Sahana Narayan: Week 10 - The Power of Propaganda
Sahana Narayan - Week 10: The Power of Propaganda – 2/2 [8:30 PM]
During World War I, Woodrow Wilson embarked on a huge mission to convince the country to support the war effort. It would be a challenge, since America had maintained a policy of isolationism up till then. But they were able to galvanize the American people using one extremely important tool: propaganda. Posters put up on all the streets, celebrities using their platform to promote the effort, music that glamorized the army. The US government put all of their effort into getting the American people on their side. Their efforts remind me of a very similar effort today: the Covid-19 vaccine.
Now, at first thought, it seems silly to compare something like a war and a pandemic. But, see, the comparison is in the propaganda that they both revolve around. Pop culture, media, and art are all used to encourage people to wear masks and to get the vaccine, same as they were used 100 years ago to encourage Americans to support the war. It begs the question: is propaganda inherently good or does it have negative implications?
It’s a largely general question. First, let’s look at the definition of propaganda. One definition that I really like is, “Propaganda is any act of human communication intended to impact the behavior of the target to suit the source’s objective.”
So when looking at the nazis or the cold war propaganda, it’s easy enough to say: “Yes, propaganda is bad.” But, is that answer different when looking at the Smokey Bear Campaign, the women's suffrage movement, or the covid 19 vaccine push? I think it is different, but that’s because I have a specific objective.
See, propaganda is a tool, a vessel for good or bad. What’s important is how we approach propaganda. Whether it’s for a cause we support or a cause we don’t support, I think it’s important to think critically about every single piece of information we come across, especially in this era of mass media and technology.
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ReplyDeleteHi Sahana! I never would have thought to compare the World War I war effort to the Covid Vaccine, so I don't think its silly at all, especially since both the world war and the pandemic affects people worldwide. I also really like how you used the word "tool" to describe propaganda as that is the perfect word for it. Propaganda is just a combination of many rhetorical, persuasive devices, and every rhetorical device could be used in a certain way to produce the same effect as propaganda. I think the analysis we have learned so far in APENG is very useful in helping us assess the information we encounter on a daily basis on the internet.
ReplyDeleteHi Sahana, I remember learning about WWI propaganda in APUSH last week. The thing is, there is no right answer behind whether or not propaganda is inherently bad. This is because it all comes down to the message that they are trying to deliver, and so some propaganda pushes good messages while other propaganda pushes bad messages. However, at the same time, we can judge the message that the propaganda is eliciting seperately from the actual concept of propaganda. The point of propaganda, as you said, is human communication meant to impact the behavior of the target audience. The actual concept of propaganda does not seem so bad to me.
ReplyDeleteHey Sahana, you make a good point in this blog post, as propaganda is not inherently bad, though in many cases it has been used to mislead and misdirect emotions and messages. Propaganda by definition is just biased information provided to promote a specific viewpoint or message, which is not inherently bad. For example, government-sponsored messages for getting the vaccine are propaganda, with a clear bias towards vaccination. However, this vaccine is concretely and directly beneficial to people, so promoting this bias is not actually wrong. The issue with propaganda, I think, starts with misleading or construing false or even malicious messages disguised as the "correct" message.
ReplyDeleteHi Sahana, I really liked your blog post, because it objectively discusses the implications of propaganda in our society. In school, we tend to focus a lot on the negative repercussions of propaganda, and how propaganda can be used to evilly manipulate people. We often examine Nazi propaganda that fostered anti-Semitic attitudes in Germany and led to the Holocaust. This has led to many people associating the word, “propaganda” with negativity and evil. However, propaganda is constantly used by all governments and many companies also use it. I really liked how you talked about propaganda being a tool rather than something that is inherently evil. Things like anti-smoking posters or posters urging people to continue wearing masks and taking safety precautions, are also pieces of propaganda that use logos, ethos, and pathos to convince their audience to do something. Yet, most of us would consider these posters to be ethical, but that is simply because we agree with the objective of the poster. As social media and mass communication continues to advance, we must be careful to recognize that propaganda and misinformation exists all around us. We should carefully consider the purpose of the propaganda piece in front of us, and use our own common sense to make a decision on whether or not to support the propaganda. Propaganda is definitely very powerful, and that can be both a good and a bad thing, depending on how carefully we consider the propaganda that we come across.
ReplyDeleteHi Sahana! Propaganda has definitely increasingly been one of the most useful resources and tools for properly publicizing in an efficient manner for any cause we are supporting. I find it extremely fascinating to think of how a simple sheet of paper that is put up on multiple walls could have such a large impact on the larger objective of what the source is intending. When evaluating the truthfulness and reliability of a person, such as a candidate or even a specific program that is being publicized, as you have mentioned, it is of extreme importance to think in terms of critically assessing all the information that comes into mass media and technology. The way in which the United States government encouraged practices such as wearing masks and getting the vaccine through the promotion of the isolation policy was done smartly through a massive propaganda publicizing unit. Thank you so much for your blog and I am looking forward to your next one!
ReplyDeleteHi Sahana! While I've typically seen propaganda as a negative influence because of the way it was presented in my history classes, your post was really eye-opening in explaining that this wasn't always the case. I suppose all of these "campaigns" used to promote inherently beneficial causes like reducing wildfires and getting vaccines are also ultimately propaganda. Perhaps the reason that the misconceptions about propaganda being bad are so common is because of its negative connotations and troubled history, like its use in Nazi Germany. While the concept of propaganda may not be morally wrong, I think the only way to determine if the use of it was justified will always require some hindsight.
ReplyDeleteHey Sahana! Propaganda is an extremely powerful tool that can be used in a multitude of situations. Whenever people hear the word, most of the time they immediately correlate it with bad. But under this definition a lot of PSAs and other services funded by the government would technically be considered propaganda. Most dictionaries do state that propaganda is generally biased or misleading. I wouldn’t call COVID PSAs particularly biased towards one political party or group. It’s a matter of health rather than an “opinion” that affects every single citizen equally and is not really something that can be argued upon as it’s backed scientifically. More political issues do bring a specific bias into account. What I see as biased and misleading is information people put online to steer people away from getting vaccinated or taking precautions against COVID. This is definitely harmful and disproven by most trustable sources, so I would certainly call this a form of propaganda. Speaking of posting, I see a lot of similar content to what we could call propaganda online. The internet and social media facilitates the spread of it and I wonder how this would change as we move forward.
ReplyDeleteThe word propaganda often has highly negative connotations, from Nazi Germany's posters to the astounding amount of enlistment posters during the bloodiest conflicts of all time. However, it is more innocent then that. Many things can be considered propaganda, and Woodrow Wilson's campaign for the First World War was one propaganda campaign that could be considered a limited success. The COVID-19 propaganda campaign is also only a limited success in how there are still millions unvaccinated and how most people outside of California look at you funny if you have a face mask on. However, there are successes. FDR's propaganda machine was at full work during World War II, and it got him elected to four terms of the presidency. Propaganda can either fail or succeed, but it is not something bad.
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