Saturday January 21, 2023; 7:11 AM EST
- We usually think of propaganda as language meant to deceive, don't we? And then we go looking for signs of falseness. But if we shoot a different slant of light through the topic and think of propaganda as language meant to disrupt, corrupt or paralyze the social order, a further part of the mechanism of propaganda might come into view. Language meant to distract? Meant to confuse? Meant to bog down the system? Meant to create incidents that are themselves treated as news, and to ride a wave of self-propagating waves forward into the sunset? Language meant to make a bold or subtle clearing for the operations of power?#
- I think a case can be made that some types of political language are meant to challenge the social order, are meant to incite and propagate fresh thought through the social order. Thought that holds more complexity in the public eye in order that something may be changed. I would rather not call this kind of language use propaganda. Another word?#