“Beware of false knowledge;

it is more dangerous than ignorance.”

George Bernard Shaw

We are in the information age. We are a knowledge based economy…or so we are supposed to be. Knowledge is power we are told.We have countless ways of receiving information…24 hour news channels, banners updating the latest on our favourite shows. Newspapers…weeklys, biweeklys, dailys…in print and on line. Magazines, in depth news shows like 20/20, marketplace, 60 minutes. There are documentrys on the boob tube, documentrys that now even go to the theatres. We have good old fashioned books and now we don’t even need to have a bookshelf because now we can just download them onto a book reader! We have blogs and even youtube and lets not forget we have google and the world wide web! And not to be remiss we cannot leave off the list the almighty Oprah and shows like it.Recent events have left me dumbfounded on how so many can just jump on bandwagons and believe the things that they do…Now I know that our education system has been slowly degraded by government cuts and mismanagement of resources…and I do realize that it is a capitalistic world where we value choice… and as well in this part of the world a democratic society, so choice is something that is is left to the marketplace because we really don’t like government intervention in what we do, watch, eat, hear or just about anything…until something bad happens to us and then we want retribution, restitution, remediation and regulation.And this seems to be a big part of the problem that is plaguing the whole dam world! We want to be able to live the way we want until we find out that it doesn’t work…and we want what we want without really thinking or knowing if what we think or what we want is really the best thing for us!We have problems thinking too far up the road which might lead us to rethink some of our wants or needs…many of us haven’t been around to remember how or why things went bad so we don’t repeat the mistakes of our ancestors. Yes living in our moment like rock stars who Live Fast Die Young Leave a good looking corpse and party in hell for eternity just doesn’t seem to be sustainable or desirable…for dying isn’t the problem…When you are dead and gone there is nothing to trouble you. No, having to deal with the repercussions of living beyond the capability of the human organism is the real problem…coping with a system that is shutting down and needs life support is expensive and and leaves one with no quality of life at all…Here in the so called “Best Place on Earth” a battle has been waging between a Corporation that has had its eyes on the motherlode since 1969, the many First Nations communities and citizens who have cared enough to take the time to acquire some knowledge other than the “knowledge” that Taseko Mining Corporation has been letting loose via their corporate friends in the media, the Chamber of Commerce, those citizens that caught the Gold Fever, those citizens who see money to be made buying houses low and selling high, those citizens who are just plain gullible and not to mention the City Council and our Provincial Government.And here, like on the National political scene real, respectful, intelligent discourse has vanished and has been replaced by bullyism…if you aren’t with us your are against us…our way or the highway, and as well Might equals Right…and when all that gets a little old we play the race card and start being racists…and of course we fall back to the holier than though stance of working for a living and paying taxes and that all those who don’t want to dig up the land, drain a lake, kill the fish, disrupt the habitat for those other beings that share our world, and build a huge reservoir for toxic tailings all because there is some shiney metal there that can be exchanged for some paper money for as long as the world price stays high or until the shiney metals run out are just a bunch of lazy asses who live off of all those hard working sods who support the whole ball of wax from working with no rewards or not enough rewards because others who don’t work are taking from their pocket.So how do we go from being polarized in our thinking…to being open to intelligent discourse? Here in our town we don’t even dare bring up the word “Prosperity” for fear of losing friends, and or respect, and even business. This project was put forward to catch the citizens and the politicians as the only hope for this area…and many bought in without thinking of all the assests that we possess. Like deer in the headlights we froze and instead of thinking rationally many became mesmerized by the glitter of gold. And like the polite want to be liked people we are – we just go about our business and keep our mouths shut thereby giving those with the agenda the appearance of having the support of the majority.

The caption: “Shame on you, chatterer! The enemy is listening. Silence is your duty.”

All propaganda has to be popular and has to accommodate itself to the comprehension of the least intelligent of those whom it seeks to reach.

Adolf Hitler

A Great Link: Lair Wilcox

Some forms of propoganda:

Ad hominem: A Latin phrase that has come to mean attacking one’s opponent, as opposed to attacking their arguments.

Ad nauseam: This argument approach uses tireless repetition of an idea. An idea, especially a simple slogan, that is repeated enough times, may begin to be taken as the truth. This approach works best when media sources are limited or controlled by the propagator.

Appeal to authority: Appeals to authority cite prominent figures to support a position, idea, argument, or course of action.

