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How Propaganda Works · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know
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Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Chuck Bryant's with me as usual.
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Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, I don't know what I
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Speaker 1: do If Chuck Bryant wasn't with me, I'd probably curl
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Speaker 1: up in the fetal position in the corner and cry
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Speaker 1: myself to sleep. I think you'd be just fine. I
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Speaker 1: don't know, Chuck. I don't ever want to find out. Chuck. Well, thanks,
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Speaker 1: almost didn't make it today. Why what's going on with you?
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Speaker 1: I was out last night. I went out and saw
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Speaker 1: Matt's band. As you know, Matt Frederick are handsome young
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Speaker 1: stand in producer. Yeah, Matt Frederick of Stuff of Genius
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Speaker 1: fame and awesome new video podcasts. We should mention, Chuck.
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Speaker 1: It's really good. You guys should check that out, Stuff
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Speaker 1: of Genius. It's it's a video podcast video and it's
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Speaker 1: cool and it has a little like Monty Python esque animation.
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Speaker 1: I like it. Yeah, And we don't want to hear
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Speaker 1: any of this. I don't have time to watch that
0:56
Speaker 1: crap because it's like a minute forty two tops. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: it's quick. Yeah. But went and saw his band last night,
1:01
Speaker 1: Lions and Scissors. Yeah, good stuff, And I wanted to
1:04
Speaker 1: say that they have a MySpace page and it's good
1:06
Speaker 1: music if you're into its very shoegaze, yeah, mag wise
1:12
Speaker 1: good is sort of a radio heady component at times.
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Speaker 1: Explosions in the sky you ever heard of them? I
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Speaker 1: have a big wall of sound, loud, my ears are ringing,
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Speaker 1: and I'm slightly tired and imbibed a bit too much.
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Speaker 1: But that was my night. That's Chuck's Thursday, everybody, So
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Speaker 1: keep rocking, Matt. We love it. Yeah, way to go, Matt.
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Speaker 1: So can we get back to our podcast now? Maybe? Yeah,
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Speaker 1: But I just wanted to give give you a hard time.
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Speaker 1: I think you're a good guy for doing that. Talented drummer,
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Speaker 1: great drummer. Okay, So, Chuck, you grew up in the
1:44
Speaker 1: Cold War, right, it's pretty funny, jerk you did. You're
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Speaker 1: a Cold War baby like me. I'm a Cold War kid.
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Speaker 1: Isn't it weird to think we actually work with people who,
1:54
Speaker 1: like weren't cognizant that, you know, the Soviets had nukes
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Speaker 1: pointed at us at all times and vice versa. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: that is weird to me. Yeah, but um yeah, I
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Speaker 1: remember being particularly unnerved from time to time that like, dude,
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Speaker 1: eventually they're going to come over and or our missile
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Speaker 1: is going to be sent over, and that's that, you know.
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Speaker 1: I think I can't help but think that we were
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Speaker 1: definitely shaped, our personalities were shaped by that underlying, constant
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Speaker 1: level of paranoia that we grew up with. You well
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Speaker 1: in the movies, uh, a lot, a lot of great
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Speaker 1: Cold war movies of that era, but the Roosky is
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Speaker 1: out to get us? Yeah, well, do you remember the
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Speaker 1: movie Rooskis? Was there one called? It was actually a
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Speaker 1: counter propaganda movie where a bunch of kids that were
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Speaker 1: probably my age you would have been, like, you know,
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Speaker 1: twenty by then. Um, where I think they found a
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Speaker 1: Russian sailor who washed ashore and they had to hide
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Speaker 1: them because of course, you know, the government would shoot
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Speaker 1: him in the head if they found him. And they
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Speaker 1: came to learn that the Soviets have hearts too, they
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Speaker 1: know how to love. Was it a real movie? Like, yeah,
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Speaker 1: it wasn't very good, but it was somebody actually put
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Speaker 1: out the effort to say, you know, hey, we're all
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Speaker 1: just people here, you know. Um, And what they were
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Speaker 1: doing actually was counter propaganda, right, Like all the that
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Speaker 1: was right off the cuff, two pounds um, all of
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Speaker 1: the all the stuff we were told, I would say,
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Speaker 1: at least the vast majority of it was lopsided at best.
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Speaker 1: Like do you remember what did you think of the
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Speaker 1: Russians when you were growing up? That they were like
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Speaker 1: they cut your throat just as soon as look at you,
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Speaker 1: And they were always standing in these horrible breadlines, and
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Speaker 1: like every single one of them wanted to escape, but
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Speaker 1: the Russian government wouldn't let her. They wanted up toilet papers.
