Yes, You Are Being Influenced: Part 2

Propaganda, or "Pro-panga-danga"

This essay is a continuation of Yes, You Are Being Influenced: Part 1, which was published last week on December 4, 2022. It described and gave examples of subconscious influence, governmental experimentation with mind control, and teed up the second half of the essay which dives more deeply into propaganda… and resolves the cliffhanger about my toe.

Pro-panga-danga is what my children called propaganda when they were little. Click here to read why they even were aware of that word at such a tender age.

A quick definition:

“Propaganda is the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behavior to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist.” —Garth S. Jowett and Victoria O’Donnell, Propaganda & Persuasion (2014)

Notice the agnosticism of that definition. There’s nothing malicious about propaganda; it’s just an attempt to sway people. It’s a tool, neither good nor bad. I’ll come back to that momentarily.

The Big Daddy of all things propaganda was Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud and the author of, appropriately enough, Propaganda. Man oh man, is his book an eye-opener.

Given the year it was written (1928), I naively thought it would be a cautionary tale along the lines of “propaganda can be dangerous and must be guarded against!” Um, no. It’s the opposite.

He actually wrote the book to redeem the concept of propaganda. Before World War I, the word “propaganda” had been a neutral term, like the definition above. During the war, however, the Central Powers’ obvious and systemic use of propaganda — the first of its kind, really, in terms of its sweep and coordination — provoked the Allies into calling it out and naming it as dark and sinister manipulation.

Never mind that the Allies themselves quickly hopped on the propaganda bandwagon, because they needed to whip their respective constituents into a frenzy of patriotism and unquestioning assent for the war. But the media tactics the Allied governments used, according to them, were purely “educational.”

Here’s the director of the U.S. Office of War Information (doesn’t an “office” like that raise concerns?) in 1920, explaining how it all worked in his book How We Advertised America (doesn’t that title raise concerns??)

“Our effort was educational and informative throughout, for we had such confidence in our case as to feel that no other argument was needed than the simple, straightforward presentation of facts.” — George Creel

Right. That’s always the case, isn’t it. When we’re using it, it’s education. When someone else is using it, it’s (cue the scary chords) propaganda.

Bernays built his propaganda empire on the shoulders of earlier sociologists, who came to the uncharitable yet probably accurate conclusion that the vast majority of people are sheep with herd instincts and few critical thinking skills, and are therefore not able to make rational decisions.

Even though I may not entirely agree with that conclusion (and will address it in another essay), Bernays took that concept and ran with it.

If the masses are sheep, then it’s simply logical, don’t you see, that they need “conscious and intelligent manipulation.” They need to be corralled into benevolently-selected stables of thought, for their own wellbeing and the wellbeing of society as a whole.

How rational. How reassuring. How like propaganda.

Reading Bernays’s Propaganda feels like reading advertising copy. It’s smooth, cool, and self-assured. He states ideas as fact, like:

“It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind, who harness old social forces and contrive new ways to bind and guide the world. It is not usually realized how necessary these invisible governors are to the orderly functioning of our group life.” [emphasis mine]

Necessary, eh?

Corral me, Daddy!

So, who are the “they” doing the corralling? Who are these “invisible governors”?

Bernays describes them as:

“shrewd persons operating behind the scenes.”

Hmm… red flag popping up…

“They govern us by their qualities of natural leadership, their ability to supply needed ideas and by their key position in the social structure.”

Well, maybe…

“We are governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of.”

Ick. Is anyone else creeped out by this? Governed by “men we’ve never heard of”? Who are they? Well, according to Bernays, the editors of The New York Times are some of them:

“Page one of the New York Times on the day these paragraphs are written contains eight important news stories. Four of them, or one-half, are propaganda.”

Again, my reaction is one of revulsion, but Bernays makes these statements with a breezy assurance: that’s just the way it is, darling. Just delivering fact. It feels like the commercial I did for Crest: “When it comes to their own teeth, more dentists brush with Crest tartar control, than any other toothpaste.”

My recoil from Bernays doesn’t mirror the prevailing opinion at the time, at least not of those large companies and prominent individuals who were hankering to hawk their ideas or products to those poor, confused sheep.

Entities like Proctor & Gamble, General Motors, NBC, CBS, The United Fruit Company, and even President Calvin Coolidge are just a few of those who lapped up his ideas and paid him big bucks to consult with them. Why wouldn’t they? Bernays was way ahead of the pack. He didn’t just come up with an “advertising campaign” for these clients. How prosaic. Plenty of ad men could do that, and did so.

No, Bernays actually came up with tactics to change the underlying opinions of the general public, which, in turn, created demand for the product he was hired to promote.

Genius.

