I was basing my comment on that and Masses Elites and Rebels, but my takeaway from those essays is that they don’t believe the things they’re saying and the targets of the propaganda aren’t supposed to believe it in a meaningful sense either, only to acquire it as a kind of currency that can be used to justify their social position (e.g. asked why you’re homeschooling your kids? Because Oprah is a devil worshipper!)
But it is the case. Let’s go through that list again. The following are all true of the people spreading the Procter & Gamble rumor:
They didn’t really believe it themselves.
They were passing it along with the intent of misinforming others. Deliberately.
They did not respect, or care about, the actual facts of the matter, except to the extent that they viewed such facts with hostility.
The post-truth element of this dynamic can’t be understated. It’s fundamental to how propaganda works: the accuracy of the claims is not an object to the emitter of the propaganda nor its target. The value of the propaganda comes purely from its capacity to make the world make sense from the POV of someone who has already bought into living their lives a certain way. But the difficult thing is that this does imply that after a certain point, we no longer have beliefs at all, just coping mechanisms detached from material reality and any kind of ground truth.
Good point, but I don’t think it’s black and white. What I think often happens is that people choose to not care about the truth of what they share. Point 3 doesn’t mean they don’t believe it, it means whether or not its true doesn’t matter as much as its utility. They are willingly choosing not to engage critically, deliberately, but also do end up reinforcing their own beliefs this way.
Yeah I work with the public a lot in the environmental field - and understanding the origin of a lot of things people parrot is a skill to stay sharp on - especially trying to deprogram people from “crabs in a pot” mentality
If you like this kind of thinking, Roderic Day also wrote (and Nia Frome also edited) Really Existing Fascism which is excellent too but focused on the way the conception of liberalism, communism, and fascism as three distinct ideologies (though usually with some symmetry between communism and fascism in the eyes of liberals because of their shared ‘totalitarianism’) came to be, how that model should be improved to be more accurate to 20th century history, and a pretty cool philosophical discussion that’s a bit of a summary or spin on Losurdo’s Nietzsche book.
tbh i think they repeat it because it’s easy to argue against, i doubt many of them actually believe it
I think they do believe it. False Witnesses is a great essay going over why people license themselves to believe clear falsehoods.
I was basing my comment on that and Masses Elites and Rebels, but my takeaway from those essays is that they don’t believe the things they’re saying and the targets of the propaganda aren’t supposed to believe it in a meaningful sense either, only to acquire it as a kind of currency that can be used to justify their social position (e.g. asked why you’re homeschooling your kids? Because Oprah is a devil worshipper!)
The post-truth element of this dynamic can’t be understated. It’s fundamental to how propaganda works: the accuracy of the claims is not an object to the emitter of the propaganda nor its target. The value of the propaganda comes purely from its capacity to make the world make sense from the POV of someone who has already bought into living their lives a certain way. But the difficult thing is that this does imply that after a certain point, we no longer have beliefs at all, just coping mechanisms detached from material reality and any kind of ground truth.
Good point, but I don’t think it’s black and white. What I think often happens is that people choose to not care about the truth of what they share. Point 3 doesn’t mean they don’t believe it, it means whether or not its true doesn’t matter as much as its utility. They are willingly choosing not to engage critically, deliberately, but also do end up reinforcing their own beliefs this way.
@Cowbee@hexbear.net , @FunkyStuff@hexbear.net ty - good essays from both - I love learning about these rhetorical tricks - especially around bad faith arguments
I see it all the time on my Lemmy.ml account, it’s useful to know when engaging with reactionaries.
Yeah I work with the public a lot in the environmental field - and understanding the origin of a lot of things people parrot is a skill to stay sharp on - especially trying to deprogram people from “crabs in a pot” mentality
Yep, absolutely!
If you like this kind of thinking, Roderic Day also wrote (and Nia Frome also edited) Really Existing Fascism which is excellent too but focused on the way the conception of liberalism, communism, and fascism as three distinct ideologies (though usually with some symmetry between communism and fascism in the eyes of liberals because of their shared ‘totalitarianism’) came to be, how that model should be improved to be more accurate to 20th century history, and a pretty cool philosophical discussion that’s a bit of a summary or spin on Losurdo’s Nietzsche book.
Nice I’ll check that out - I haven’t read much meta analysis of ideologies - that’ll be a good read. Thanks!