LEAP 1 Project: Propaganda in My Life
As consumers of a vast materialistic society, people have grown to overlook the influences of propaganda within our everyday lives. We tend to think of propaganda as if it only pertained to history books, back in WWII. This couldn’t be farther from the truth, as our everyday decisions are influenced by different outlets of propaganda. They can come the engrained roots of society, through our education, government, and news. They can also come from advertisements, entertainmen
t, and activism too. Here are some of the ways in which propaganda has influenced me through these various types of outlets:
Education:
Throughout my childhood education, up until recently, I never had a wide variety of historic knowledge. I can remember vaguely the different segments of history I learned throughout middle school and high school. We learned about the different sections in our government, the history on Christopher Columbus, the Civil War, WWI, WWII (the Great Depression), Vietnam War, and other small historical events that date back to A.D. and B.C.. It wasn’t until recently that I realized taking my COM 441 class, that none of my classes went in depth into Native American History. We knew they we’re wrongly stripped of their land, but that was about it. We never talked about different tribes like the Souix Nation or the wounded knee massacre, and their court case that would’ve been still ongoing if we had talked about it in middle school. The greatest influence of propaganda that the education system offered was not in what they said, but rather what they didn't say. In this case, particularly in our education system, there is a lack of cultural awareness and diversity, but an abundance for patriotism and praise for our own culture.
“There is marked eagerness for a college education, and a vague aspiration for culture, expressed in innumerable courses and lectures” (Barnays, pg. 38).
Often times, when propaganda is mentioned, we think of motivating forces that push ideas and values into our lives. However, deeply rooted propaganda that operates within a long system, like education, has the power to isolate the type of information we receive, rather having to constantly ‘spoon feed it’ to us.
Advertisements:
Propaganda in advertisements are usually more blatant and direct, especially when you understand that a brand or company is trying to sell you a product. For the most part, businesses and companies are spending a good portion of money on advertising, to sway the publics perception about their brand or product, hoping it has long term results. Businesses and companies aren't the only ones that use propaganda in advertisements, although they represent a good portion of that market. Even social services use propaganda to raise awareness and promote the giving of donations. Particularly to me, Sarah McLachlan’s animal cruelty video stands out as propaganda, in the way the commercials dramatizes animal cruelty. The overall message of the commercial comes with good intentions, but dramatizing animal cruelty by showing pictures and videos of injured/sad dogs, while playing angels in the background is reaching to far out for a message that everybody understands.
“The public must be interested by means of associational values and dramatic incidents”(Barnays, pg. 45).
The advertisement is most effective in terms of propaganda because of its relation to the context of pet owners. Pet owner’s don’t want to have to imagine their pets in that situation. Therefore by creating a set ting in which it dramatizes the reality, it only reinforces the public perception about animal cruelty.
Activism/Advocacy:
Propaganda can also be used in a positive manner to spread awareness. In 2014, a viral sensation broke the internet, with what is called, “The ALS ice bucket challenge”. It was a wide spread campaign to spread awareness about Lou Gehrig’s disease or motor neurons disease. The challenge was to fill a bucket of ice and water, challenge three other people who haven't done the challenge before to do the same, and then pour it on yourself. If the person didn’t comply, they could opt out of the challenge by donating to ALS organizations. Advocacy is a different type of propaganda that relies on the bandwagon effect. It hopes that the event will widely spread from one person to another. The ALS challenge was generally well accepted as a good cause and a fun way to participate in something that everybody was doing.
“If it doesn’t spread, it’s dead.” With social sharing comes traffic, and with traffic comes money.”
(Holiday, p. 68)
During this time period in 2014, social media was becoming more prevalent among media users, and helped in the engagement and participation of the ALS challenge. Ryan’s quote from the chapter, Give em’ what spreads’ is accurate for this type of propaganda. Without the advocacy and wide spread of social sharing, ALS wouldn’t have gained the popularity to actually generate money.
Journalism:
“Wow, CNN had to retract big story on "Russia," with 3 employees forced to resign. What about all the other phony stories they do? FAKE NEWS!”
