like marketing or evangelising, a behavior or product which uses various methods to change opinions. The big problem is when you have political or corporate powers using these tools to change opinion about something in a way that degrades democracy or causes harm.
For example, oil companies stand to benefit from people being uncertain about the science, so when they engage in propaganda they are trying to inject doubt where there is none and to do so in a way that will benefit them in the short term. This will cause massive harm in the future, potentially leading to a significant number of wars and a staggerig death toll, but that is not part of their consideration.
Another example is alt med. When someone claims that their pill can make your brain work better and will also boost your sexual performance all while protecting you from the dangers they just told you about they obviously stand to benefit from you believing them. They create the need and then offer the solution. Alex Jones is a good example of this. He tells you that the global elite are planning nuclear war, then in the next ad break tells you about iodine for radiation exposure.
So why is propaganda frowned on? It is more like propaganda is the label we give to marketing or evangelising that we consider worthy of frowning. Someone in another countries may sort different things into evangelising, marketing, and propaganda categories but they will do so based on their understanding of the world and you will likely agree with most of their sorting. Almost everyone thinks that Nazis are bad and put their marketing in the propaganda bucket.
Marketing and evangelism are fucking terrible too while we are at it
Propaganda has always held an aspect of dishonesty, though, either subtle or egregious. It’s never been looked at as more than a tool- like how the Roman historiographers used it to paint their neighbors as barbarians. (Thereby justifying extended wars. Which… were not cheap.)
This reminds me of the same issue with the term “discriminate”. Discrimination is an important, good thing to be able to do. You look at a traffic light and you should hopefully discriminate between the red and green colors. Teachers discriminate good students from bad ones through tests.
People have started using is generally to mean racial discrimination in a bad context. So now, a lot of people understand “discrimination” to mean “racism” or “sexism”.
That’s because the definition of discrimination you’re talking about is not the main definition of the word, and is not a good fit for the use you’re describing.
The word you’re looking for is differentiate.
intransitive verb To make a clear distinction; distinguish. “discriminate among the options available.”
To make distinctions on the basis of class or category without regard to individual merit, especially to show prejudice on the basis of ethnicity, gender, or a similar social factor. “was accused of discriminating against women; discriminated in favor of his cronies.”
To perceive or notice the distinguishing features of; recognize as distinct. “unable to discriminate colors.”
Seems like it’s primary use is to distinguish between things.
The Marriam Webster dictionary disagrees.
Fascinating, because I just looked it up on there in addition to the English heritage dictionary which I originally used. The specific use case of discriminate being used in a social prejudice sense was even closer to the bottom than in my original post. So your specific dictionary doesn’t even support your claim, it’s predominantly used to describe being able to identify differences in a set of items.
MW dictionary:
a : to mark or perceive the distinguishing or peculiar features of Depth perception may be defined as the ability to appreciate or discriminate the third dimension … —H. G. Armstrong b : DISTINGUISH, DIFFERENTIATE discriminate hundreds of colors 2 : to distinguish by discerning or exposing differences : to recognize or identify as separate and distinct discriminate right from wrong especially : to distinguish from another like object discriminate the individual voices in the choir intransitive verb
1 a : to make a distinction discriminate among historical sources discriminates between literary fiction and popular fiction b : to use good judgment 2 : to make a difference in treatment or favor on a basis other than individual merit discriminate in favor of your friends discriminate against a certain nationality
Propaganda is by definition misleading and political in nature. It can lead to policies that can make life very bad for a lot of people (see Nazi propaganda).
A misleading, nonpolitical ad, may make you waste money, but it’s unlikely to lead to police rounding up foreigners in the night. Dishonest interpersonal communications will make you lose friends but it (generally) doesn’t set political policy.
Thats not to say that advertisements can’t be dangerous, but at least they’re regulated to limit potential damage. Anyone can push any political statement as fact and get away with it as long as it doesn’t piss off the wrong people too much.It’s because propaganda is by definition false. It’s purposely misleading information intended to control people. There’s not really any way to put a positive spin on that
Not all propaganda is false, sometimes propaganda uses facts to persuade. All forms of persuasion involve controlling others, but for some reason propaganda is the most taboo.
If the information were true then it wouldn’t be propaganda anymore, it would just be facts. Propaganda is a negative word intended to alert people to misinformation
You can still be manipulative without lying, by simply choosing the right facts.
It’s not about choosing the right facts. It’s about how the information is presented. One such case I can recall involved covid propaganda. A qultist anti-vaxxer I know posted an article with the headline (paraphrasing) “70% of covid deaths in hospital were vaccinated”. Turns out that was true. Except the article was presented as if this was evidence of the vaccine failing. Unfortunately for the qultist idiot, that’s an expected outcome. The area it happened in, had pushed hard for early vaccination. The population was like 90% vaccinated and vulnerable people were targeted early. Quite the opposite to the tone of the article, reality is that the vaccine was massively effective. But the facts were presented with an ignorant and incorrect interpretation.