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Speaker 1: They heard stories about they don't have blue jeans and
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Speaker 1: they don't have toilets. Yeah, like you could get you know,
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Speaker 1: five wives with the single pair of jeans if you
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Speaker 1: wouldn't ever the kind of thing. Yeah, well, I remember
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Speaker 1: when the Iron curtain fell and like actual news started
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Speaker 1: coming out of the the former USSR states that I
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Speaker 1: remember thinking, oh, yeah, what a surprise. All of that
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Speaker 1: was lies And they're actually kind of nice folks by
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Speaker 1: and large. I'm not saying that they weren't trying to
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Speaker 1: do bad things. When we were trying to do bad things. Well, no,
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Speaker 1: I think that that was the Russian people were good
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Speaker 1: people that came that. That's what I figured out when
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Speaker 1: the propaganda ended, the Cold War propaganda ended so abruptly,
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Speaker 1: is that we're all people like the average Russian is
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Speaker 1: like the average American at heart, with the same dreams, goals, aspirations,
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Speaker 1: same things that Kim or her. You know, it's the
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Speaker 1: same thing. And we didn't want our stockpiles of weapons
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Speaker 1: pointed in their direction either. You know, you're average American
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Speaker 1: probably didn't know, certainly not I didn't either. Let's just
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Speaker 1: get along, all right, So, Chuck, what we're talking about
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Speaker 1: clearly is propaganda, right, which in just that word, A
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Speaker 1: very smart person once said, um that propaganda is not
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Speaker 1: a dirty word, and it didn't end with the Cold War,
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Speaker 1: and that's actually true. But propaganda still has horrible connotations
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Speaker 1: just the word itself, right, I mean, it elicits images
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Speaker 1: of like brainwashed mass and that's it's definitely the case
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Speaker 1: in most cases when it comes to propaganda. But there's
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Speaker 1: a classical, more classical definition of propaganda, and essentially, Um,
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Speaker 1: it's that it's simply a tool for persuasive arguments, Um,
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Speaker 1: that use facts and beliefs, but omit facts and beliefs
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Speaker 1: that that would persuade people to the other side of
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Speaker 1: the argument, right. It's it's accentuating the positive in a way,
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Speaker 1: and you never talked about the negative side of the things. Right,
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Speaker 1: So it's sort of like Facebook, it is. It's very
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Speaker 1: much like Facebook. Um. I figured out that, um through
5:25
Speaker 1: reading this article how propaganda works. That technically the truth campaign,
5:29
Speaker 1: you know, to to get people to quit smoking comcials,
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Speaker 1: that's propaganda because they omit the fact that cigarettes make
5:37
Speaker 1: you alive with pleasure and flavor country. Right, So it's
5:42
Speaker 1: that's a little bit of both. I'm not sure we
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Speaker 1: should say the brands because I'm pretty sure Big Tobacco
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Speaker 1: would sue our parents. And you're right, you've come a
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Speaker 1: long way, nice chuck, Um. So yes, But the the
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Speaker 1: main hallmark of propaganda is that it includes omissions of facts, right. Um.
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Speaker 1: And actually, the where where did the whole word come from?
6:02
Speaker 1: You got any you got any info on that? Dude? Uh? Yeah,
6:06
Speaker 1: started with religion way back, and it started, you know,
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Speaker 1: hundreds of years before it was officially coined. But in
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Speaker 1: sixteen twenty two, Pope Gregory was I need to work
6:18
Speaker 1: in my room in new Pope Gregory fifteen established the
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Speaker 1: Congregation of Propaganda in sixty two, and that was basically
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Speaker 1: trying to win back Catholics who had taken up the
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Speaker 1: Protestant faith. Yeah, Martin Luther made a real damp in
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Speaker 1: the number of seats in the pews every Sunday. So
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Speaker 1: Pope Gregory formed the what was it, the Congregation of Propaganda. Um,
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Speaker 1: and they, oh you did say that, Holy cow man,
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Speaker 1: I gotta pay more attention. Basically, this Congregation of Propaganda,
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Speaker 1: you know, one Catholics back by pointing out that anyone
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Speaker 1: who doesn't take communion every week as a loser. And
6:52
Speaker 1: it worked, it did, sure, I'm sure numbers increased. So
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Speaker 1: since then, you know, from that point until I don't know,
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Speaker 1: the nineteen forties, there was absolutely no propaganda whatsoever. That's
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Speaker 1: probably not true. No, you don't think that's okay. I
7:06
Speaker 1: need to read a little more clearly World War One?
7:08
Speaker 1: Are we talking? Are we're gonna go with the history now?
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Speaker 1: I don't think we should get to that party. I
7:12
Speaker 1: think we should talk more about propaganda's implications. Right in
7:16
Speaker 1: the article, you you read that there was an interview
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Speaker 1: with a guy named em Laine Bruner. Yeah, he's a
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Speaker 1: professor of what rhetoric at Georgia State. Yeah, I didn't
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Speaker 1: know that was such a thing. I didn't either, but
7:28
Speaker 1: it's interesting for him. Um. But Brunner said that the
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Speaker 1: the distinction for him between good and bad propaganda was
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Speaker 1: whether or not, um, the the people perpetrating the propaganda
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Speaker 1: have the best interests of their audience at heart. Right, Yeah,
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Speaker 1: but that's subjective. I agree wholeheartedly. I take issue with
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Speaker 1: that because I think that it's up to the individual
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Speaker 1: to decide what his or her best interests, all right,
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Speaker 1: and to make the decision, you have to be fully informed. Well,
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Speaker 1: propaganda is based on an a mission of facts. You're
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Speaker 1: never fully informed when you're when you're being propagandized. Right,
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Speaker 1: So therefore there's no such thing as good propaganda. Sure,
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Speaker 1: you never see two both sides of the argument with propaganda, right, right,
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Speaker 1: So that's I don't think there is such a good
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Speaker 1: thing as I take issue. And he's a Georgia State.
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Speaker 1: He's not too far. Maybe we should hop on the
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Speaker 1: subway and go down him take issue with him. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: I want to take issue with this, professor, I got
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Speaker 1: some propaganda for you. Yeah. Uh, so, Chuck, how do
8:26
Speaker 1: you how do you get propaganda? Cross, Well, there's a
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Speaker 1: lot of techniques actually, and these are pretty cool. And
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Speaker 1: I know that when people hear these are going to
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Speaker 1: be very familiar, maybe not with the name, but with
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Speaker 1: the result. Yeah. Um, name calling is a big one. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: I I found a poster I showed you. Um, it's
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Speaker 1: a takeoff on that Shepherd Ferry right Obama political poster,
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Speaker 1: but this one it's a slightly different picture. He has
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Speaker 1: his nose in the air and it says snob under.
