Think of the average White American's views on race. They accept behavior towards themselves which they would find utterly unacceptable if a white person behaved that way towards a black person. Even in conservative think tanks, people lower their voices when they say something is "anti-white".
The reason for this bizarre behavior is clearly that people are exposed to a massive amount of race issues propaganda in school and in TV/movies. The explanatory effect of propaganda in society is enormous.
This is a good point, and it makes me wonder if a major role of propaganda isn’t to change minds but to shift social norms. Propaganda may effectively label some positions as low status or suggest they will carry a penalty, discouraging people from expressing those views.
Best essay yet, Mike! (And there have been a lot of great ones.) I wonder if left-wing propaganda is making a difference, however, by keeping Trump’s popularity numbers relatively high despite his awful work on tariffs and deportations. Many people don’t trust the Trump critics.
“When you’ve been engaging in propaganda for decades, at some point people are going to distrust everything you say.”
It seems like this ought to be self-correcting, but so far it isn’t. The corporate media have not changed their tactics. Those tactics are not as successful as they used to be, but where are the new competitors with different tactics? The internet is constantly coming up with evidence of their BS, but they keep dishing it.
I think it's because of the incentives of the individuals within the mainstream media. The whole industry would be better off if they were more honest, but each individual would ruin their career if they broke with the cult.
Think of the average White American's views on race. They accept behavior towards themselves which they would find utterly unacceptable if a white person behaved that way towards a black person. Even in conservative think tanks, people lower their voices when they say something is "anti-white".
The reason for this bizarre behavior is clearly that people are exposed to a massive amount of race issues propaganda in school and in TV/movies. The explanatory effect of propaganda in society is enormous.
This is a good point, and it makes me wonder if a major role of propaganda isn’t to change minds but to shift social norms. Propaganda may effectively label some positions as low status or suggest they will carry a penalty, discouraging people from expressing those views.
Best essay yet, Mike! (And there have been a lot of great ones.) I wonder if left-wing propaganda is making a difference, however, by keeping Trump’s popularity numbers relatively high despite his awful work on tariffs and deportations. Many people don’t trust the Trump critics.
“When you’ve been engaging in propaganda for decades, at some point people are going to distrust everything you say.”
It seems like this ought to be self-correcting, but so far it isn’t. The corporate media have not changed their tactics. Those tactics are not as successful as they used to be, but where are the new competitors with different tactics? The internet is constantly coming up with evidence of their BS, but they keep dishing it.
I think it's because of the incentives of the individuals within the mainstream media. The whole industry would be better off if they were more honest, but each individual would ruin their career if they broke with the cult.
You posted this at the perfect time; right before I argued with other law students about the difference in racial performance on standardized tests.
*explanatory role