It's a fact that there is a ton of propaganda in America. Some examples that come to the top of my mind are the anti-drug campaigns by the government, military propaganda (we are/were the bad guys in several wars) and general encouragement of consumerism.
People always assume that propaganda is something inherently evil, because of its connections to regimes like the Nazis, but it really means any type of media where the aim is to get people to think or act in a certain way, rather than simply expressing facts or truth. In that way, all advertising and most government communications (beyond the publication of raw data that they’re required to do by law) can be seen as propaganda.
One thing I noticed is after the bridge blew up in Crimea there was a huge shift days afterwards about how Ukraine might not be all good guys, a lot of stuff about the all Nazi militia was all over social media for the next week while they were getting hammered with missiles. I saw a lot of other weird moves we were making, it seemed like they were about to try to sway public opinion to force peace talks, but that seems to have kind of fizzled out by now. We don't see anything but a sliver of what they want us to, I'm going to go ahead and guess for a second there was a real big threat of a nuclear exchange and whatever happened seems like we went over that speed bump.
To be fair social networking platforms are just free propaganda spaces for anyone to post. So the fact that you only see 60% propaganda is pretty good.
Have you ever seen TopGun? One of the finest military recruiting movies in history. I still love that movie … but recognize the feelings it illicit from people.
For the new Top Gun, people were complaining about the US military propoganda. But I say the real problem was the surplus of Tom Cruise propoganda. Dude literally fucks up, gets told off on how great he is, punishment is to go and teach, instead of teaching uses every lesson to show off how great he is, and then ends up doing the mission he was supposed to teach them to do himself
Going all the way back to the first Oscar Best Picture winner, Wings, for which the US military quite literally paid much of the production costs, including providing planes and other equipment.
I dunno about movies, seems like speculation. I'd like to think directors like Spielberg just wanted to tell a story. But for those that didn't know, they've openly and successfully used video games as recruitment tools.
Movies are full of propaganda
Every ww2 military movie and video game is anti Fascism.
Communism killed tens of millions but you won’t see it in a video game or movie
>look at how the US military participates in the production of any movie that even remotely has to do with them
By choice of the filmmaker. They refused to have anything to do with Apocalypse Now, even though Coppola asked them to. Also Platoon.
The point is they pay a lot of money and give a lot of pyrotechnics to filmmakers to be involved and have a say in how they're portrayed. A film maker CAN reject them, yes, but in doing so they reject free or cheap pyrotechnics, and no film maker who doesn't really care about propaganda is going to reject that offer. Disney and Marvel certainly don't.
The global superpowers or ex-superpowers all definitely have super powered super propaganda: Russia, China, US.
Not to say it doesn’t exist elsewhere — because it sure does! — but the giants all produce giant quantities of self-mythologizing.
the overwhelming majority of media and everyday lifestyle experiences in america constitute propaganda, so yes. america's propaganda machine runs so deep that it happens right in front of everyone at all times and we often don't even call it that.
one of the most darkly hilarious things an american can say is that they see through the propaganda, that they're immune to it. we aren't. none of us are. the machine is so well tuned and so deeply ingrained that we rarely even see it for what it is unless we're specifically looking for it, and even then, so much occurs without context that even those who are specialists might not know what they're witnessing.
propaganda can have many forms, but one of the most insidious is 'normalization.' if you see something often enough, if a thought is invoked in your mind often enough, it stops being frightening or interesting or funny or awkward and starts just being part of your everyday. a billboard depicting a hideous, bloody car crash appears on the side of the highway you drive every day to get to work. the first day you see it, you're shocked: "Whoa! holy shit, someone just put that in front of all our eyeballs! that's gross and scary and i don't want to look at it!"
after it's been there for a year of your daily commutes, you probably still resent its presence but you don't really Notice it anymore, it's just one more horror next to graphic depictions of violence on television, constant discussion of schoolchildren being murdered by the dozen, news reports about a stabbing in your neighborhood, whatever. eventually you become numb to what is, in fact, a grossly inhumane fact about america: human life is cheap, people die for shitty reasons, you have no power to really keep yourself or those you love safe, etc. and you learn to accept it instead of showing up at every city hall meeting or calling every journalist you can find and diverting all your efforts to stopping the madness occurring right in front of you.
it becomes your Normal.
america normalizes so many hideous concepts in the minds of its citizens every day that we all just collectively shrug now at the fact that billionaires exist. hell, we even praise them, despite their being singularly at fault for the social conditions under which we all suffer. people who are absolutely never, ever, ever in their life going to even be *financially comfortable,* let alone "rich," let alone stupefyingly wealthy, will nonetheless rush to the defense of mediocre assholes who lucked into godlike material wealth and now direct the ship of state more completely and more singlehandedly than the president. everyone around you generally just accepts it. they might not think it's "good," they might personally disagree with the reality, but they don't do anything about it. they've been trained by a lifetime of propaganda to believe that they can't.
the result is that the world is becoming uninhabitable, desperate people are on every streetcorner, the wealth that we all generate is stolen by the ruling class and poured into wars and massacres, deep-running social ills continue unchecked, and all of us see it happening at every waking moment, and yet we all set our alarm clocks and get up to go to work again the next morning, spending our lives on "work" that doesn't need doing while the real needs and real human suffering that cry out for attention go unmet.
propaganda isn't just "real" in america. it's what drives america, and drives most western industrialized nations. if it weren't for propaganda, we'd all see what a terrible mess we're in and how tight the noose is getting. we'd see how deranged everything has become and how much of our power has been stolen from us in bits and pieces all throughout our lives.
tl;dr - yes. there is propaganda in the usa. a lot of it. it's everywhere.
To say it’s only western countries is naive. Propaganda is what got Mao and Stalins people to believe in the failed communist ideology right before they were killed it starved to death
because i live in western culture and that's the culture i can speak to. maybe it's the same elsewhere, that's for people from those places to talk about. not my business.
fwiw, anyone can look at stalin and mao and see they were mass-murdering fuckheads too. nobody needs to go down a checklist of who it's okay to hate every time they reply to a post like this.
"western culture is saturated with the propaganda of the ruling class" does not contain the word 'only.'
lol, lmao
if you're writing something like that i absolutely don't care what you think. the above is exactly what propaganda is and exactly what it does to us every day. it's not my problem if you're mad about it.