Appeal to fear: Appeals to fear and seeks to build support by instilling anxieties and panic in the general population, for example, Joseph Goebbels exploited Theodore Kaufman’s Germany Must Perish! to claim that the Allies sought the extermination of the German people.

Appeal to prejudice: Using loaded or emotive terms to attach value or moral goodness to believing the proposition. Used in biased or misleading ways.

Bandwagon: Bandwagon and “inevitable-victory” appeals attempt to persuade the target audience to join in and take the course of action that “everyone else is taking”.

Inevitable victory: Invites those not already on the bandwagon to join those already on the road to certain victory. Those already or at least partially on the bandwagon are reassured that staying aboard is their best course of action.

Join the crowd: This technique reinforces people’s natural desire to be on the winning side. This technique is used to convince the audience that a program is an expression of an irresistible mass movement and that it is in their best interest to join.

Beautiful people: The type of propaganda that deals with famous people or depicts attractive, happy people. This makes other people think that if they buy a product or follow a certain ideology, they too will be happy or successful.

Big Lie: The repeated articulation of a complex of events that justify subsequent action. The descriptions of these events have elements of truth, and the “big lie” generalizations merge and eventually supplant the public’s accurate perception of the underlying events. After World War I the German Stab in the back explanation of the cause of their defeat became a justification for Nazi re-militarization and revanchist aggression.

Black-and-white fallacy: Presenting only two choices, with the product or idea being propagated as the better choice. For example: “You’re either with us, or against us….”

Classical conditioning: All vertebrates, including humans, respond to classical conditioning. That is, if object A is always present when object B is present and object B causes a negative physical reaction (e.g., disgust, pleasure) then we will when presented with object A when object B is not present, we will experience the same feelings.

Cognitive dissonance: People desire to be consistent. Suppose a pollster finds that a certain group of people hates his candidate for senator but love actor A. They use actor A’s endorsement of their candidate to change people’s minds because people cannot tolerate inconsistency. They are forced to either to dislike the actor or like the candidate.

Common man: The “plain folks” or “common man” approach attempts to convince the audience that the propagandist’s positions reflect the common sense of the people. It is designed to win the confidence of the audience by communicating in the common manner and style of the target audience. Propagandists use ordinary language and mannerisms (and clothe their message in face-to-face and audiovisual communications) in attempting to identify their point of view with that of the average person. For example, a propaganda leaflet may make an argument on a macroeconomic issue, such as unemployment insurance benefits, using everyday terms: “Given that the country has little money during this recession, we should stop paying unemployment benefits to those who do not work, because that is like maxing out all your credit cards during a tight period, when you should be tightening your belt.”

Cult of personality: A cult of personality arises when an individual uses mass media to create an idealized and heroic public image, often through unquestioning flattery and praise. The hero personality then advocates the positions that the propagandist desires to promote. For example, modern propagandists hire popular personalities to promote their ideas and/or products.

Demonizing the enemy: Making individuals from the opposing nation, from a different ethnic group, or those who support the opposing viewpoint appear to be subhuman (e.g., the Vietnam War-era term “gooks” for National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam aka Vietcong, or “VC”, soldiers), worthless, or immoral, through suggestion or false accusations. Dehumanizing is also a termed used synonymously with demonizing, the latter usually serves as an aspect of the former.

Dictat: This technique hopes to simplify the decision making process by using images and words to tell the audience exactly what actions to take, eliminating any other possible choices. Authority figures can be used to give the order, overlapping it with the Appeal to authority technique, but not necessarily. The Uncle Sam “I want you” image is an example of this technique.

Disinformation: The creation or deletion of information from public records, in the purpose of making a false record of an event or the actions of a person or organization, including outright forgery of photographs, motion pictures, broadcasts, and sound recordings as well as printed documents.

Door-in-the-face technique: Is used to increase a person’s latitude of acceptance. For example, if a salesperson would like to sell an item for $100 but the public would only be willing to pay $50 for it, the salesperson will first offer the item at a higher price (e.g., $200) and then the salesperson will subsequently reduce the price to $100 to make it seem like a good deal.

Euphoria: The use of an event that generates euphoria or happiness, or using an appealing event to boost morale. Euphoria can be created by declaring a holiday, making luxury items available, or mounting a military parade with marching bands and patriotic messages.