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Speaker 1: It's actually pretty funny. Yeah, especially since you want it's
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Speaker 1: a lot funnier because he won, right Yeah uh yeah, true.
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Speaker 1: I guess that was done before he won. Yeah uh.
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Speaker 1: And you know, name calling is that's just typical playground stuff.
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Speaker 1: But they do it on large you know, on a
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Speaker 1: large scale. Grown men and women in the political spectrum
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Speaker 1: call people out. They'll they'll use names to uh, they'll
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Speaker 1: use names like terrorists and trader and like evil doers.
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Speaker 1: Stuff that nobody wants to be right. Not to pick
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Speaker 1: too much on George Bush, but when you throw down
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Speaker 1: words like access of evil and evil doers. That's propaganda
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Speaker 1: definitely form Yeah, it is, it is, and it makes
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Speaker 1: you wonder like what exactly is going on in Iran
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Speaker 1: right now? How much propaganda we're experiencing from that? Sure,
9:40
Speaker 1: so that's one technique. Sure, you want to talk about
9:43
Speaker 1: the bandwagon, Well, bandwagon is pretty simple. It's like get
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Speaker 1: on the winning side, dummy, you know, which is actually
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Speaker 1: that example mixed name calling and bandwagon. Nobody wants to
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Speaker 1: feel left out, and again this is pretty much a
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Speaker 1: playground technique, which is still come with us, then you're
9:57
Speaker 1: and your other group, right, or you're gonna be left behind.
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Speaker 1: All your friends and neighbors are gonna be cooler than you,
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Speaker 1: smarter than you, richer than you, whatever, um. And you know,
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Speaker 1: everybody wants to be a part of something good, you know.
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Speaker 1: So yeah, basically with with the bandwagon technique, you're made
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Speaker 1: to feel like you can be a part of something
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Speaker 1: good if you join in, or be left behind if
10:19
Speaker 1: you don't. You got it. Thanks. I like this one
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Speaker 1: a lot. The glittering generalities. Yeah, it's a great name. Yeah,
10:26
Speaker 1: this is really common in political propaganda, and that's when
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Speaker 1: you combine words that have positive connotations the concept that
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Speaker 1: is beloved. So basically, no one's gonna come out and
10:37
Speaker 1: denounce something that you call And I have another example,
10:40
Speaker 1: and again not to put on pick on Bush, but
10:43
Speaker 1: he was in office for eight years. There's a lot
10:46
Speaker 1: of years. You know, there's a lot of recent things
10:48
Speaker 1: you can point to, like the Patriot Act. Like anyone
10:51
Speaker 1: who would come out and say, oh, the Patriot Act
10:53
Speaker 1: is bad, then what you're not a patriot not supporting? Yeah,
10:58
Speaker 1: But and the worst part is is it worked. Yeah,
11:01
Speaker 1: although do you remember one of the original provisions was
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Speaker 1: basically to turn postal workers into spies, and the post
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Speaker 1: Office said, no, we're not going to do that, right,
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Speaker 1: and it got left out. But they wanted postal workers
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Speaker 1: to keep an eye on what was going on, to
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Speaker 1: report on communities and individual people, right, Yeah, So other
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Speaker 1: words you can use in the glittering general generalities or
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Speaker 1: words like liberty and dreams and family and you you
11:26
Speaker 1: throw these words in there, and you know, God forbid
11:29
Speaker 1: you step up and say something that's anti family just
11:32
Speaker 1: because they tagged that name to it, right exactly, And
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Speaker 1: all all politicians do this. We're not we're not gonna
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Speaker 1: single things out. It happens all over the place on
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Speaker 1: both sides of the spectrum. Yeah, it's just that Bush
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Speaker 1: was in office for eight years, which I just said
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Speaker 1: you should listen. Cards stacking. Card stacking is exactly what
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Speaker 1: it sounds like. It's stacking. Uh, it's stacking the argument
11:56
Speaker 1: in the favor of one side over another. Right. Um,
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Speaker 1: and again this is the is the one that where
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Speaker 1: fact emission really comes into play, you know. Um And
12:04
Speaker 1: and it's most often seen in political campaigns where you know,
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Speaker 1: one candidate is like Broadwater. Have you ever seen Ali
12:11
Speaker 1: g Yeah, did you ever see the barat where he
12:14
Speaker 1: follows around that candidate, Jim Broadwater. It's hilarious. At one point,
12:19
Speaker 1: he tells a voter that Broadwater is talking to that
12:21
Speaker 1: if you do not vote for Broadwater, Broadwater will take power.
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Speaker 1: It's hilarious. And he compares him to Stalin. Yeah, and
12:29
Speaker 1: this is is poor you know Republican guys running for
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Speaker 1: city councilmen. But yeah, have Betty last you didn't? He
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Speaker 1: I don't know, I'd like to find that out. But yeah.
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Speaker 1: Card stacking is basically just um saying, here's our candidates great,
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Speaker 1: great attributes, leaving out any bad stuff. Well, details and
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Speaker 1: statistics too, Like they'll throw out legitimate studies, but studies
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Speaker 1: that don't mention the other study that can point out
12:53
Speaker 1: the exact opposite. Nice point, Chuck, card stacking like Facebook, Yeah,
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Speaker 1: it's exactly. And then it is my favorite fear. That's
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Speaker 1: a big one. So, Chuck, say we were to point
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Speaker 1: out that the guys who host tech stuff uh steal
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Speaker 1: babies in America and then sell them to human traffickers
13:17
Speaker 1: in the Balkans. You're saying that Jonathan Strickland and Chris
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Speaker 1: Puette would do that. I'm just saying I've heard things,
13:23
Speaker 1: So I mean, don't you think would be a good
13:25
Speaker 1: idea to not listen to their podcast and all the
13:28
Speaker 1: people who are tech stuff fans maybe come over and
13:31
Speaker 1: listen to us instead, because we certainly don't steal babies
13:34
Speaker 1: and we would never sell any to human traffickers if
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Speaker 1: we did. That's spaganda. Great example, Josh, thanks, of course,
13:40
Speaker 1: we have to do them on the tech Stuff podcast
13:42
Speaker 1: so they'd hear it. Yeah, good point. Uh, subliminal subliminal messaging.
