Propaganda under Trump

“It is an old lesson of history that when a young party sure of its aim wrecks

the rule of a corrupt and inwardly foul system, when it takes into its own

hands the power of the state, it give the responsibility to a dictator, who must

conquer the state with new ideas and put them through. That is what we are

going to do.”    – Joseph Goebbels

Joseph Goebbels was Adolph Hitler’s Reich Minister of Propaganda from 1933 through 1945, the end of the second World War. Goebbels, for all his faults (to put them mildly), was a pioneer in the art of modern propaganda. Along with Hitler, he understood the importance of selling a message. We know very well that the message they were selling was repugnant (particularly with the benefit of hindsight), but Goebbels and Hitler demonstrated with utter clarity the power of the press, how it could be manipulated to ensure the reception and acceptance of a message, and why people were susceptible to propaganda. In today’s rapidly-moving, hyper-connected world, where information is not only abundant but constant, it can be easier than ever to be propagandized. One shudders to think how Hitler and Goebbels would have been able to manipulate people if they had the tools of mass communication available to an aspiring 21st century despot. For its part, the press, used so effectively by the Nazis during World War II, has today become an important tool in the chests of parties who are diametrically opposed in regards to propaganda: those who fight for objective truth as well as those who seek to obfuscate and propagandize.

In some regard, every bit of information we encounter is propaganda. How does it happen? Can society at large really fall victim to another Goebbels? Fear not, the resistance is already underway, and not a moment too soon. The election of Donald Trump has given us the unintended gift of a rejuvenated press that fights to keep the light of truth shining, even while elements inside that same media corps works to undermine the institution and prop up the Commander-In-Chief at all costs.  There are ways that we, also, can fight; by addressing some of the ways propaganda is disbursed or perpetrated, we can inoculate ourselves to some of its effects. Simply being aware of how propaganda is affecting you, or is intended to affect you, can help you be less susceptible.

Propaganda is defined by Richard Campbell, author of Media & Culture: Mass Communication in the Digital Age, as “a communication strategy that tries to manipulate opinion to gain support for a special issue, program, or policy, such as a nation’s war effort”. As addressed previously, modern humanity lives in a rapidly moving world, inundated with information. Johnnie Manzaria, et al, discusses this in the report, War & Peace: Media and War: in the last 100 years, technology has allowed us to spread information across a large group, and has evolved into a scientific process capable of influencing all people. The plentiful information is impossible to process, our minds need shortcuts. Propaganda provides these shortcuts by appealing to familiar feelings through slogans, stereotypes, or rules of thumb. Donald Trump has certainly shown a proclivity for this tactic. His screams of “fake news”, his “Make America Great Again” hats or hashtags, and the cries of “build the wall!” are repeated and have become familiar. The statements have very little substance, but work many of his supporters into an absolute frenzy of patriotism. “Make America Great Again” has become ubiquitous in our society, even though many of the proponents of the notion do not know what “great again” actually means, or at least do not agree on a single definition. To Donald Trump, the meaning is unimportant; what matters is the ferocious loyalty the slogans inspire. Herr Schiller, part of Goebbel’s Der Angriff, which was essentially the Nazi Office of Propaganda (Lemmons), said it thusly: “The masses want it. We can and must give it to them. We must see through the eyes of the masses” (Nelson). Indeed, a significant portion of the country has lapped this up, and the media was a very large part of the dissemination of his message. Estimates range from $2 Billion to $5 billion dollars worth of “free” airtime granted to Trump during the 2016 election, as opposed to $746 million for Hillary Clinton or $321 million for Bernie Sanders (LaFrance).

This power of the media to disseminate a message is called by Manzaria “The Dune Effect”.  The Dune Effect describes the theory that who controls access can control public opinion. In our modern media landscape, six major companies control 90% of the outlets from which we obtain our information (Wagner). Rupert Murdoch, owner of NewsCorp, is well-known for his pro-conservative leanings. He certainly makes no qualms about them. NewsCorp owns Fox Broadcasting, DirecTV, 20th Century Fox, The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Post, just to name a few. It doesn’t take a leap of imagination to see just how much power he (or his company) possess to control the narrative our country receives every day. Besides the ability to decide what news we see, they can determine the lens through which we view it. The news can be dramatized to make an emotional impact, which can be far more effective than facts when it is time to drive people to action. Again turning to Goebbels, he describes this in one of his 3 Maxims of Nazi Propaganda (as reported by Roger B. Nelson): “Dramatize your propaganda. All the world is a stage. Act well.” Of course, this drive to action is not always a bad thing; the ASPCA uses propaganda in their commercials whenever they show pictures of shivering animals locked in cages, set to the longing chords of Sarah MacLachlan.

Aldous Huxley, in his seminal Brave New World, posits that mass communication is “neither good nor bad, it is simply a force. It can be used for good or evil.” While those terms may be largely subjective, it is undeniable that we are experiencing this phenomenon today. Huxley mentions the value to the propagandist of crowds. Crowds are more likely to abandon reason and react to their passions, through peer pressure or sheer excitement. Crowds are likely to lend themselves to absolutes, issues become black or white, you’re either with us or against us. It feels good to be a part of a crowd, and it evokes an enjoyable emotion, which is perhaps the most persuasive form of propaganda there is. Confirmation bias is incredibly powerful, and is an evolutionary fact. Think back to our discussion of how we process information: We prefer familiar, easily digestible things, we care less about veracity. Entertainment is another form of this. When we are being entertained, we need not worry about what is true or false, because it isn’t real. Man’s capacity for distraction cannot be overstated (Huxley). One look at today’s Trump rallies, fawningly covered by a media all too willing to play the evil or bungling foil to Trump’s tough guy hero, is an embodiment of this.

The fractious and vacuous nature of today’s media was a natural occurrence, a free market feature that could not have been avoided. In a way, the media was forced to adapt or die; to find their audience and cater to them. This has led to rise of separate sets of “facts”; the truth depends on who you ask. It is incumbent on us, then, as consumers, to be aware of how propaganda works and act accordingly. There are still press outfits with veracity and dignity, but in order for truth to recapture the spotlight, we will have to demand it. The media will give the consumer what they want, so let’s reward truthful media with reads and dollars. More importantly, it will take a cultural shift. I can’t even begin to predict how to spark such a shift, it certainly seems like an uphill battle. Does anyone know any benevolent propagandists?