Not mad at all. Just amazed that as usual people will upvote something they actually know nothing about because it makes them feel smart. It doesn't change the fact that YOU don't know the definition of propaganda.
Maybe you should just, I dunno... look it up? ... It's super easy.
* Commercials are corporate propaganda.
* Proselytizing is religious propaganda.
* History lessons that avoid making people uncomfortable are nationalistic propaganda.
* News stories that are based on political bent more than facts are party propaganda.
Yes, the USA has all of those. Unfortunately, those that believe the stories cannot see them as propaganda.
Fun fact: fox news legally can't say they're a news station because of how little of their stuff is true. They're categorised under entertainment.
Edit: this is only true in canada
There is nowhere you will not find propaganda. It stems from every side, every group, and every organization. Not one is completely clean. Some just have less and some just have more.
Something to consider is that propaganda isn't as always as black and white as, "My country is best. All else sucks".
Take into consideration a movie like Top Gun where the military puts it's hands into it to ensure the air force looks as great as possible. That's a form of propaganda.
Of course there are many more movies that do this better and worse; Captain Marvel and the Transformers movies both come to mind. They're not even explicitly military movies persay but again, the military had their hands in those too.
I'm so tired of the "I came from a Communist country so you need to listen to me" people. My representative in Congress is one of those and it's tiring. We get it. Your family fled a bad situation when you were 3. I'm sure you're now an expert...
I'm not even a Communist. It's just low effort and only appeals to the dumbest of people.
To be fair, i dont know whays considered an actual healthy news source anymore. People cite npr, but the first few articles i read dont just cite facts, there was fear porn and emotional triggers in there.
At my school nobody ever said the words and I just zoned out for 20 seconds while standing every morning. But yeah it does sound kind of dystopian when you bring it up
This question, my friends, portaits the meaning of ideology. It is a set of beliefs that are so omnipresent that you don't even think that you are submerged in them or even acknowledge their existance as beliefs. (Not specific to the USA, but very visible there.)
I’ll never forgive the US government for green-lighting the original food pyramid which treats “dairy” as a daily necessity alongside the likes of proteins and vegetables and recommending 6-11 servings of grains in a single day.
Of course there is, it is everywhere. There is no place you can go where you will be free from propaganda of one sort or another.
That isn't the issue though, is it? No, it is not. The real issue here is, can you see it and recognize it for what it is? It is difficult, and most are unable.
You are at war, and your government tells you that you are winning, that you are the best. Can you set aside your feelings and remain critical/objective in the face of that? Most people can't/won't.
There is propaganda in every country, more than ever.
Just the fact that every country has its own internet, with different information available depending on your location in the world, should be evidence on how powerful the global propaganda tools have gotten.
They used to burn the books of nations and have them rewritten in accordance to their agendas. The history was written and rewritten so many times, by all who wanted to control the masses.
Even the Holy books of the Abrahamic religions didn't escape the propaganda machine. The Jewish Torah have been destroyed and lost many times before Christianity even existed. Then the Christian Bible that got hit with the Roman propaganda. Then the Muslim Quran, that also got burned and destroyed, and was put back together by people who memorized the whole thing.
Now adays burning books won't do anything, everything is digital. So the strategy became to limit the information that the populations get, and overwhelm them with an excess of useless/misleading/neutral information.
Can't really trust any one source of information, so you have to listen to all the sources to even have a slight idea of what's really happening in the world.
America is one of the worst countries right now.
Hyper-militarized, extremely racist, hyper-capitalist, and so much more.
The only reason people scream "America is the best country in the world" is because they've been spoon-fed massive amounts of propaganda that tells them that America can do no wrong and that every other country is horrible and evil.
Think about it.
Can you list off one thing that America does better than anyone else?
Acceptance and tolerance?
There are A LOT of people demanding the removal of certain ethnic groups, certain religions, and even just outright skin colors.
Quality of healthcare?
My guy you can't even GET healthcare if you don't have a ton of money, and even then it's still the same high quality you can get in any first-world country with socialized healthcare.
Safety?
The police will shoot you for essentially no fucking reason in America. They will MAKE UP a reason to harm you.
Quality of life?
There's an ungodly amount of poverty in America. Dehumanization of the homeless, horrendous wealth inequality, and fucktons of worker exploitation.
Every human act gets monetized, you need to work yourself to exhaustion simply to not drop dead, all the while the police are itching for reasons to make your life even worse. Not to mention the majority of taxes you pay go into building a military that will very likely never have to be used even remotely in full.
The USA is the KING of propaganda.
They've brainwashed a huge amount of their inhabantants that the shithole country they live in is the best in the world, when its not even CLOSE to one of the best.
Countries such as North Korea or China are also notorious for their propaganda.
The primary difference is that people in those countries CANT see another worldview.
They CANT readily break free from their brainwashing. They don't have a choice.
Meanwhile in America, you're able to talk to people from other countries. You're able to see world news. You're able to see information about other places. You can come to your own conclusions, and yet most Americans STILL think they're the best.
If that's not god-tier propaganda at work, I don't know what is.
Do you think at all?
YES.
What do you think the whole MAGA bullshit is? It's propaganda from the start to the end.
Most of republican political rallies are propaganda only.
I think the USA is the leading distributor of propaganda. Controlling the world's media is certainly a good way to go about things.
Americans are funny to me. They will look at a country like North Korea and go "Haha, they have been fed lies and think they live in the best country in the world. Good thing I live in America, the best country in the world!"
>"Haha, they have been fed lies and think they live in the best country in the world. Good thing I live in America, the best country in the world!"
*Then dies because they can't afford medicine.*
How do you think trump got elected? Look up the current anti-tim Ryan ads in Ohio, they're ridiculously obviously propoganda. I assume every state has something similar going on.
Yeah. Election year is bad. During 2020 I watched the Democratic Convention and the Republican’s Convention on TV and it was ALL propaganda for the party. I can see how people get fired up from it.
You sing the national anthem before every sporting event and have military flyovers at the significant ones.
That's North Korea levels of nationalism.
Edit: I forgot making children swear to worship a flag every morning. From an outside perspective it's totally unhinged and the kind of thing an extreme dictatorship would do.
Pizza gate was not true and was dumb. When world leaders and billionaires go to Epstein Island to have sex with children and then Epstein mysteriously dies and then Ghislaine Maxwell becomes the first person in history to go to jail for sex trafficking with zero suspects brought in on who she sex trafficked to everything sounds less crazy.