13:49
Speaker 1: I'm sorry I should say it. Subliminally subliminal messaging. Huh.
13:53
Speaker 1: I feel like doing your bidding all of a sudden exactly,
13:56
Speaker 1: and that is, uh, that's one of the oldest tricks
13:58
Speaker 1: in the book. And that's basically images and whip. Yeah,
14:03
Speaker 1: it's oldest drick in the book. Now it's you know
14:05
Speaker 1: how it is. It's images and words that are so
14:07
Speaker 1: quick and abstract that you don't consciously recognize it. Again,
14:11
Speaker 1: we keep going back to politics because it's just so
14:13
Speaker 1: obvious with politics. But at any campaign poster for anyone,
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Speaker 1: from it somebody running for school board to somebody running
14:20
Speaker 1: for president, they always have red, white and blue in them.
14:23
Speaker 1: They'll often have a star or the the there there'll
14:26
Speaker 1: be a wavy graphic that's kind of reminiscent of a flag.
14:30
Speaker 1: And none of these things are concrete like that that
14:32
Speaker 1: you never see the candidate dress as a statue of liberty.
14:34
Speaker 1: They're actually wrapped in a flag. It's a little more
14:38
Speaker 1: subtle than that, but it has the same effect. Obama
14:41
Speaker 1: symbol was exactly like that. The one that they designed.
14:44
Speaker 1: It was kind of looked like the wavy flag in
14:46
Speaker 1: the circle. It makes the Owen snob, It doesn't it does.
14:50
Speaker 1: I'll show you more closely. But yeah, so, and actually
14:54
Speaker 1: a really good way to kind of pick out this
14:57
Speaker 1: kind of propaganda. What it's called transfer, right, um, is
15:02
Speaker 1: to pretend you're from another country. Right, so all of
15:07
Speaker 1: a sudden that wave, what's that wave for? Or what's
15:10
Speaker 1: that star for? Like stuff we just take for granted
15:13
Speaker 1: that immediately because in our neurons are like patriot, patriot,
15:16
Speaker 1: you know, Um, if you imagine you're from another country,
15:19
Speaker 1: suddenly you deconstruct these abstract images and it seems a
15:24
Speaker 1: little clunky, clumsy, doesn't have the same effect. What these
15:27
Speaker 1: way they star exactly in Soviet Russia, wavy star doesn't
15:31
Speaker 1: understand you. That's good, thank you that what do? What
15:37
Speaker 1: happened to that guy? And then lastly there's plain folks propaganda,
15:40
Speaker 1: which is kind of weak. Actually, yeah, that didn't. That
15:43
Speaker 1: didn't strike me as propaganda when I read it, like
15:46
Speaker 1: kind of the politician trying to seem like your average ordinary,
15:49
Speaker 1: you know, next door neighbor American. Um, I guess it's
15:53
Speaker 1: propaganda if the article says so, But it never struck
15:56
Speaker 1: me as that. Well, technically it is, because it's an
15:58
Speaker 1: omission of fact. So you know, if they sure the
16:01
Speaker 1: candidate loves fishing, but is he really fishing in some
16:04
Speaker 1: rinky dink rowboat that he rented from like a local fisherman.
16:07
Speaker 1: Or is he on like an eight foot yacht, you know,
16:10
Speaker 1: using babies that he bought off the tech stuff guys
16:12
Speaker 1: bait or or what did they set up some you
16:16
Speaker 1: know TV commercial where they did take him to that
16:18
Speaker 1: farm in the rinky dink rowboat and said, hey, excellent
16:22
Speaker 1: points with you for five most decidedly propaganda. Yeah, so yeah, plane, folks,
16:27
Speaker 1: is propaganda to and Chuck. The more you start looking
16:30
Speaker 1: or thinking about propaganda, the more you realize it is
16:33
Speaker 1: everywhere it is, Chuck, how well it's it's it's where
16:39
Speaker 1: you would expect it to be, which is in print,
16:41
Speaker 1: on the internet, TV, radio, movies, you name it. Like
16:45
Speaker 1: I was talking about with the with the eighties movies
16:47
Speaker 1: and the Cold War, I mean every every action movie
16:50
Speaker 1: that came out, the Russians were the enemy pretty much,
16:53
Speaker 1: and then kind of later on it became Middle Easterners
16:56
Speaker 1: were the enemy. Like look who Rambo fought and who
16:59
Speaker 1: Rocky thought. Those were prime examples the Russian. But he
17:02
Speaker 1: helped the mujah hadein a k a. The Taliban. He
17:06
Speaker 1: did what in uh one of the Rambo movies the
17:08
Speaker 1: third Rambo movie. He and at the very end it's
17:11
Speaker 1: they said that they dedicated the movie to the muja
17:14
Speaker 1: Hadean freedom fighters and the mujah Hadein who we were
17:17
Speaker 1: funding to help fight the Russians in Afghanistan turned into
17:22
Speaker 1: the Taliban won. What Chuck Norris is not happy about
17:27
Speaker 1: that at all. He's been after still long since in
17:30
Speaker 1: right and show a thing or two? Yeah, so apparently, Um,
17:33
Speaker 1: according to one of the uh the the professor's interviewed
17:36
Speaker 1: in this article, UM, broadcast media like radio or TV
17:43
Speaker 1: is the most dangerous propaganda medium because people tend to
17:47
Speaker 1: believe it. Well, not just that there's no discourse, it's
17:50
Speaker 1: all one sided. It's all here you ingest this. And
17:53
Speaker 1: also it's it's much it's very entertaining. You know, your
17:57
Speaker 1: average TV shows usually more entertain aiming then your average
18:01
Speaker 1: AP news article. Yeah that's true, you know what I mean.
