The first edition of ‘In the Parlour’ discusses how propaganda is used to undermine democracy and reduce free will. It also offers up a solution to enable democracy to be enhanced and to empower the public consciousness.
Focusing on the likes of Colonel Tom Walker, Edward Bernays and George Monbiot, Keith Lindsay-Cameron and Jason Cridland investigate how the state disempowers the public through the use of bias and often untrue content to manipulate us to their desired outcomes.
Finally it suggests that the penalties for media transgression should be much stricter.
As Jason says in the opening of this episode of ‘In the Parlour’, we all do propaganda. Every time we colour or embellish a story, an issue, a situation in our favour, to make us look good or to garner sympathy or to disguise our culpability, we are using propaganda. Which is just ‘human nature’ really. However, the use and abuse of propaganda by the government or media as a tool of mass manipulation is the practice of deceit and a much darker beast.
That’s the beast which Edward Bernays unleashed on the world to effectively dumb down the people in order to control them. It is one thing to try to save face or win someone over, and quite another to call cigarettes ‘Torches of Freedom’ to persuade women to smoke to fill the coffers of tobacco corporations.
Today the need to be hyper vigilant to propaganda and the machinations of power are such important issues the future of the human race may depend on it.
Tom Moore
This is a classic example of how language is used to manipulate the reader. There is no doubting the wonderful efforts of Tom but The Telegraph uses patriotic and nationalistic narrative in preference to just the facts. Its analysis leaves out more than it includes to push the reader in a direction chosen by the ethos of the specific media. This is propaganda.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/30/captain-tom-moore-birthday-colonel-flypast-raf-spitfire/
Edward Bernays
George Monbiot
Please comment below and add your thoughts to the nature and pervasiveness of propaganda.
In the next edition we will be discussing the nature of schooling and education.