That’s how facts can be used in propaganda.
All forms of persuasion involve controlling others, but for some reason propaganda is the most taboo.
That’s not true. Persuasive dialogue allows others to make their own choices. The persuader’s job is to get the person with the decision to choose the desired option. In this sense, persuasion preserves the autonomy of the other and, more importantly, respects them enough to reason with them.
Propaganda largely does not do that.
Fox News is basically a propaganda factory, so it’s my go-to example. Look at how they talk about the border situation: it’s an invasion, a crisis. That’s not bad, per se, but there’s no discussion about how the problem came to be in the first place. It’s here’s an urgent problem that’s a direct threat to you, and here’s the specific thing we should do about it. Propaganda of an urgent nature is an underhanded technique because it precludes other feasible solutions.
Similarly, propaganda that persuades by omitting important facts also doesn’t give the audience a chance to reason through the problem and respect their right to choose among the feasible options if that information were included.
That’s why propaganda is often considered coercive and controlling while persuasion generally is not.
Not all propaganda involves lying.
Dictionaries seem to disagree with your definition.
Wiktionary suggests lying isn’t necessary:
Biased communication aimed to influence an audience to further an agenda, encourage a particular perception or provoke an emotional response
It’s very similar to the OED definition returned from Google.
Can you show me?
the spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, a cause, or a person
information, ideas, opinions, or images, often only giving one part of an argument, that are broadcast, published, or in some other way spread with the intention of influencing people’s opinions
The systematic dissemination of information, esp. in a biased or misleading way, in order to promote a particular cause or point of view, often a political agenda. Also: information disseminated in this way; the means or media by which such ideas are disseminated. Cf. black propaganda n.
Propaganda is information, often inaccurate information, that a political organization publishes or broadcasts in order to influence people.
Point being, even if it’s not necessarily all lies how do you know you’re not being lied to or mislead when most propaganda are, by definition, lies and half-truths? I don’t trust any sort of propaganda because chances are I’m being lied to.
how do you know you’re not being lied to or mislead when most propaganda are, by definition, lies and half-truths?
Research, dig deeper and come to your own conclusion.
People use words in different ways. You will find varying definitions of propaganda. Some people will call any information produced by a government propaganda. Some people will only call that information propaganda if it appears to have a notable bias. Some will only call the info propaganda if it contains outright lies.
You seem to want to define propaganda as any information produced by a government designed to pursuance people of something. Most people are not going to be against that kind of information (or at least not strongly against it). I’m pretty sure most people that say they are against propaganda view propaganda as information that is misleading or an outright lie.
The problem here seems to be that you have taken the stance that propaganda simply means “persuasion”.
I like propaganda like this.
https://youtu.be/IWAf3dQxAfQ?feature=shared
A lot of cool art has been made as propaganda. Let them cook.
I think it’s more about who is lying. We want our governments to be honest with us, because they have so much power over us.
Unlike other advertisers, governments have effectively unlimited budgets and can use force to suppress other narratives.
Similarly, we trust our governments. A great example is the whole weapons-of-mass-destruction/uranium lie perpetrated by the US government (or just the Oval Office?) before the Second Gulf War. The Washington press and most of the US public trusted the government and accepted the lie. We believe in our leaders and institutions, and think they’re above those kind of lies.
I think it’s generally that propaganda is pushed by big organizations, and there’s no room for rebuttal. You’d be talking to a brick wall. A brick wall with a propaganda poster on it.
Personal persuasion can be just as villainized when politics are involved. Try talking to a lefty in support of Trump or to a righty in support of CRT and you’ll see. But it’s not complained about as much in third party conversations because you can yell at those people to their face (or screens, if online.)
Advertisements are a special case. Nearly universally hated, but not seen as so evil because they’re just after your money to buy a product, not your loyalty to some cause.
The implication is that propaganda is either a lie, a twisting of the truth or selective facts.
But isn’t any form of persuasion going to involve selective facts?
Becsuse people are always angry at it.
Its comparison to ad campaigns is a good one, and they are both considered bad for the same reasons: Manipulating people via selective facts, twisted facts or outright lies.
Propaganda, however, is by definition related to conflicts. This means all propaganda has opponents who eagerly seek out to point out and destroy it.
If a newspaper in New York City put a huge page about McDonald’s being an amazing place to work, you would not expect people to yell “that’s ADVERTISEMENT” and form gangs to go destroy all the issues for sale.
If a newspaper in New York City put a huge page about how honorable and valiant the Russian soldiers are in defending Ukraine against Western degenerates, you would have furious people calling it “PROPAGANDA!” and trying really really hard to get rid of it and punish the people publishing it.