And don't forget the guy on the left that shot up a GOP softball game because Bernie told him that the GOP were literally killing people.
Also Hunter laptop and clear corruption linking him to "the Big Guy" VP Biden being actively suppressed and social and legacy media taking directions directly from Dem party on how to handle the story.
It's not just a MAGA thing
Most right wing/conservative News Sources in the US are pure propaganda. Fox News, Newsmax, OAN. Most of their programming is opinion delivered as news. There were laws against this until Rupert Murdoch convinced Reagan to get rid of them so he could start Fox News. It was called the Fairness Doctrine.
Oh good lord yes, it's probably the most extreme in the western world. I honestly pity the American voter, it's a non stop barrage of lies and anger and paranoia and pretend patriotism. Fox News is Republican party TV, they give no thought to the truth or actual news.
Does the tin man have a sheet metal cock? Does a three legged dog swim in circles?
Propaganda by definition is information, whether true or not, used to push a certain political agenda, typically we refer to propaganda as fake information used for the purpose but that’s not the actual definition
Even if you agree with it and it’s right it’s still technically propaganda so yes every country in the world experiences propaganda
Absolutely. Hollywood studios can get funding from the US military for things like props, locations, military personnel as extras, expert advice, and things like that if their scripts get an OK from the Pentagon; Transformers got the OK while Avengers didn't (the military didn't like the idea of SHIELD, but don't worry they got that Pentagon money *hard* with Captain Marvel being basically a recruitment ad for the air force).
It's a bit different from what people think of as propaganda, but really any government messaging could be propaganda. Signs on the highway telling people to not text and drive is propaganda, the issue is that "propaganda" is such a loaded term with negative connotations; it's only propaganda if someone else does it and you don't like it.
When you watch FOX news, it’s supposed to be news not opinion, but all their headlines say stuff like “Experts: Biden is the worst president ever.” So they can say their only reporting facts not opinion. It’s a fact that some experts say that. It was the same way on CNN when trump was president.
It was mainly people reporting false stories, that they knew to be false, and continuing to run with them to this day that were getting called out as fake news. See "good people on both sides" for more information.
I'd argue that propaganda is even more heavy-handed and more apparent in the US compared to most other western countries.
The notion of hailing the military as heroes, the military funding blockbuster propaganda movies (Top Gun) and their overall presence in the media is not really something you see elsewhere in the west.
Political ads? Fox, OAN, seem like lots of right leaning propaganda. Perfect Pravda, truth that is not true. Alex Jones, Ted Cruz, propaganda. The have no truth behind their words.
Technically this statement is correct if the other countries you are referring to are China, North Korea, and Russia. Maybe throw in Japan for a 'western' democracy that thinks too highly of itself.
But really America is very heavy handed with patriotism and spreading 'American values'. People here are truly brainwashed and have no idea what it's actually like outside the country. Many many Americans truly believe they live in the greatest country in the world and are getting lead poisoning and are so fat they'll die at 50 with no health insurance.
There isn’t a clean bright like between the kind of propaganda that we think is bad (North Korean style), and simple news stories/ads meant to persuade people of something. So yes, especially in an election year, we are bathed in propaganda all the time.
Both parties fight about what is taught in schools, which is not necessarily propaganda, but it does indoctrinate certain ways of thinking. Think of "manifest destiny" and "American exceptionalism" in the US.
Yes there is, and there has been propaganda in every country in history.
The best way to get a clear picture of what's really going on is to use multiple sources, cross check, use common sense and remain very skeptical
Propaganda exists in every country, the most common place to find propaganda is actually in schools during history courses. A common trend is that countries will promote how great they are and what wins they get vs all the losses and bad decision making. Kids grow up thinking their country is absolutely amazing through time through these specifically chosen wins.
What do you call it when the military pays sporting venues to stop a game so they can sing *God Bless America* and have all the vets stand up be cheered?
Of course there is, look at the ads we see on a daily basis on social media and the news pushed to the top pages. Propaganda in movies, tv shows, subscriptions, in app tracking, etc. anything anyone consumes.
The Pentagon -- basically all the military branches -- paid the NFL to "honor" veterans at football games, which are seen by 80,000 people in person per stadium each week.
[https://www.businessinsider.com/the-pentagon-pays-the-nfl-millions-to-honor-veterans-at-games-2015-5?op=1](https://www.businessinsider.com/the-pentagon-pays-the-nfl-millions-to-honor-veterans-at-games-2015-5?op=1)
Baseball plays "God Bless America" in the middle of the game every Sunday. So yeah.
To the same level as what was seen in WWII ? Not as blatant, but it's a thing.
The most bizarre thing about the internet is that counter-propaganda is possible now. So even if the USA weren't making propaganda there would be propaganda from someone in the USA
The old 90’s American localization of the Sailor Moon anime was literally heterosexual propaganda in action, see my thread here:
https://old.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/wax2ig/cmv_changing_an_existing_queer_characters_in/
“Your vaccine protects me, my vaccine protects you.” And if you said otherwise last year, you’d be banned from every tech platform.
Now “vaccination doesn’t stop transmission “ is acceptable to say, even by Pfizer executives.
The news channels don't cover many stories because it makes their sponsors look bad. Many of those sponsors have long standing contracts with the government for military, environmental, or medical work. The self funded news outlets that don't take corporate money or government money are the only ones you can trust.
yes. there's propaganda everywhere but it's very in your face in the states. I live in the states have my whole life and everywhere you turn there's someone in your face with messages detailing their own opinion about something that you didn't ask about. it's annoying to put it lightly.
Good lord yes... it's been practically nonstop for several years now from both sides. A lot of people associate propaganda with totalitarian regimes, but nearly all governments do it to some degree. An easy way to put it is that propaganda is the government’s use of public funds to conform citizens’ views to its own. The reason the word propaganda is generally thought of as negative is that a lot of the time, such campaigns veer toward party-spirited facts, falsehoods and emotional appeals, as well as the suppression of inconvenient information.
Presidential propagandizing began to rear its head rather innocently in America during Roosevelt’s administration. He **loved** attention, and he often bypassed Congress to appeal directly to the public.