This was a tweet created by President Donald Trump back in June of 2017. For context behind this tweet, CNN published a story, “that alleged that Trump adviser Anthony Scaramucci was on the radar of the Senate Intelligence Committee for meeting with the chief executive of a $10 billion Russian investment fund”(NewRepublic.com). The post would later be retracted, while the 3 of the CNN employees would resign. The propaganda behind this could be CNN posting “FAKE NEWS”, or it could also be Trump’s ongoing relationship with the media, as a way to use this instance to discredit journalism towards specific networks.
Personally as someone who once explored journalism early in college, I understand journalistic efforts and ethical standards. I don’t agree nor do I think it was ethical to publish a story without accuracy or fairness. Because of a someones mistake, it could have mislead people to believing in something inaccurate and unverifiable. As for Trump, this mistake only added to his arsenal of propaganda, to bash on other networks other than Fox, that question and defy his own logic. His strategic use of propaganda and falsifying facts such as saying, “Ratings are down”, sway public opinion and perception about the networks credibility. Especially when you factor in the amount of power he exerts as president and his own use of twitter as his main media outlet.
Government:
One major way that I notice propaganda in my life through the government, is during the presidential elections. This time period is the most crucial point in trying to gain followers and increase votes. Living in a democratic society, it's impossible to ignore all the propaganda that exists. People have signs on their lawn, bumper stickers, its mentioned on every news channel, trending on social media sites, people wearing shirts with politician names, protests, etc.
"Only through the wise use of propaganda will our government, considered as the continuous administrative organ of the people, be able to maintain that intimate relationship with the public which is necessary in a democracy"(Barnays, pg. 35)
Propaganda according to Barnays, functions hand in hand within our society. It's deeply rooted within our system in order to create relations with people and politicians. Without it, we would be less informed beings about current events and would have less power within our government as an overall democratic society.
Entertainment:
Propaganda in hollywood media, is one of the most powerful tools in my opinion to changing public perception. One small example of this is how people view clowns due to the media. Before the recent movie IT came out, there was a series of videos that went viral of clowns being seen out in public. People dramatized and even fabricated videos to make it seem like they we're being chased, or that the clown was following them. Not only did people create the hysteria of clowns and continue to perpetuate that all clowns we're killers or creeps, but so did hollywood media. Another example, of hollywood media that has changed my perception, is the show, "Fresh off the Boat". Which is an Asian American sitcom based on a taiwanese family that moves to america, in search of the american dream. It has changed my perception of how Asian americans are portrayed in society. Particularly in hollywood, asians are usually restricted to very minimum roles and prototypes, like accountants, geeks, kung foo fighters, etc. Pacific Asian americans lack major roles in television shows and movies. So, it's refreshing to see a shows that portrays asian americans as 'normal' families, and doesn't perpetuate stereotypes of asians.
Works Cited:
- HOLIDAY, R. (2018). TRUST ME IM LYING: confessions of a media manipulator. S.l.: PROFILE BOOKS LTD.
- BERNAY, E. (2016). PROPAGANDA. S.l.: LULU COM.
- Johnson, T. (2018, January 23). Journalists Raise Concerns About Fake News Rhetoric After Mans Arrest for Threats to CNN. Retrieved February 14, 2018, from http://variety.com/2018/politics/news/trump-fake-news-cnn-1202673974/
- Shephard, A. (2017, June 27). Donald Trump is treating Fox News like its state TV. Retrieved February 14, 2018, from https://newrepublic.com/minutes/143564/donald-trump-treating-fox-news-like-its-state-tv
- Gold, H. (2017, June 27). 3 CNN staffers resign over retracted Scaramucci-Russia story. Retrieved February 14, 2018, from https://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2017/06/26/cnn-resign-russia-scaramucci-239975
- Http://ljournal.ru/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/a-2017-023.pdf. (2017). doi:10.18411/a-2017-023
- Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) Fact Sheet. (n.d.). Retrieved February 14, 2018, from https://www.ninds.nih.gov/Disorders/Patient-Caregiver-Education/Fact-Sheets/Amyotrophic-Lateral-Sclerosis-ALS-Fact-Sheet
- R. (2006, October 03). Retrieved February 14, 2018, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gspElv1yvc