His most famous campaign was on behalf of the American Tobacco Company. I’ll let ThoughtCo.com describe it:

“Smoking had caught on among American women in the years following World War I, but the habit carried a stigma and only a fraction of Americans found it acceptable for women to smoke, especially in public…

Bernays was informed that women of the late 1920s were seeking freedom, and smoking represented that freedom. To find a way to convey that concept to the public, Bernays hit upon the stunt of having young women smoke cigarettes while strolling in the annual Easter Sunday parade on Fifth Avenue in New York City.

The event was carefully organized and essentially scripted. Debutantes were recruited to be the smokers, and they were carefully positioned near particular landmarks, such as St. Patrick's Cathedral. Bernays even arranged for a photographer to shoot images just in case any newspaper photographers missed the shot.

The next day, the New York Times published a story on the annual Easter celebrations and a sub-headline on page one read: “Group of Girls Puff at Cigarettes as a Gesture of Freedom.” The article noted “about a dozen young women” strolled back and forth near St. Patrick's Cathedral, “ostentatiously smoking cigarettes.” When interviewed, the women said the cigarettes were “torches of freedom” that were “lighting the way to the day when women would smoke on the street as casually as men."

Mrs. Taylor-Scott Hardin parades down New York’s Fifth Avenue with her husband while smoking “Torches of Freedom,” a gesture of protest for absolute equality with men, 1929.

Wow. Notice all of the collaborators: the debutantes; a scriptwriter to make sure the debs had just the right sound bites; a photographer; and The New York Times.

It’s theatre, folks, in service of corporate interests. Not the interests of health or women’s rights. Just selling more cigarettes, which it apparently did beautifully. Sales went through the roof.

Bernays was wildly successful, and soon became known as the “father of public relations.” He minted the term “public relations” and deployed it in his book. Let’s face it: “public relations” is just a shiny, new, slick label for propaganda. It is propaganda itself.

It turns out that the “men we’ve never heard of” are Bernays, plus every other individual who knows exactly how the human psyche works and uses that knowledge to shape our beliefs, and ultimately, our behavior.

Given how long Bernays’s ideas have been a constant, accepted presence in our culture, (100 years!) it’s perhaps no surprise that terms like “choice architecture” or “content moderation” or even “influencer” now get batted around earnestly, and no one seems to mind. If you’re not familiar with all of those terms, you might want to be.

It’s also no surprise that in 2012, the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act was passed. The original Smith–Mundt Act of 1948 was intended to regulate broadcasting of programs produced by the State Department. Basically, it prohibited the U.S. from bombarding its own citizens with programs intended for foreign audiences.

But in 2012, that law was “modernized” to do an about-face, ostensibly to combat propaganda from terrorists and the like, but in effect making it perfectly legal for the U.S. to propagandize U.S. audiences.

Fight fire with fire, was their logic. But an unnamed Pentagon official at the time said,

“It removes the protection for Americans…It removes oversight from the people who want to put out this information. There are no checks and balances. No one knows if the information is accurate, partially accurate, or entirely false.”

One could argue that it has always been thus — or at least, once the printing press came on the scene. First we were propagandized by religious and governmental leaders, then later, by advertisers and public relations specialists working for companies, organizations, and even private individuals. What’s the big deal?

What’s different now, and the part that keeps me awake at night, is the method of delivery for the propaganda that has insinuated itself into our lives.

Bernays died in 1995, before the advent and complete proliferation of smart phones. Can you even imagine how he would have drooled with delight at the prospect of reaching every single sheep directly, through a device the sheep attaches to its wooly body and can’t conceive of doing without?

Actually, drooling would have been far too déclassé. Not known for his humility, Bernays made the following statement, given (appropriately enough) to The New York Times on his 100th birthday: “…any dope, any nitwit, any idiot, can call him or herself a public relations practitioner.” He went on to say that he’d be happy to be called “the father of public relations when the field is taken seriously, like law or architecture.”

We’d better take it seriously, though not in the legitimized way he envisioned. We need to pay attention because it works, and because it works at an emotional level below the level of rational reasoning.

Propagandists are not interested in an intellectual, rational response; they are interested in, and capable of, hacking the attitudes and morals that are already embedded deep in the psyches of their target audiences. In doing that, they can elicit a deep, powerful, long-lasting response.

That’s dangerous. First, because we’re not aware it’s working on us. We think we’re making free, empowered decisions — Look at me! I’m freely walking into this corral! — when in reality, the desire we feel to hang out in a paddock was created by some guy in a suit, thousands of miles away.

Second, it’s dangerous because it’s a tool that anyone can use — no matter whether they are acting out of love and benevolence, or greed and ambition. May I point out that sheep are enclosed in paddocks not only for their protection, but also to keep them close-at-hand for slaughter?