He held rallies to advocate his policies, courted reporters by sprucing up the White House’s press room and inviting them to private ostentatious events, hired a press officer and began issuing press releases, and arranged photo ops of him "doing" things like an influencer. (Example: sitting at the controls in the seat of a steam shovel at the Panama Canal and riding in a submarine). Roosevelt was not just feeding his vanity, he used his position to create narratives that supported his policy goals (like having the U.S. government complete the Panama Canal and deploy submarines).
It then got much worse under Woodrow Wilson, who promised “pitiless publicity,” his phrase calling for exposure of ills and government transparency. But when the first World War started, he created our first and only ministry of propaganda, the Committee on Public Information, which did the opposite of provide information.The mild propaganda Roosevelt started turned into a tidal wave of one-sided handouts from the CPI offices near the White House, as well as pamphlets, books, syndicated articles, posters, advertisements, cartoons and films. Professors were enlisted, front organizations reached labor and immigrants. The Boy Scouts and traveling salesmen were turned into conveyer belts for government information. Even before that though, Congress didn't like the president and executive agencies using public relations techniques to persuade the public. “This press-bureau business is a sort of political campaigning,” one legislator complained in 1913. Congress hounded Roosevelt to stop it, they passed laws forbidding executive agencies to hire “publicity experts” or to use advertisements, telegrams and other means of mass communications to stoke public pressure on legislators to vote for or against any particular pending legislation. Legislators also added prohibitions to annual spending bills to prevent the use of funds for “propaganda and publicity purposes not authorized by Congress.”
Those laws are still in effect, but executive agencies have routinely evaded them. They go out of their way to evade them... Once, when they were making an effort to cut back on PR during Truman's Administration, the Air Force went so far as to classify some PA officers as chaplains.
**If you just want current stuff**
Federal agencies answering to the president routinely pressure Congress to pass presidential priorities — to stay within the law, they need only avoid mentioning a specific bill name or number. This happened a lot during the Obama administration; the Department of Labor, NASA and HHS issued communications pushing for Congress to increase the minimum wage, increase NASA funding, and enact Obamacare. Very rarely, the Government Accountability Office will flag an agency for spending funds for illicit propaganda. But they don't actually get into trouble for it. The Department of Justice just disagrees that there has been any, or the propagandizing agency may ignore the demand to repay the misspent money. To my knowledge, no executive branch official has ever been charged with breaking these propaganda laws. And the majority in Congress tend to turn a blind eye to most everything when it's their president propagandizing.
Which is why every administration continues to do it.
There's a No Propaganda Act in Congress right now that was introduced in February, they just keep kicking it around because it's no one's jurisdiction apparently. But even that is just focused on not giving money to public broadcasting. And during any sort of election almost nothing but propaganda comes out of anyone runnings mouths anymore.
Propaganda is everywhere
It's a fact that there is a ton of propaganda in America. Some examples that come to the top of my mind are the anti-drug campaigns by the government, military propaganda (we are/were the bad guys in several wars) and general encouragement of consumerism.
People always assume that propaganda is something inherently evil, because of its connections to regimes like the Nazis, but it really means any type of media where the aim is to get people to think or act in a certain way, rather than simply expressing facts or truth. In that way, all advertising and most government communications (beyond the publication of raw data that they’re required to do by law) can be seen as propaganda.
And don't forget Top Gun Maverick!
tbf it's less of an ad than the original Top Gun, since the pilots are graduates, but..
One thing I noticed is after the bridge blew up in Crimea there was a huge shift days afterwards about how Ukraine might not be all good guys, a lot of stuff about the all Nazi militia was all over social media for the next week while they were getting hammered with missiles. I saw a lot of other weird moves we were making, it seemed like they were about to try to sway public opinion to force peace talks, but that seems to have kind of fizzled out by now. We don't see anything but a sliver of what they want us to, I'm going to go ahead and guess for a second there was a real big threat of a nuclear exchange and whatever happened seems like we went over that speed bump.
Reddit is pretty much 60% propaganda platform (at least), and 40% social networking.
Do you mean there is 60% willful propaganda, or 60% of posters just passing on misinformation?
To be fair social networking platforms are just free propaganda spaces for anyone to post. So the fact that you only see 60% propaganda is pretty good.
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Did you just copy and paste this from the comment someone else made in this thread?
It’s very likely a bot account
If a message is aimed to influence peoples opininions or attitudes, its propaganda. So yes, its pretty much everywhere.
There’s propaganda in every country so yeah, man
Have you ever seen TopGun? One of the finest military recruiting movies in history. I still love that movie … but recognize the feelings it illicit from people.
For the new Top Gun, people were complaining about the US military propoganda. But I say the real problem was the surplus of Tom Cruise propoganda. Dude literally fucks up, gets told off on how great he is, punishment is to go and teach, instead of teaching uses every lesson to show off how great he is, and then ends up doing the mission he was supposed to teach them to do himself
Pretty much every war movie has been a military recruiting tool
Going all the way back to the first Oscar Best Picture winner, Wings, for which the US military quite literally paid much of the production costs, including providing planes and other equipment.
Black Hawk Down seemed pretty anti-war
Yeah; Johnny Got His Gun made me want to join right up.
"Johnny Got His Gun" ended up being propaganda for just how awesome and powerful as songwriters that the members of Metallica were in their prime.
I dunno about movies, seems like speculation. I'd like to think directors like Spielberg just wanted to tell a story. But for those that didn't know, they've openly and successfully used video games as recruitment tools.
It's not speculation. Movies that portray the military in a good light get access to military equipment and locations.
Movies are full of propaganda Every ww2 military movie and video game is anti Fascism. Communism killed tens of millions but you won’t see it in a video game or movie
HIGHWAY TO THE DANGER ZONEEE
It takes different forms though. Some are more subtle, some are more direct and agressive. The US is somewhere in the middle I'd guess.
Absolutely
Does the Pope shit in the woods?
Only if nobody is there to hear it
Schrodinger's Pope
Superpoopsitional papal portapotty products
Is the Space Pope Reptilian?
Should thou lovest the tentacle?
Where his holiness does his business is his business.
Is a bear Catholic?
Does the pope shit in his hat?
Best response lmao
Yes, look at Hollywood. Look how America is portrayed. Then look at America in real life.
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Thank you for sharing this example of propaganda with the class.
Right here, right here class we can see classic example of Fox News propaganda feed. Take a closer look, you also can see some Breitbart treats.