18:04
Speaker 1: But ironically it's the AP news articles that are generally
18:08
Speaker 1: the least propagandic. Yeah, you're right, because you think about
18:11
Speaker 1: it's like fact fact fact, fact fact quote fact quack. Yes,
18:16
Speaker 1: that's that's actually a quote in a fact quack. Um,
18:19
Speaker 1: and then um, that's it, right, there's not. It's pretty
18:23
Speaker 1: bare bones. I like those political commercials. Those are great.
18:27
Speaker 1: Which one, you know, the big time propaganda where they're
18:31
Speaker 1: where they're you know, this candidate, your family, stuff like that.
18:35
Speaker 1: Do you remember the phone ringing one? I think it
18:37
Speaker 1: was a Clinton add against Obama. It was one of
18:40
Speaker 1: the last ones she ran during the primary, and it
18:43
Speaker 1: was just a phone ringing. Is that when the phone,
18:46
Speaker 1: when the phone rings in the middle of the night,
18:48
Speaker 1: who do you want as president to answer it? Something
18:51
Speaker 1: like that? Right, Yeah, that's that's definitely fear propagandia. Yeah.
18:54
Speaker 1: Those crack me up, though, I mean the people that
18:56
Speaker 1: buy into those, that's what scares me. The commerce themselves.
19:00
Speaker 1: I get a kick out of it. I think it's hysterical.
19:02
Speaker 1: Yeah that anyone wouldn't say this is so one sided.
19:05
Speaker 1: It's what's mind bogglingly frightening is that it actually works
19:09
Speaker 1: on some people, so um chuck. Propagana also sometimes is
19:15
Speaker 1: not necessarily contrived. It just kind of comes out. Like
19:19
Speaker 1: I spent a few years as a journalist, right and
19:21
Speaker 1: I realized that it is really easy for your beliefs
19:25
Speaker 1: to creep into a story. It doesn't matter whether it's
19:28
Speaker 1: a story about somebody who just turned a hundred or um,
19:31
Speaker 1: you know about the war in a rock is as
19:35
Speaker 1: unbiased as you try to be, it's impossible to be
19:38
Speaker 1: totally objective. Right in this very podcast. We get taken
19:42
Speaker 1: to task occasionally by people that think we're communist, communists,
19:47
Speaker 1: anti religious, sexist, Bommy worshippers, that kind of thing. But
19:51
Speaker 1: we're not any of those things. No, not really, And
19:54
Speaker 1: if we are, we're sure not aware of it anyway.
19:56
Speaker 1: But you know, your belief system informs your outlook, right,
20:00
Speaker 1: so you know, just the very position you're taking, just
20:03
Speaker 1: the very approach to an article, there's eighty hundred countless
20:07
Speaker 1: different ways to approach an article. The one you choose,
20:10
Speaker 1: even if you're trying to be objective, that's a choice
20:13
Speaker 1: that's a bias right out of the gate. And you're
20:15
Speaker 1: gonna choose the one that you identify with that you
20:17
Speaker 1: understand more. Yeah, so again, I mean, I guess what
20:19
Speaker 1: I'm trying to say is, if you're getting news, only
20:21
Speaker 1: get it from a p not a bad idea. Thank you, Chuck.
20:25
Speaker 1: You want to move along, uh different types of propaganda, Well,
20:29
Speaker 1: let let's talk about the internet real quick, because I
20:32
Speaker 1: find this interesting. The Internet actually has the potential to
20:35
Speaker 1: totally undermine traditional propaganda, right, So well, think about it, like,
20:40
Speaker 1: if broadcast programming is the most dangerous form propaganda because
20:44
Speaker 1: there's no feedback, then the Internet would be the least
20:48
Speaker 1: dangerous form because there's nothing but feedback. Social media has
20:51
Speaker 1: just opened the Internet up to everybody in any crack
20:54
Speaker 1: pot normal person saint can put this stuff on the
20:59
Speaker 1: Internet and and get opposing viewpoints out there, so you
21:03
Speaker 1: can conceivably just be a fully informed person to make
21:05
Speaker 1: your own decisions, which completely undermines um propaganda, right right.
21:11
Speaker 1: The problem is, you know, facts spreading lightning fast just
21:18
Speaker 1: as much as that undermines propaganda. Um, uninformed ideas or
21:23
Speaker 1: facts that aren't really facts can spread just as quickly,
21:27
Speaker 1: and that helps propaganda. So yeah, and the Internet is
21:30
Speaker 1: just rife with that kind of time. What my solution,
21:32
Speaker 1: Snopes dot com. Yeah, they're pretty good. So let's talk
21:35
Speaker 1: about the different types of propaganda and wrap this puppy
21:38
Speaker 1: up like a Christmas president. Religious propaganda was kind of
21:42
Speaker 1: where it all began, like we said earlier, and uh,
21:45
Speaker 1: missionaries yeah, for centuries have been uh even and they've
21:51
Speaker 1: been traveling to other countries trying to recruit others to
21:55
Speaker 1: their to their faith. And this is a form of
21:59
Speaker 1: propaganda pamphlets and the posters that they hand out, and
22:03
Speaker 1: and we're not saying that they're bad people and that
22:05
Speaker 1: they're spreading lies. What we're saying is that's a form
22:08
Speaker 1: of propaganda when you only evangelize the one side of
22:11
Speaker 1: the coin, and they do when you go to these
22:13
Speaker 1: countries tell people that this is the answer right here. Well,
22:16
Speaker 1: you can also make the case that another kind of
22:19
Speaker 1: propaganda the article points out, but doesn't join to religion,
22:22
Speaker 1: thought reform. There's actually a form of religious propaganda as well.
