What is Propaganda and How Do We Define it?
“All propaganda is lies, even when one is telling the truth.” George Orwell
Propaganda is a dirty word!
Interestingly however the term’s negative connotations are in truth quite a recent development!
Etymologically stemming from the Latin term ‘to spread’ — the term was originally associated with education and the propagation of information. Something that most people would agree to be a good thing.
This however would all change after the rise of Nazi Germany. When Adolf Hitler would introduce Joseph Goebbels, a philologist and Nazi loyalist, into his Cabinet as the Minister of Propaganda.
In his position Goebbels would snatch control of almost all German media platforms, from newspapers to film and everything in between, and in turn almost fully monopolized all German communication networks!
And using his newly acquired platform Goebbels bombarded the German populace with a series of ideological bombs — each of which aimed at demonizing marginalized groups within Nazi Germany such as gipsies, homosexuals, Slavs and mainly Jews!
His endeavour's proving so successful that they eventually culminated in the tragic events of the Holocaust which refers to the systematic round-up, torture and murder of said marginalized groups.
One of the most tragic genocides of recent history — made possible in part by Joseph Goebbels wide communicative network!
These events are far and away the primary roots of the term’s negative connotations!
But the ramifications of this linguistic development has rendered us today with a very vague understanding of what constitutes propaganda.
Prior to said events propaganda referred to all forms of information dissemination as well as some educational platforms but now in a very broad sense it refers to said practices’ but with a malicious intent.
Poisoning the minds of the populace if you wish!
Meaning that in the present the term “Propaganda” essentially refers to the dissemination of harmful information(emphasis being on the term harmful)!
This however presents quite a significant categorization issue due to the problem of subjectivity — something one person deems to be negative another may deem to be positive (and vice versa)!
Now to some this issue may seem to be overstated — after all the overwhelming majority of people would vehemently agree that the dissemination of information for the sake of demonizing groups for immutable properties is a gargantuan negative!
However in less radical contexts this line becomes a lot harder to define. In an electoral context for example dissemination information beneficial to a specific candidate can be deemed as fair by said candidates’ supporters and propaganda for detractors!
But despite this subjective context a glaring distinction between information dissemination and propaganda may seem to be the obvious solution to the subjectivity problem!
Lies.
Propaganda, based upon this interpretation, refers to untruthful information dissemination.
A category that may seem alluring upon first reflection.
In reality however this notion to seems incomplete due to its over simplicity!
You see, truth, especially independent of context can in itself be dishonest.
A statement which ironically itself sound like propaganda. Something that you would read in the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four!
But as the novel’s own author himself states in the aforementioned quote even truth may constitute propaganda within specific contexts!
To illustrate this point succinctly just consider the statement (assuming it to be a truthful statement)
“The pirate attacked Saint Charlos”!
This clearly paints the pirate as an aggressor and Saint Charlos as a victim.
But now just imagine that this exchange took place at a slave auction in which, after purchasing a slave that the pirate was attempting to emancipate Saint Charlos went on to shoot another one of said pirates’ friends thus triggering him to lash out!
Well in light of this one can now understand how despite its truthfulness the first statement can still be classified as propaganda.
But this of course begs the question — what exactly is propaganda? Well, whilst the term is bound to fall into some sort of subjective loop some basic universals may nonetheless be determined to categorise the term.
Said criteria predominantly related to intent!
In other words propaganda is the dissemination of information with the specific intent to be misleading — whether by way of a pure lie or an uncontextualized truth!
And this is the precise reason why propaganda is so difficult to delineate — because intent is practically impossible to read without some sort of supernatural abilities!
This however isn’t to say that delineating propaganda is completely impossible to do!
In the case of Goebbels and Nazi Germany for example, throwing the label upon the Ministry is an easy thing to do (and not just because it was literally called the Ministry for Propaganda)!
Ironically therefore the primary method for recognising propaganda is by doing the very thing that propagandists emit — context!
In conclusion therefore propaganda is often difficult to categorise due to its inherent relation to intent of purpose, but by contextualising information dissemination to a series of factors one may nonetheless recognise propaganda in action.
Within upcoming articles I will analyse a case study that sits on the border between propaganda and non-propaganda in turn leaving the reader to jumpt to their own conclusions on the fact!