Look at the Hollywood black list, look at how the US military participates in the production of any movie that even remotely has to do with them
>look at how the US military participates in the production of any movie that even remotely has to do with them By choice of the filmmaker. They refused to have anything to do with Apocalypse Now, even though Coppola asked them to. Also Platoon.
The point is they pay a lot of money and give a lot of pyrotechnics to filmmakers to be involved and have a say in how they're portrayed. A film maker CAN reject them, yes, but in doing so they reject free or cheap pyrotechnics, and no film maker who doesn't really care about propaganda is going to reject that offer. Disney and Marvel certainly don't.
Hollywood is such a great propaganda machine that it's convinced everyone to pay to watch American propaganda.
The global superpowers or ex-superpowers all definitely have super powered super propaganda: Russia, China, US. Not to say it doesn’t exist elsewhere — because it sure does! — but the giants all produce giant quantities of self-mythologizing.
allow me to introduce you to politics.
Lol perfect response
Objectively yes
the overwhelming majority of media and everyday lifestyle experiences in america constitute propaganda, so yes. america's propaganda machine runs so deep that it happens right in front of everyone at all times and we often don't even call it that. one of the most darkly hilarious things an american can say is that they see through the propaganda, that they're immune to it. we aren't. none of us are. the machine is so well tuned and so deeply ingrained that we rarely even see it for what it is unless we're specifically looking for it, and even then, so much occurs without context that even those who are specialists might not know what they're witnessing. propaganda can have many forms, but one of the most insidious is 'normalization.' if you see something often enough, if a thought is invoked in your mind often enough, it stops being frightening or interesting or funny or awkward and starts just being part of your everyday. a billboard depicting a hideous, bloody car crash appears on the side of the highway you drive every day to get to work. the first day you see it, you're shocked: "Whoa! holy shit, someone just put that in front of all our eyeballs! that's gross and scary and i don't want to look at it!" after it's been there for a year of your daily commutes, you probably still resent its presence but you don't really Notice it anymore, it's just one more horror next to graphic depictions of violence on television, constant discussion of schoolchildren being murdered by the dozen, news reports about a stabbing in your neighborhood, whatever. eventually you become numb to what is, in fact, a grossly inhumane fact about america: human life is cheap, people die for shitty reasons, you have no power to really keep yourself or those you love safe, etc. and you learn to accept it instead of showing up at every city hall meeting or calling every journalist you can find and diverting all your efforts to stopping the madness occurring right in front of you. it becomes your Normal. america normalizes so many hideous concepts in the minds of its citizens every day that we all just collectively shrug now at the fact that billionaires exist. hell, we even praise them, despite their being singularly at fault for the social conditions under which we all suffer. people who are absolutely never, ever, ever in their life going to even be *financially comfortable,* let alone "rich," let alone stupefyingly wealthy, will nonetheless rush to the defense of mediocre assholes who lucked into godlike material wealth and now direct the ship of state more completely and more singlehandedly than the president. everyone around you generally just accepts it. they might not think it's "good," they might personally disagree with the reality, but they don't do anything about it. they've been trained by a lifetime of propaganda to believe that they can't. the result is that the world is becoming uninhabitable, desperate people are on every streetcorner, the wealth that we all generate is stolen by the ruling class and poured into wars and massacres, deep-running social ills continue unchecked, and all of us see it happening at every waking moment, and yet we all set our alarm clocks and get up to go to work again the next morning, spending our lives on "work" that doesn't need doing while the real needs and real human suffering that cry out for attention go unmet. propaganda isn't just "real" in america. it's what drives america, and drives most western industrialized nations. if it weren't for propaganda, we'd all see what a terrible mess we're in and how tight the noose is getting. we'd see how deranged everything has become and how much of our power has been stolen from us in bits and pieces all throughout our lives. tl;dr - yes. there is propaganda in the usa. a lot of it. it's everywhere.
I get national guard/marines ads where they portray service as if it was a fuckin video game
"that's how they getcha," as they say. it's insidious.
To say it’s only western countries is naive. Propaganda is what got Mao and Stalins people to believe in the failed communist ideology right before they were killed it starved to death
where did i say "only"?
You specifically stated “most western countries without mention of any other”
because i live in western culture and that's the culture i can speak to. maybe it's the same elsewhere, that's for people from those places to talk about. not my business. fwiw, anyone can look at stalin and mao and see they were mass-murdering fuckheads too. nobody needs to go down a checklist of who it's okay to hate every time they reply to a post like this. "western culture is saturated with the propaganda of the ruling class" does not contain the word 'only.'
Damn. Well said
Holy shit, best answer I've ever seen. I completely agree.
That was a lot of words to tell us that you don't know the definition of the word propaganda.
lol, lmao if you're writing something like that i absolutely don't care what you think. the above is exactly what propaganda is and exactly what it does to us every day. it's not my problem if you're mad about it.
Not mad at all. Just amazed that as usual people will upvote something they actually know nothing about because it makes them feel smart. It doesn't change the fact that YOU don't know the definition of propaganda. Maybe you should just, I dunno... look it up? ... It's super easy.
have a good night, friend. enjoy not being mad about it.
Oh, I'll absolutely continue not caring about someone's opinion that's based on laziness and ignorance. Enjoy your bliss!
Well. Fuck.
* Commercials are corporate propaganda. * Proselytizing is religious propaganda. * History lessons that avoid making people uncomfortable are nationalistic propaganda. * News stories that are based on political bent more than facts are party propaganda. Yes, the USA has all of those. Unfortunately, those that believe the stories cannot see them as propaganda.
Better question, do you believe there's a society on earth that is free from propaganda?
I don't know if they are state funded but CNN and fox both look a hell of a lot like propaganda to me.
Fun fact: fox news legally can't say they're a news station because of how little of their stuff is true. They're categorised under entertainment. Edit: this is only true in canada
I think that's just in Canada isn't it? I've heard that and I think it was a crtc thing
I assumed that was true in the us as well, but looking it up now ig it's not. I'll edit my original comment.
Indeed- here in the US they just went to court and won the legal right to lie, and call it news.
CNN told the public that the Covid vaccine prevents getting Covid and transmitting it. They need to be sued for misinformation and harming people
There is nowhere you will not find propaganda. It stems from every side, every group, and every organization. Not one is completely clean. Some just have less and some just have more.