22:28
Speaker 1: You know, if you're running around worshiping like a d
22:30
Speaker 1: deities and the Christians come along and say, no, no,
22:34
Speaker 1: there's just one, we're monotheistic. Now, that's thought reform, right right, Yeah,
22:39
Speaker 1: although you know generally they don't give up kool aid
22:41
Speaker 1: that's laced with sinide. Now that that's a very cult
22:45
Speaker 1: But you know, all those those types of political religious,
22:48
Speaker 1: well especially political and religious propaganda, they kind of um
22:53
Speaker 1: underscore our divisive nature, right like us versus them. And
22:58
Speaker 1: actually took an anthropology us once in college and the
23:01
Speaker 1: professor challenged us to go a day, just one day,
23:05
Speaker 1: without using the words us or them or any variation
23:08
Speaker 1: on that theme. And I defy you to do it successfully.
23:13
Speaker 1: You can't start now the day's half over. You have
23:15
Speaker 1: to start tomorrow. Just those two words. You can say,
23:18
Speaker 1: we know no variation on the theme of us in
23:21
Speaker 1: us or them. Try it. It's tough. I'm gonna forget
23:25
Speaker 1: about that as soon as I leave this, yes studio check.
23:29
Speaker 1: The big one, though, of all of them, is government propaganda,
23:32
Speaker 1: right right, which is illegal since nightficially, and if you
23:35
Speaker 1: think about it, that government propaganda is taxpayers paying to
23:40
Speaker 1: be brainwashed, which is why it should be illegal, right yeah,
23:45
Speaker 1: And it has been since technically, but w Mr Bush
23:50
Speaker 1: in two thousand five actually signed the Stop Government Propaganda
23:54
Speaker 1: Now Bill to UH to keep some like blatant outright
23:58
Speaker 1: acts of propaganda commit by government agencies, like when you
24:02
Speaker 1: pay television reporters to skew a message like planting stories,
24:05
Speaker 1: planting stories exactly. Yeah. And it also established some that
24:10
Speaker 1: audio in printed press communication state who the agency is
24:15
Speaker 1: that funded it, like paid for by blah blah blah
24:18
Speaker 1: blah blah, that kind of thing, And we we see
24:20
Speaker 1: government propaganda, most prominently during times of war, right like
24:25
Speaker 1: Hitler and the Nazis were masters of propaganda. He was
24:28
Speaker 1: the king of propaganda in world history, I think. Yeah,
24:32
Speaker 1: he cut Germany off from the outside world. He sold
24:38
Speaker 1: radios for next to nothing. I think he was driving
24:41
Speaker 1: around in the back of a truck selling him. He
24:43
Speaker 1: made sure the prices were loft so every German could
24:45
Speaker 1: afford one, so they could tune into his radio addresses
24:48
Speaker 1: and and hear how great they were and how awful
24:50
Speaker 1: the Jews and everybody else was. Uh, and and the
24:53
Speaker 1: portrayal of what was going on, like Germans living in
24:58
Speaker 1: the in other parts of the world were being abused
25:00
Speaker 1: at the hands of their host countries and things like that. Um,
25:03
Speaker 1: And it was effective. Yeah. And they also made movies,
25:06
Speaker 1: the famous Nazi propaganda movies where they, you know, made
25:09
Speaker 1: out Jews to be rats and Hitler to be godlike
25:13
Speaker 1: and it was And they didn't like the Gypsies much either,
25:16
Speaker 1: or Gays or Catholics. Yeah. Yeah, you forget sometimes you
25:20
Speaker 1: know that it wasn't just the Jews that were persecuted
25:22
Speaker 1: in the Holocaust. There's a lot of other groups. Yeah.
25:26
Speaker 1: And here in the US here state side we had
25:29
Speaker 1: our own propaganda as well. And also we should say
25:32
Speaker 1: um on our very enjoyable sister podcast stuf you missed
25:36
Speaker 1: in history class, They actually did an entire podcast on
25:40
Speaker 1: the Nazi propaganda machinery. Yeah, yeah they should. People should
25:43
Speaker 1: check that out. You can get that on iTunes too.
25:45
Speaker 1: But again, state side, we had our own propaganda, and
25:48
Speaker 1: that's something that have become pop icons, right. Yes, and
25:51
Speaker 1: World War two was when it really kicked up. Like
25:53
Speaker 1: if you think of the famous Uncle Sam I want
25:56
Speaker 1: you posters with Uncle Sam pointing trying to get young
26:00
Speaker 1: American men to enlist in the army. Yeah, that was
26:02
Speaker 1: new in the forties. Yeah, and that was a big,
26:04
Speaker 1: big time propaganda posters were very effective back then. My
26:07
Speaker 1: favorite I had two favorites. One of them is what
26:10
Speaker 1: what which? One Rosie? Probably Rosie is pretty cool, um.
26:14
Speaker 1: But there was one that had somebody riding in a
26:16
Speaker 1: car by by by by himself and it said, um
26:20
Speaker 1: when you it was for car pooling, right, ration gas
26:23
Speaker 1: and stuff. When you ride alone, you ride with Hitler.