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In Part 1 of this essay, I likened the human mind to a car, and the subconscious to a “second key” to that car — a key that controls our actions but is susceptible to outside influence and propaganda.

So what can you do to take back that second key to your car? Four things, and yes, one of them relates to my toe infection — finally, the cliff hanger resolved!

1. Look for it.

Ultimately, the most potent way to defuse influence is to SEE IT. It’s not easy; we are all up against skilled professionals.

"Propaganda becomes ineffective the moment we are aware of it."
—Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Propaganda Minister 1933-1945

So here are some defining characteristics of propaganda:

• It appeals to the emotions.

• It’s SIMPLE, so everyone can understand it.

• It uses distinctive phrases or slogans to label people or events.

• It is constantly repeated.

• It gives only one side of the story (you may have to dig to find out the other side).

• It points out a "villain" to attack.

• It incessantly criticizes and attacks its opponents.

• Its veracity is not important, as long as it’s believed.

Some examples:

“Change You Can Believe In”
“Make America Great Again”
Every Advertising Slogan Ever Created
This video compilation:

Remember, propaganda is agnostic. Only you can determine if the message being beamed into your consciousness is for your highest and best interests or not. So…

2. Choose carefully. As though your life depends upon it.

Think of the Media Food you consume as an All-You-Can-Eat buffet, with every possible dish laid out in front of you.

Remember, SOMEONE made that dish. Ask yourself: Who are they? Why did they cook it up? How did they pay for the ingredients? What are they hoping to gain by your eating it?

Do you really want to eat a Twinkie that’s been sitting there since the 80s? Or some unidentifiable fritter? What about that reiterated meat product that was jammed into a can by a mega-corporation?

Before you consume something, ask yourself cui bono? (who benefits?) and be highly selective.

In my early twenties, a former boyfriend accused me of being an “intellectual snob” because I railed against magazines like Cosmopolitan and People. It felt like an absurd accusation; for god’s sake, what kind of intellectual snob watches General Hospital?

But there was truth buried underneath the absurdity. I was a snob alright, but it didn’t have to do with intellect. It had to do with losing my mother when I was 23. I just wasn’t willing to waste my precious time on meaningless (at best, propagandizing at worst) media.

What I consider to be worthwhile changed over the years, for sure. But I’m still super-selective about what I consume. (You’ll be relieved to know that General Hospital fell off the menu a long time ago.)

Check out the Substackers I follow if you’d like to know who and what feeds me.

3. Find the right tool.

Finally, my toe. (You’re welcome!)

After trying everything under the sun, I found a laser device that penetrates the nail, and within a few days of using it, I could tell things were changing. Within two weeks, the infection was gone!

Like that handy laser, tools exist that you can use to reach beyond the critical factor (the rational, intellectual part of the brain) to fill the subconscious with messages you choose, in turn influencing the subconscious to behave the way you want it to. Don’t believe anyone who tells you those tools don’t exist.

Mantras, subliminals, and hypnosis are all tools that can have a detoxifying, salutary effect. Be careful, though… before you avail yourself of any tool, ask yourself the same questions you’d ask about the buffet above, and choose carefully.

The above links will lead you to tools I can personally vouch for. The mantra takes you to an mp3 (Om Tara) created by Cynthia Quintanal, a gifted sound artist and musician who uses her talents to facilitate transformation; and the subliminal and hypnosis links will take you to specific tracks on my husband Peter’s YouTube channel, BlueSky Hypnosis.

Are there other tools you’ve used to counteract the onslaught of outside influence? Please, put your recommendations or sources in the comments, so we can all benefit!

4. Perhaps most important of all: empty your mind, every day.

Think of it like taking out the trash; it starts to stink if you don’t stay on top of it.

You don’t have to lotus-pose yourself in silence to do it. Walk in nature. Get in the tub. Listen to soothing music that has no agenda — anything instrumental created before the industrial revolution should do the trick. :-)

Do anything that unhooks your mind from input that’s outside your control. Just do it regularly, like brushing your teeth.

An added benefit? Remember Bruce Lipton’s dictum: if you’re not living fully in the present moment, you’re being ruled by your subconscious. So taking time every day to sink into untrammeled being gives you a taste of true sovereignty — which, over time, may help you differentiate between the car key you own and the one you don’t.

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Clearly, the subject of propaganda and human influence is impossibly vast and there’s no way that one little essay (or even a long-ish one like this) can cover it adequately.

All I have is the dearest wish that by understanding propaganda’s historical power and prevalence, you might be able to spot it as it manifests itself again and again under new guises… and in doing so, take back that second key.

You never know… that key might also unlock the paddock.

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As always, keep your light shining bright.

xox
Mary