Fear, uncertainty and doubt: An attempt to influence public perception by disseminating negative and dubious/false information designed to undermine the credibility of their beliefs.

Flag-waving: An attempt to justify an action on the grounds that doing so will make one more patriotic, or in some way benefit a country, group or idea which the targeted audience supports.

Foot-in-the-door technique: Often used by recruiters and salesmen. For example, a member of the opposite sex walks up to the victim and pins a flower or gives a small gift to the victim. The victim says thanks and now they have incurred a psychological debt to the perpetrator. The person eventually asks for a larger favor (e.g., a donation or to buy something far more expensive). The unwritten social contract between the victim and perpetrator causes the victim to feel obligated to reciprocate by agreeing to do the larger favor or buy the more expensive gift.

Glittering generalities: Glittering generalities are emotionally appealing words applied to a product or idea, but which present no concrete argument or analysis. A famous example is the campaign slogan “Ford has a better idea!” This technique has also been referred to as the PT Barnum effect.

Half-truth: A half-truth is a deceptive statement, which may come in several forms and includes some element of truth. The statement might be partly true, the statement may be totally true but only part of the whole truth, or it may utilize some deceptive element, such as improper punctuation, or double meaning, especially if the intent is to deceive, evade, blame or misrepresent the truth.

Labeling: A euphemism is used when the propagandist attempts to increase the perceived quality, credibility, or credence of a particular ideal. A Dysphemism is used when the intent of the propagandist is to discredit, diminish the perceived quality, or hurt the perceived righteousness of the Mark. By creating a “label” or “category” or “faction” of a population, it is much easier to make an example of these larger bodies, because they can uplift or defame the Mark without actually incurring legal-defamation. Example: “Liberal” is a dysphemism intended to diminish the perceived credibility of a particular Mark. By taking a displeasing argument presented by a Mark, the propagandist can quote that person, and then attack “liberals” in an attempt to both (1) create a political battle-ax of unaccountable aggression and (2) diminish the quality of the Mark. If the propagandist uses the label on too-many perceivably credible individuals, muddying up the word can be done by broadcasting bad-examples of “liberals” into the media. Labeling can be thought of as a sub-set of Guilt by association, another logical fallacy.

Latitudes of acceptance: If a person’s message is outside the bounds of acceptance for an individual and group, most techniques will engender psychological reactance (simply hearing the argument will make the message even less acceptable). There are two techniques for increasing the bounds of acceptance. First, one can take a more even extreme position that will make more moderate positions seem more acceptable. This is similar to the Door-in-the-Face technique. Alternatively, one can moderate one’s own position to the edge of the latitude of acceptance and then over time slowly move to the position that was previously.^[9]

Love bombing: Used to recruit members to a cult or ideology by having a group of individuals cut off a person from their existing social support and replace it entirely with members of the group who deliberately bombard the person with affection in an attempt to isolate the person from their prior beliefs and value system—see Milieu control.

Lying and deception: Lying and deception can be the basis of many propaganda techniques including Ad Homimen arguments, Big-Lie, Defamation, Door-in-the-Face, Half-truth, Name-calling or any other technique that is based on dishonesty or deception. For example, many politicians have been found to frequently stretch or break the truth.

Managing the news: According to Adolf Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels “The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly – it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over.”^[10] This idea is consistent with the principle of classical conditioning as well as the idea of “Staying on Message.”

Milieu control: An attempt to control the social environment and ideas through the use of social pressure

Name-calling: Propagandists use the name-calling technique to incite fears and arouse prejudices in their hearers in the intent that the bad names will cause hearers to construct a negative opinion about a group or set of beliefs or ideas that the propagandist would wish hearers to denounce. The method is intended to provoke conclusions about a matter apart from impartial examinations of facts. Name-calling is thus a substitute for rational, fact-based arguments against the an idea or belief on its own merits.^[11]

Obfuscation, intentional vagueness, confusion: Generalities are deliberately vague so that the audience may supply its own interpretations. The intention is to move the audience by use of undefined phrases, without analyzing their validity or attempting to determine their reasonableness or application. The intent is to cause people to draw their own interpretations rather than simply being presented with an explicit idea. In trying to “figure out” the propaganda, the audience forgoes judgment of the ideas presented. Their validity, reasonableness and application may still be considered.