26:27
Speaker 1: How great would it be to have one of those posters? Now,
26:29
Speaker 1: I'm sure you can find at least a replica Yeah,
26:32
Speaker 1: that's true. I mean that. That's the other thing about
26:35
Speaker 1: him is they're like great art. Oh yeah, propaganda posters
26:38
Speaker 1: have the best art. Yeah, I like that that that era.
26:42
Speaker 1: The The other one I like is just I just
26:45
Speaker 1: can't believe it, like that. These were up in in
26:47
Speaker 1: on public display. Um during World War Two. There's a
26:51
Speaker 1: Japanese soldier using the butt of his rifle to smack
26:55
Speaker 1: an American pow in the chin, and it says, what
26:59
Speaker 1: are you going to do about it? And below is
27:03
Speaker 1: the answer. And the answer, according to this propaganda poster
27:06
Speaker 1: is stay on the job until every murdering Jap is
27:09
Speaker 1: wiped out. You're kidding. It even has a little Government
27:12
Speaker 1: Office of Propaganda logo at the bottom. Look, I kid
27:16
Speaker 1: you not. That's something else. Yeah, it's a little nuts.
27:19
Speaker 1: So yeah, well you go a little overboard during times
27:22
Speaker 1: of war. I liked Rosie the Riveter. That's who I
27:24
Speaker 1: thought you were going to mention. Have you seen my
27:27
Speaker 1: favorite mechanic as a woman over indicatory riff on that? Yeah?
27:31
Speaker 1: Successfully too. Um Yeah, Rosie the Riveter was famous obviously
27:35
Speaker 1: because women at the time during World War Two were
27:38
Speaker 1: encouraged to help the war at home. On the home
27:43
Speaker 1: front by working in the taking these factory jobs that
27:45
Speaker 1: the men had to leave. And as she became like
27:48
Speaker 1: an iconic character, and one of the posters read longing
27:52
Speaker 1: won't bring him back sooner, get a war job. Yeah,
27:55
Speaker 1: I love that. Yeah, it is. It's pretty cool that
27:57
Speaker 1: I saw another one who was a woman holding a
27:58
Speaker 1: giant key and it's a food ration ng is the
28:01
Speaker 1: key to the war effort. And and actually that was
28:04
Speaker 1: one of the things that I don't think you could
28:07
Speaker 1: predict that came out of propaganda was um, women suddenly
28:12
Speaker 1: were uh put into their proper position of power. They
28:17
Speaker 1: were elevated to that that kind of power. They were
28:19
Speaker 1: no longer the mirror little houndsewives. They were empowered to
28:23
Speaker 1: like actually help with the war effort, get a war job,
28:26
Speaker 1: or to um food ration food or do whatever. They
28:30
Speaker 1: suddenly had a role. And not just women but blacks
28:32
Speaker 1: as well. There was a propaganda poster that said like
28:35
Speaker 1: united we win and it was a black guy and
28:37
Speaker 1: a white guy working side by side, decades before the
28:40
Speaker 1: Civil rights movement. Yeah, so sometimes it's um it's foreshadowing
28:43
Speaker 1: of social change and possibly even a mechanism of social
28:46
Speaker 1: change that follows. Whatever the the the issue is it's
28:49
Speaker 1: being propagandized. I think definitely in the case of women,
28:52
Speaker 1: I think World two probably had a lot of good
28:55
Speaker 1: benefits for women, kind of having a voice for the
28:57
Speaker 1: first time, or not the first time, but probably a
29:01
Speaker 1: really big, curly on voice for the first time. Yeah yeah,
29:04
Speaker 1: um and Chuck, that's propaganda, baby. Yeah. You know. I
29:08
Speaker 1: had a movie idea, script idea when I was during
29:10
Speaker 1: my screenwriting days about a film student that gets um,
29:15
Speaker 1: like he wins the big student film award and then
29:17
Speaker 1: all of a sudden he gets whisked away by the
29:19
Speaker 1: government to the secret Layer and they recruit young filmmakers
29:23
Speaker 1: to the Ministry of Propaganda and like the moon landing
29:26
Speaker 1: was fake and all these things have been faked or what.
29:28
Speaker 1: We talked about that in another podcast. But this, yeah,
29:31
Speaker 1: this kid gets caught up into making these movies that
29:33
Speaker 1: are all faults and have the dog. Yeah. It's a
29:36
Speaker 1: great one too. Yeah, sort of a riff on that
29:38
Speaker 1: And I never wrote it, and I don't I'm not
29:39
Speaker 1: going to. So if anyone out there's a screenwriter a
29:41
Speaker 1: longs that idea, feel free, Yeah, just give a shout
29:44
Speaker 1: out to Chuck at the premiere, right right, Yeah, so
29:47
Speaker 1: again that's propaganda, that is right. So are we plugging
29:52
Speaker 1: anything to We haven't add nothing, Holy cow. That means
29:55
Speaker 1: we get to go right to listener mail Josh today.
30:03
Speaker 1: I think we uh, since it would be appropriate to
30:06
Speaker 1: talk about Molly Orshansky. Yeah, are less subject matter there.
30:10
Speaker 1: We were talking about the women in World War Two.
