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>You can’t call things that rustle your jimmies propaganda just like you can’t call news you don’t like fake. I don't think that's a great analogy. Oliver is b

>You can’t call things that rustle your jimmies propaganda just like you can’t call news you don’t like fake. I don't think that's a great analogy. Oliver is biased and he has never pretended to be a journalist. He presents stories he cares about from a specific viewpoint. The definition of propaganda is: >information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view. Seems fitting. Just because you may agree does not make it any less propaganda. Essentially any narrative which is not 100% fact based and unbiased is technically propaganda.

dagw 8y ago
Essentially any narrative which is not 100% fact based and unbiased is technically propaganda. So in your world is all news propaganda?
- EpicEng 8y ago
  In my world, which is the same as yours, where the word "propoganda" has a definition, I consider all news which fits the definition to in fact be propaganda, yes. Let me ask you this? Do you consider Fox News propaganda? How about MSNBC? CNN? If not, which shows specifically? I'm fairly certain the _majority_ of what those networks air falls squarely in the propaganda bucket because what they air is primarily dictated by how much money they think it will make them. An example of news which I would not consider propaganda is PBS Newshour. In general they are pretty good. Not easy to tell though; you really have to do a lot of work on your own to be certain.
  - eeeuo 8y ago
    > "I'm fairly certain the _majority_ of what those networks air falls squarely in the propaganda bucket because what they air is primarily dictated by how much money they think it will make them." This explanation seems confused to me. Is the primary concern of these networks ideology or is it profit? If it's ideology, then profit does not dictate their content. If it's profit, then ideology does not dictate their content. There, of course, is overlap, but there must be one primary goal that ultimately decides content. Personally, I do not believe those news organizations are propaganda because I do not believe they would forego profit to push an ideological stance. In contrast, I believe that state media in China would forego profits to push an ideological stance. As a real world example, we can consider how the New York Times pushed the Clinton e-mail story ad nausem in the lead up to the 2016 election, despite this being in opposition to the ideology of the majority of its readers.
- justinclift 8y ago
  It does kind of seem that way. At least, what people generally call "mainstream media.. ;)"
ctrl-j 8y ago
I mean... under that definition isn't all media propaganda? At that point does it just depend on whether or not you choose to use the term in a pejorative manner? If any biased claim can be called propaganda - then it seems the word loses it's meaning. Perhaps the word propaganda is losing it's weight over time? Do we need a specific word for state sanctioned biased media? Or perhaps one specifically for attacks on political states or policies?
- EpicEng 8y ago
  >I mean... under that definition isn't all media propaganda? At that point does it just depend on whether or not you choose to use the term in a pejorative manner? If you define "all media" as MSNBC, CNN, and Fox News, then sure. Of course it's a spectrum as well. For example I'd consider PBS a _far_ less biased source than e.g. Fox News, but I'm sure they have their moments as well. I'm not sure writing everything off as propaganda (or not) is useful in any way.
  - skinnymuch 8y ago
    PBS still isn’t 100% unbiased like what you said would have to be the case for not technically propaganda. Seems a bit extreme and ridiculous to define propaganda as that.
    - EpicEng 8y ago
      >PBS still isn’t 100% unbiased like what you said would have to be the case for not technically propaganda. Seems a bit extreme and ridiculous to define propaganda as that. You realize that _I_ am not defining anything, right? I suggest you write Webster. I think the problem is the pedantry of your typical engineer. No one is saying that all propaganda is equal, or that it is all inherently bad. Per a literal reading of the definition I find it hard to accept anything other than a laying out of factual data to not be propaganda, but it can be minor (e.g. PBS), major (e.g. Fox News), or somewhere in between. That's why I said above that I don't think this is a terribly useful discussion. But if you don't agree with that then maybe we can come to common ground on the "especially of a... misleading nature." Some reporting, even if biased, is far more misleading than the rest. So if Oliver presents the facts (_all_ the relevant facts) and then shares his interpretation of those facts, not propaganda I suppose. However, if anything relevant is left out I don't know how you can call it balanced.
ggggtez 8y ago
Once again, it seems like people who read dictionaries missed the boat. Propaganda has a specific legal definition which maybe is more relevant than what you found in Webster.
- EpicEng 8y ago
  >Once again, it seems like people who read dictionaries missed the boat. Yes, those darn dictionary readers... From Black's Law Dictionary[1]: >A message that is aimed at a specific audience that will try to change their thinking to that of the person releasing such propoganda. It will often contain disinformation to promote a certain view point in politics. Not sure why they chose to use the word they're defining in the definition, but how precisely is that significantly different? We can debate the level of disinformation in any specific context, but this sounds about the same to me. [1] https://thelawdictionary.org/propaganda/ https://thelawdictionary.org/propaganda/
394549 8y ago
> Oliver is biased and he has never pretended to be a journalist. He presents stories he cares about from a specific viewpoint. The definition of propaganda is: >> information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view. I think the key word there is misleading. Having a genuinely-held viewpoint and expressing it through media isn't propaganda, it's opinion and commentary. Things get into propaganda territory when there's an element of deliberate dishonesty or misdirection or when it occurs in the context of coercive censorship of other viewpoints. Oliver's segment was not misleading and it was not dishonest, therefore it was not propaganda. In fact, it is an example of the kind of free exchange of ideas that's required for an open society to operate. Examined on certain axes, it's actually the opposite of propaganda.
- EpicEng 8y ago
  >I think the key word there is misleading. Having a genuinely-held viewpoint and expressing it through media isn't propaganda, it's opinion and commentary. It's misleading if you omit facts which run contrary to your narrative. I have no idea if this is the case in the China episode, but he has done this previously (specifically thinking about some comments he made on the wage gap, but I'd have to hunt for others.)
  - 394549 8y ago
    > It's misleading if you omit facts which run contrary to your narrative. I have no idea if this is the case in the China episode, but he has done this previously Even though I don't know you, I'm sure at some point you've omitted some fact that was contrary to your option or some narrative you were expressing (because literally everyone has). Does that make you a propagandist and everything you write propaganda? Oliver's recent Xi Jinping segment wasn't propaganda, it was an op-ed/satire that was obviously produced under length constraints. If your operational definition of propaganda allows you to label all expressions of opinion as propaganda unless they're ponderously lengthy (so as to never omit a thing that some critic might want to see), then I think your definition is flawed.
    - 8y ago