Obtain disapproval or Reductio ad Hitlerum: This technique is used to persuade a target audience to disapprove of an action or idea by suggesting that the idea is popular with groups hated, feared, or held in contempt by the target audience. Thus if a group that supports a certain policy is led to believe that undesirable, subversive, or contemptible people support the same policy, then the members of the group may decide to change their original position. This is a form of bad logic, where a is said to include X, and b is said to include X, therefore, a = b.

Operant conditioning: Operant conditioning involves learning through imitation. For example, watching an appealing person buy products or endorse positions teaches a person to buy the product or endorse the position. Operant conditioning is the underlying principle behind the Ad Nauseam, Slogan and other repetition public relations campaigns.

Oversimplification: Favorable generalities are used to provide simple answers to complex social, political, economic, or military problems.

Pensée unique: Enforced reduction of discussion by use of overly simplistic phrases or arguments (e.g., “There is no alternative to war.”)

Quotes out of context: Selectively editing quotes to change meanings—political documentaries designed to discredit an opponent or an opposing political viewpoint often make use of this technique.

Rationalization (making excuses): Individuals or groups may use favorable generalities to rationalize questionable acts or beliefs. Vague and pleasant phrases are often used to justify such actions or beliefs.

Red herring: Presenting data or issues that, while compelling, are irrelevant to the argument at hand, and then claiming that it validates the argument.

Scapegoating: Assigning blame to an individual or group, thus alleviating feelings of guilt from responsible parties and/or distracting attention from the need to fix the problem for which blame is being assigned.

Slogans: A slogan is a brief, striking phrase that may include labeling and stereotyping. Although slogans may be enlisted to support reasoned ideas, in practice they tend to act only as emotional appeals. Opponents of the US’s invasion and occupation of Iraq use the slogan “blood for oil” to suggest that the invasion and its human losses was done to access Iraq’s oil riches. On the other hand, supporters who argue that the US should continue to fight in Iraq use the slogan “cut and run” to suggest that it would be cowardly or weak to withdraw from Iraq.

Stereotyping: This technique attempts to arouse prejudices in an audience by labeling the object of the propaganda campaign as something the target audience fears, hates, loathes, or finds undesirable. For instance, reporting on a foreign country or social group may focus on the stereotypical traits that the reader expects, even though they are far from being representative of the whole country or group; such reporting often focuses on the anecdotal. In graphic propaganda, including war posters, this might include portraying enemies with stereotyped racial features.

Straw man: A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent’s position. To “attack a straw man” is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by substituting a superficially similar proposition (the “straw man”), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.

Testimonial: Testimonials are quotations, in or out of context, especially cited to support or reject a given policy, action, program, or personality. The reputation or the role (expert, respected public figure, etc.) of the individual giving the statement is exploited. The testimonial places the official sanction of a respected person or authority on a propaganda message. This is done in an effort to cause the target audience to identify itself with the authority or to accept the authority’s opinions and beliefs as its own.

Third party technique: Works on the principle that people are more willing to accept an argument from a seemingly independent source of information than from someone with a stake in the outcome. It is a marketing strategy commonly employed by Public Relations (PR) firms, that involves placing a premeditated message in the “mouth of the media.” Third party technique can take many forms, ranging from the hiring of journalists to report the organization in a favorable light, to using scientists within the organization to present their perhaps prejudicial findings to the public. Frequently astroturf groups or front groups are used to deliver the message.

Thought-terminating cliché: A commonly used phrase, sometimes passing as folk wisdom, used to quell cognitive dissonance.

Transfer: Also known as association, this is a technique that involves projecting the positive or negative qualities of one person, entity, object, or value onto another to make the second more acceptable or to discredit it. It evokes an emotional response, which stimulates the target to identify with recognized authorities. Often highly visual, this technique often utilizes symbols (e.g. swastikas) superimposed over other visual images (e.g. logos). These symbols may be used in place of words.

Unstated assumption: This technique is used when the propaganda concept that the propagandist intends to transmit would seem less credible if explicitly stated. The concept is instead repeatedly assumed or implied.

Virtue words: These are words in the value system of the target audience that produce a positive image when attached to a person or issue. Peace, happiness, security, wise leadership, freedom, “The Truth”, etc. are virtue words. Many see religiosity as a virtue, making associations to this quality affectively beneficial. Their use is considered of the Transfer propaganda technique.