30:13
Speaker 1: We were uh, and also we mentioned that we have
30:16
Speaker 1: been called sexists and mommy worshipers. You want to read
30:20
Speaker 1: the letter in question. Yes, we actually got a couple
30:22
Speaker 1: of letters, um, one which we're going to read now,
30:26
Speaker 1: and one that was kind of nasty and mean, and
30:29
Speaker 1: we're not going to read that or we're not gonna
30:30
Speaker 1: say that uh, nasty, mean person's name. But this one
30:34
Speaker 1: was much more above board. Uh. This says you probably
30:37
Speaker 1: have received a bunch of emails about this, but I
30:39
Speaker 1: wanted to let you know that Molly or Shansky is
30:41
Speaker 1: a woman. If you recall, she is a woman who
30:44
Speaker 1: developed the poverty line. But in your podcast how much
30:47
Speaker 1: money do I Really Need to live? You referenced ms.
30:49
Speaker 1: Orshansky as a heat as a female graduate student of
30:52
Speaker 1: public policy with a specialization in poverty. I was so
30:55
Speaker 1: excited to hear you mentioned a woman who was so
30:58
Speaker 1: influential to the field. But then I was stremely disappointed
31:00
Speaker 1: when you got the gender wrong. Obviously she had a
31:03
Speaker 1: right to be and I hope you make this correction
31:05
Speaker 1: on your podcast. And that comes from Cheryl Master in
31:08
Speaker 1: public policy candidate at the John F. Kennedy School of
31:11
Speaker 1: Government at Harvard University. And I wrote Cheryl back and
31:14
Speaker 1: thanked her for being kind since we had gotten the
31:16
Speaker 1: nasty letter calling its misogynistic freaks and it was a
31:21
Speaker 1: big mistake. We were wrong, and the research that we
31:25
Speaker 1: got actually referenced uh, Molly rus Chancey as a key
31:29
Speaker 1: and so it wasn't some big assumption on our part
31:32
Speaker 1: that it had to be a man. Great wait, Chuck, Chuck,
31:34
Speaker 1: I've been thinking about this. I think at this point
31:36
Speaker 1: we should make up a research team and lay this
31:41
Speaker 1: hot in their feet. I don't think we should take
31:43
Speaker 1: any responsibility to what spear you right? Right, So, Chuck Um,
31:48
Speaker 1: it was our research team that really uh dropped the
31:51
Speaker 1: ball on this one. It wasn't you or I We
31:53
Speaker 1: were misinformed. We did We did not assume like a
31:56
Speaker 1: couple of readers or listeners have thought that we didn't
31:59
Speaker 1: assume that it is a man just because it was
32:01
Speaker 1: some big college. It wasn't us at all that we
32:03
Speaker 1: don't do that cut. But to make up for the
32:04
Speaker 1: failings of our crack research team, who have been chastised,
32:08
Speaker 1: um since we got this pointed out to us, well fired,
32:10
Speaker 1: We fired them both. It's a different way of putting it.
32:13
Speaker 1: In this economy, you want to stay chastised. We didn't
32:15
Speaker 1: fire anyone. I'm just kidding. UM. So we did a
32:18
Speaker 1: little research into Maali or Shansky. We found out that
32:20
Speaker 1: she is dead. She died in April two thousand seven.
32:24
Speaker 1: And she actually was quite a pioneer UM in her field.
32:28
Speaker 1: She worked for the Social Security Administration from nineteen fifty
32:31
Speaker 1: eight to nineteen eighty two, and uh, as historian Alice
32:35
Speaker 1: O'Connor wrote in Poverty Knowledge, she was one of a
32:38
Speaker 1: respected but mostly invisible cardro of women research professor professionals
32:43
Speaker 1: based at Social Security Administration and other government agencies during
32:47
Speaker 1: the postwar years. And I think that's part of the
32:50
Speaker 1: part of the problem. I think, um, we as you
32:54
Speaker 1: know thirty early thirty somethings, well, one of us is
32:57
Speaker 1: in early thirty somethings in two thousand nine kind of
33:00
Speaker 1: Um underestimated what women were allowed to do, I think
33:05
Speaker 1: in the sixties. Right, that's fair enough. Sure so, because
33:10
Speaker 1: you don't hear much about it. No, they were, no,
33:13
Speaker 1: I know, and that is that is the travesty. And
33:15
Speaker 1: I even thought, like when we were doing that podcast,
33:18
Speaker 1: like Molly is a weird name for a guy. But
33:20
Speaker 1: I did too. Still, I thought it was an Irish thing,
33:22
Speaker 1: and I thought Mally Orshansky. I could see a guy
33:25
Speaker 1: being named Molly or Chansky, right, So it was. It
33:27
Speaker 1: was a mistake, I would say, much more notable or
33:31
Speaker 1: noteworthy than being invisible, you know. But successful was that
33:34
Speaker 1: she actually um has helped countless uh, impoverished people in
33:40
Speaker 1: the United States absolutely by creating this poverty line, which
33:43
Speaker 1: basically forces the government's hand into saying, Okay, if you're
33:46
Speaker 1: below this, we're gonna help you, right uh. And this
33:49
Speaker 1: is largely due to her work as a mathematician and statisticians.
33:53
Speaker 1: True trailblazer. He was a great man. He was hats
33:56
Speaker 1: off to you, Mr George Shansky. So if you want
33:59
Speaker 1: to say, and checking emails, taking us to task, or
34:02
Speaker 1: pointing out an error or just say hi. Whatever, gender confusion.
34:06
Speaker 1: If you want to call us sexist mommy worshipers, whatever,
34:09
Speaker 1: We accept all comers. You can send that to stuff
34:13
Speaker 1: podcast at how stuff works dot com. For more on
34:19
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics, visit how stuff works
34:22
Speaker 1: dot com and be sure to check out this stuff
34:24
Speaker 1: you Should Know blog on the house stuff works dot
34:26
Speaker 1: com home page. Brought to you by the reinvented two
34:31
Speaker 1: thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you