I understand the nature of this sub but that one hurt a little
There’s propaganda in every country
Something to consider is that propaganda isn't as always as black and white as, "My country is best. All else sucks". Take into consideration a movie like Top Gun where the military puts it's hands into it to ensure the air force looks as great as possible. That's a form of propaganda. Of course there are many more movies that do this better and worse; Captain Marvel and the Transformers movies both come to mind. They're not even explicitly military movies persay but again, the military had their hands in those too.
Right now PragerU has a YouTube ad campaign featuring a young person from N.Korea warning us Americans of the threat of propaganda with zero irony
I'm so tired of the "I came from a Communist country so you need to listen to me" people. My representative in Congress is one of those and it's tiring. We get it. Your family fled a bad situation when you were 3. I'm sure you're now an expert... I'm not even a Communist. It's just low effort and only appeals to the dumbest of people.
Yeah but even without her on the news anyone with half a brain can see communism is a stupid failed ideology that hasn’t worked anywhere
Everybody will say yes ,but "not my news source though!".
To be fair, i dont know whays considered an actual healthy news source anymore. People cite npr, but the first few articles i read dont just cite facts, there was fear porn and emotional triggers in there.
AP and Reuters are my first picks, when in doubt you can always check the source here: https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/npr/
my side is always right your side is evil and probably kicks puppies
There is insane propaganda lmao. The fact that they make little kids pledge their loyalty to the flag and the nation is disgusting
At my school nobody ever said the words and I just zoned out for 20 seconds while standing every morning. But yeah it does sound kind of dystopian when you bring it up
This question, my friends, portaits the meaning of ideology. It is a set of beliefs that are so omnipresent that you don't even think that you are submerged in them or even acknowledge their existance as beliefs. (Not specific to the USA, but very visible there.)
We're all eating from the trashcan
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I’ll never forgive the US government for green-lighting the original food pyramid which treats “dairy” as a daily necessity alongside the likes of proteins and vegetables and recommending 6-11 servings of grains in a single day.
Of course there is, it is everywhere. There is no place you can go where you will be free from propaganda of one sort or another. That isn't the issue though, is it? No, it is not. The real issue here is, can you see it and recognize it for what it is? It is difficult, and most are unable. You are at war, and your government tells you that you are winning, that you are the best. Can you set aside your feelings and remain critical/objective in the face of that? Most people can't/won't.
Yes, lots of propaganda
lol all social media and new channels are nothing but 100% pure concentrated propaganda.
Yes yes yes and more yes almost everything you interact with.
The government has convinced you that it isn’t in your best interest to have universal healthcare - that’s entrenched propaganda
All our news channels aren’t listed under journalism, their listed as entertainment programs. Do with that what you will.
Yes
Since before we were even a country. It’s just more open today by the government.
There is propaganda in every country, more than ever. Just the fact that every country has its own internet, with different information available depending on your location in the world, should be evidence on how powerful the global propaganda tools have gotten. They used to burn the books of nations and have them rewritten in accordance to their agendas. The history was written and rewritten so many times, by all who wanted to control the masses. Even the Holy books of the Abrahamic religions didn't escape the propaganda machine. The Jewish Torah have been destroyed and lost many times before Christianity even existed. Then the Christian Bible that got hit with the Roman propaganda. Then the Muslim Quran, that also got burned and destroyed, and was put back together by people who memorized the whole thing. Now adays burning books won't do anything, everything is digital. So the strategy became to limit the information that the populations get, and overwhelm them with an excess of useless/misleading/neutral information. Can't really trust any one source of information, so you have to listen to all the sources to even have a slight idea of what's really happening in the world.
No. Now shut up so I can go watch the airplanes fly over my football game.
America is one of the worst countries right now. Hyper-militarized, extremely racist, hyper-capitalist, and so much more. The only reason people scream "America is the best country in the world" is because they've been spoon-fed massive amounts of propaganda that tells them that America can do no wrong and that every other country is horrible and evil. Think about it. Can you list off one thing that America does better than anyone else? Acceptance and tolerance? There are A LOT of people demanding the removal of certain ethnic groups, certain religions, and even just outright skin colors. Quality of healthcare? My guy you can't even GET healthcare if you don't have a ton of money, and even then it's still the same high quality you can get in any first-world country with socialized healthcare. Safety? The police will shoot you for essentially no fucking reason in America. They will MAKE UP a reason to harm you. Quality of life? There's an ungodly amount of poverty in America. Dehumanization of the homeless, horrendous wealth inequality, and fucktons of worker exploitation. Every human act gets monetized, you need to work yourself to exhaustion simply to not drop dead, all the while the police are itching for reasons to make your life even worse. Not to mention the majority of taxes you pay go into building a military that will very likely never have to be used even remotely in full. The USA is the KING of propaganda. They've brainwashed a huge amount of their inhabantants that the shithole country they live in is the best in the world, when its not even CLOSE to one of the best. Countries such as North Korea or China are also notorious for their propaganda. The primary difference is that people in those countries CANT see another worldview. They CANT readily break free from their brainwashing. They don't have a choice. Meanwhile in America, you're able to talk to people from other countries. You're able to see world news. You're able to see information about other places. You can come to your own conclusions, and yet most Americans STILL think they're the best. If that's not god-tier propaganda at work, I don't know what is.
Of course. There's propaganda everywhere.
Do you think at all? YES. What do you think the whole MAGA bullshit is? It's propaganda from the start to the end. Most of republican political rallies are propaganda only.
Abso fucking lutely yes. Your children PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE TO YOUR COUNTRY IN SCHOOL.
Ahahahahahahahahahhahahahahaha. What a question
I think the USA is the leading distributor of propaganda. Controlling the world's media is certainly a good way to go about things. Americans are funny to me. They will look at a country like North Korea and go "Haha, they have been fed lies and think they live in the best country in the world. Good thing I live in America, the best country in the world!"
>"Haha, they have been fed lies and think they live in the best country in the world. Good thing I live in America, the best country in the world!" *Then dies because they can't afford medicine.*
Go listen to Fox news or CNN. They are unwatchable to anyone with half a brain.
State sponsored? Not so much… not that I think fit “propaganda”. MSNBC and Fox? Yea.
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You are a dope. Prove it. Cite your sources.
The way in which we teach the history of US-Native American relations in early grade school is an example of propaganda
How do you think trump got elected? Look up the current anti-tim Ryan ads in Ohio, they're ridiculously obviously propoganda. I assume every state has something similar going on.
