Tuesday January 3, 2023; 9:14 AM EST
- Propaganda is language intended to deceive people, meant to enrage them or make them docile. Seems we could all agree on that. But a couple of years ago the tallest building in town was renovated and renamed, and suddenly at the top floor the words Liberty Tower appeared, visible from afar. I imagine that the new name pleases some people, but it had a nagging effect on me. It felt like an empty gesture, perhaps, as if saying patriot words or painting them big on a building was in itself meaningful. It felt empty, or too easy a gesture. It felt like a step in the direction of patriotism being expressed endlessly. Like singing the national anthem between every inning of a ballgame. #
- I'm sure some liked the change, so why did it strike me that way?#
- It seems to empty important language of specificity, maybe, empty it of meaning, make it rote, make it maybe into an unsanctioned and thoughtless ritual, make it a form of language indoctrination. Make people feel the need to stand at attention most of the time? I'm not sure. But it felt both empty and indoctrinating to me.#
- And so I'll add to my opening sentence: Propaganda is language intended to deceive people, meant to enrage them or make them docile, language meant to turn important words into shallow rituals, language meant to fill the air with unquestionable generalities, meant to degrade public discourse and muffle or stifle the harder discussions we need to be having. #
- It's branding masquerading as democratic practice.#
- Paint a patriotic word high on the nearest tall building and see what you think?#
- PS. A passing thought, probably not original, is that enraging people can be a way of making them docile because it turns their attention away from the role the propaganda-maker has in maintaining an oppressive status quo. It's can be a distraction meant to stop thinking, yes?#