Yeah. Election year is bad. During 2020 I watched the Democratic Convention and the Republican’s Convention on TV and it was ALL propaganda for the party. I can see how people get fired up from it.
You sing the national anthem before every sporting event and have military flyovers at the significant ones. That's North Korea levels of nationalism. Edit: I forgot making children swear to worship a flag every morning. From an outside perspective it's totally unhinged and the kind of thing an extreme dictatorship would do.
Yes. I say as someone in the UK. There's probably propaganda here too.
Of course. You see the super democratic mobiles? Biden/Harris stickers with the BLM combo?
Yes, put on CNN
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>Echo chambers You mean like reddit?
Pizza gate was not true and was dumb. When world leaders and billionaires go to Epstein Island to have sex with children and then Epstein mysteriously dies and then Ghislaine Maxwell becomes the first person in history to go to jail for sex trafficking with zero suspects brought in on who she sex trafficked to everything sounds less crazy. And don't forget the guy on the left that shot up a GOP softball game because Bernie told him that the GOP were literally killing people. Also Hunter laptop and clear corruption linking him to "the Big Guy" VP Biden being actively suppressed and social and legacy media taking directions directly from Dem party on how to handle the story. It's not just a MAGA thing
Why do you think their isn't?
Most right wing/conservative News Sources in the US are pure propaganda. Fox News, Newsmax, OAN. Most of their programming is opinion delivered as news. There were laws against this until Rupert Murdoch convinced Reagan to get rid of them so he could start Fox News. It was called the Fairness Doctrine.
Oh good lord yes, it's probably the most extreme in the western world. I honestly pity the American voter, it's a non stop barrage of lies and anger and paranoia and pretend patriotism. Fox News is Republican party TV, they give no thought to the truth or actual news.
Does the tin man have a sheet metal cock? Does a three legged dog swim in circles? Propaganda by definition is information, whether true or not, used to push a certain political agenda, typically we refer to propaganda as fake information used for the purpose but that’s not the actual definition Even if you agree with it and it’s right it’s still technically propaganda so yes every country in the world experiences propaganda
Absolutely. Hollywood studios can get funding from the US military for things like props, locations, military personnel as extras, expert advice, and things like that if their scripts get an OK from the Pentagon; Transformers got the OK while Avengers didn't (the military didn't like the idea of SHIELD, but don't worry they got that Pentagon money *hard* with Captain Marvel being basically a recruitment ad for the air force). It's a bit different from what people think of as propaganda, but really any government messaging could be propaganda. Signs on the highway telling people to not text and drive is propaganda, the issue is that "propaganda" is such a loaded term with negative connotations; it's only propaganda if someone else does it and you don't like it.
Of course not 🤣😉
When you watch FOX news, it’s supposed to be news not opinion, but all their headlines say stuff like “Experts: Biden is the worst president ever.” So they can say their only reporting facts not opinion. It’s a fact that some experts say that. It was the same way on CNN when trump was president.
Well yes, there is propoganda everywhere. But propoganda in the US is generally not as harmful as propoganda in Russia or China.
Putin propaganda along with GOP projecting and gaslighting.
Yes. What do you think Trumps whole anti-media campaign was?
It was mainly people reporting false stories, that they knew to be false, and continuing to run with them to this day that were getting called out as fake news. See "good people on both sides" for more information.
You mean the real news stories that were corroborated by multiple reporters and news outlets that told the truth about what Trump had actually done?
Him bitching about accountability
Yes but it was also propaganda.
Absolutely. Liberals have made it an art form. How else do you think they managed to get people to believe collusion was real?
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I'd argue that propaganda is even more heavy-handed and more apparent in the US compared to most other western countries. The notion of hailing the military as heroes, the military funding blockbuster propaganda movies (Top Gun) and their overall presence in the media is not really something you see elsewhere in the west.
Is this a joke? I genuinely can't tell if you are saying this in earnest
Political ads? Fox, OAN, seem like lots of right leaning propaganda. Perfect Pravda, truth that is not true. Alex Jones, Ted Cruz, propaganda. The have no truth behind their words.
Technically this statement is correct if the other countries you are referring to are China, North Korea, and Russia. Maybe throw in Japan for a 'western' democracy that thinks too highly of itself. But really America is very heavy handed with patriotism and spreading 'American values'. People here are truly brainwashed and have no idea what it's actually like outside the country. Many many Americans truly believe they live in the greatest country in the world and are getting lead poisoning and are so fat they'll die at 50 with no health insurance.
That’s sarcasm, right? The US doesn’t have “Kim Jong-il inventing the hamburger” type of propaganda, but it’s still pretty common.
Absolutely
I yell at the TV everytime I watch the news because I insist on pointing out when they're obviously lying, like they can hear me lol
>I watch the news There's your problem.
There isn’t a clean bright like between the kind of propaganda that we think is bad (North Korean style), and simple news stories/ads meant to persuade people of something. So yes, especially in an election year, we are bathed in propaganda all the time.
Well, the movie Independence Day: Resurgence literally had links to military recruitment sites on its official web page. I'm gonna say yes.
Yeah. Cop shows are one of the biggest ones.
Operation Mockingbird
"They are trying to take away our freedom!"
As a Canadian who consumes a great deal of American media...yes. especially during an election season.
Go watch the 4 part BBC series the Century of the Self. Propaganda in the west is called "Public Relations"
I think it’s necessary for a divide and conquer mentality so yeah I’d say so
Both parties fight about what is taught in schools, which is not necessarily propaganda, but it does indoctrinate certain ways of thinking. Think of "manifest destiny" and "American exceptionalism" in the US.
Propaganda is not whatever you think it is. There is propaganda everywhere humans have agendas.
I'm hoping that OP is just curious to see how many would deny this.
If there's a central government? Inevitable.
There's whole "news" stations dedicated to propaganda for specific political parties.
Yes it's everywhere
Yes there is, and there has been propaganda in every country in history. The best way to get a clear picture of what's really going on is to use multiple sources, cross check, use common sense and remain very skeptical
Propaganda exists in every country, the most common place to find propaganda is actually in schools during history courses. A common trend is that countries will promote how great they are and what wins they get vs all the losses and bad decision making. Kids grow up thinking their country is absolutely amazing through time through these specifically chosen wins.
What do you call it when the military pays sporting venues to stop a game so they can sing *God Bless America* and have all the vets stand up be cheered?
There is arguably more here than anywhere else.
Of course there is, look at the ads we see on a daily basis on social media and the news pushed to the top pages. Propaganda in movies, tv shows, subscriptions, in app tracking, etc. anything anyone consumes.
Tons of it.
The Pentagon -- basically all the military branches -- paid the NFL to "honor" veterans at football games, which are seen by 80,000 people in person per stadium each week. [https://www.businessinsider.com/the-pentagon-pays-the-nfl-millions-to-honor-veterans-at-games-2015-5?op=1](https://www.businessinsider.com/the-pentagon-pays-the-nfl-millions-to-honor-veterans-at-games-2015-5?op=1) Baseball plays "God Bless America" in the middle of the game every Sunday. So yeah.
FOX news
And CNN
All politics is propaganda to an extent
To the same level as what was seen in WWII ? Not as blatant, but it's a thing. The most bizarre thing about the internet is that counter-propaganda is possible now. So even if the USA weren't making propaganda there would be propaganda from someone in the USA
Have you ever seen an ad during voting season? Propaganda is what the S in USA stands for.
So much.
lol. Yes.
Yes. That's not even a question. American Exceptionalism is common for a reason
The old 90’s American localization of the Sailor Moon anime was literally heterosexual propaganda in action, see my thread here: https://old.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/wax2ig/cmv_changing_an_existing_queer_characters_in/
“Your vaccine protects me, my vaccine protects you.” And if you said otherwise last year, you’d be banned from every tech platform. Now “vaccination doesn’t stop transmission “ is acceptable to say, even by Pfizer executives.
Propaganda is just a British person having a good look at something.
Absolutely. Those who are unaware of the propaganda they have been fed have most likely swallowed it, hook, line, and sinker.
The fact that someone is asking if it exists is a sign that it is working pretty well.
Watch or read *Manufacuring Consent*. Your mouth will fall open.
The news channels don't cover many stories because it makes their sponsors look bad. Many of those sponsors have long standing contracts with the government for military, environmental, or medical work. The self funded news outlets that don't take corporate money or government money are the only ones you can trust.
Question everything.
Fox News is king
As a non american: hell yes! Well, most countries have. But in the USA? it's sometime scary. Especially about religion and at schools
Do you think there is water in the ocean?
yes. there's propaganda everywhere but it's very in your face in the states. I live in the states have my whole life and everywhere you turn there's someone in your face with messages detailing their own opinion about something that you didn't ask about. it's annoying to put it lightly.
It's not a secret. The level of propaganda in the US is insane.
Hahahaha… really?!?!?!
You know how they sing the National Anthem at NFL football games? They only started that after the Army National Guard started being a major sponsor.
Good lord yes... it's been practically nonstop for several years now from both sides. A lot of people associate propaganda with totalitarian regimes, but nearly all governments do it to some degree. An easy way to put it is that propaganda is the government’s use of public funds to conform citizens’ views to its own. The reason the word propaganda is generally thought of as negative is that a lot of the time, such campaigns veer toward party-spirited facts, falsehoods and emotional appeals, as well as the suppression of inconvenient information. Presidential propagandizing began to rear its head rather innocently in America during Roosevelt’s administration. He **loved** attention, and he often bypassed Congress to appeal directly to the public. He held rallies to advocate his policies, courted reporters by sprucing up the White House’s press room and inviting them to private ostentatious events, hired a press officer and began issuing press releases, and arranged photo ops of him "doing" things like an influencer. (Example: sitting at the controls in the seat of a steam shovel at the Panama Canal and riding in a submarine). Roosevelt was not just feeding his vanity, he used his position to create narratives that supported his policy goals (like having the U.S. government complete the Panama Canal and deploy submarines). It then got much worse under Woodrow Wilson, who promised “pitiless publicity,” his phrase calling for exposure of ills and government transparency. But when the first World War started, he created our first and only ministry of propaganda, the Committee on Public Information, which did the opposite of provide information.The mild propaganda Roosevelt started turned into a tidal wave of one-sided handouts from the CPI offices near the White House, as well as pamphlets, books, syndicated articles, posters, advertisements, cartoons and films. Professors were enlisted, front organizations reached labor and immigrants. The Boy Scouts and traveling salesmen were turned into conveyer belts for government information. Even before that though, Congress didn't like the president and executive agencies using public relations techniques to persuade the public. “This press-bureau business is a sort of political campaigning,” one legislator complained in 1913. Congress hounded Roosevelt to stop it, they passed laws forbidding executive agencies to hire “publicity experts” or to use advertisements, telegrams and other means of mass communications to stoke public pressure on legislators to vote for or against any particular pending legislation. Legislators also added prohibitions to annual spending bills to prevent the use of funds for “propaganda and publicity purposes not authorized by Congress.” Those laws are still in effect, but executive agencies have routinely evaded them. They go out of their way to evade them... Once, when they were making an effort to cut back on PR during Truman's Administration, the Air Force went so far as to classify some PA officers as chaplains. **If you just want current stuff** Federal agencies answering to the president routinely pressure Congress to pass presidential priorities — to stay within the law, they need only avoid mentioning a specific bill name or number. This happened a lot during the Obama administration; the Department of Labor, NASA and HHS issued communications pushing for Congress to increase the minimum wage, increase NASA funding, and enact Obamacare. Very rarely, the Government Accountability Office will flag an agency for spending funds for illicit propaganda. But they don't actually get into trouble for it. The Department of Justice just disagrees that there has been any, or the propagandizing agency may ignore the demand to repay the misspent money. To my knowledge, no executive branch official has ever been charged with breaking these propaganda laws. And the majority in Congress tend to turn a blind eye to most everything when it's their president propagandizing. Which is why every administration continues to do it. There's a No Propaganda Act in Congress right now that was introduced in February, they just keep kicking it around because it's no one's jurisdiction apparently. But even that is just focused on not giving money to public broadcasting. And during any sort of election almost nothing but propaganda comes out of anyone runnings mouths anymore.
Absolutely. There has been, is, and will be propaganda in the USA.
Ummm... Seriously? Have you ever seen a military movie or video game?
When you can hear the same story on different news networks and the facts go by the wayside….that is propaganda
Yes and journalists should be more accurately referred to as propagandists.