dagw 8y ago

Essentially any narrative which is not 100% fact based and unbiased is technically propaganda. So in your world is all news propaganda?

EpicEng 8y ago
In my world, which is the same as yours, where the word "propoganda" has a definition, I consider all news which fits the definition to in fact be propaganda, yes. Let me ask you this? Do you consider Fox News propaganda? How about MSNBC? CNN? If not, which shows specifically? I'm fairly certain the _majority_ of what those networks air falls squarely in the propaganda bucket because what they air is primarily dictated by how much money they think it will make them. An example of news which I would not consider propaganda is PBS Newshour. In general they are pretty good. Not easy to tell though; you really have to do a lot of work on your own to be certain.
- eeeuo 8y ago
  > "I'm fairly certain the _majority_ of what those networks air falls squarely in the propaganda bucket because what they air is primarily dictated by how much money they think it will make them." This explanation seems confused to me. Is the primary concern of these networks ideology or is it profit? If it's ideology, then profit does not dictate their content. If it's profit, then ideology does not dictate their content. There, of course, is overlap, but there must be one primary goal that ultimately decides content. Personally, I do not believe those news organizations are propaganda because I do not believe they would forego profit to push an ideological stance. In contrast, I believe that state media in China would forego profits to push an ideological stance. As a real world example, we can consider how the New York Times pushed the Clinton e-mail story ad nausem in the lead up to the 2016 election, despite this being in opposition to the ideology of the majority of its readers.
justinclift 8y ago
It does kind of seem that way. At least, what people generally call "mainstream media.. ;)"

ctrl-j 8y ago

I mean... under that definition isn't all media propaganda? At that point does it just depend on whether or not you choose to use the term in a pejorative manner? If any biased claim can be called propaganda - then it seems the word loses it's meaning. Perhaps the word propaganda is losing it's weight over time? Do we need a specific word for state sanctioned biased media? Or perhaps one specifically for attacks on political states or policies?

EpicEng 8y ago
>I mean... under that definition isn't all media propaganda? At that point does it just depend on whether or not you choose to use the term in a pejorative manner? If you define "all media" as MSNBC, CNN, and Fox News, then sure. Of course it's a spectrum as well. For example I'd consider PBS a _far_ less biased source than e.g. Fox News, but I'm sure they have their moments as well. I'm not sure writing everything off as propaganda (or not) is useful in any way.
- skinnymuch 8y ago
  PBS still isn’t 100% unbiased like what you said would have to be the case for not technically propaganda. Seems a bit extreme and ridiculous to define propaganda as that.
  - EpicEng 8y ago
    >PBS still isn’t 100% unbiased like what you said would have to be the case for not technically propaganda. Seems a bit extreme and ridiculous to define propaganda as that. You realize that _I_ am not defining anything, right? I suggest you write Webster. I think the problem is the pedantry of your typical engineer. No one is saying that all propaganda is equal, or that it is all inherently bad. Per a literal reading of the definition I find it hard to accept anything other than a laying out of factual data to not be propaganda, but it can be minor (e.g. PBS), major (e.g. Fox News), or somewhere in between. That's why I said above that I don't think this is a terribly useful discussion. But if you don't agree with that then maybe we can come to common ground on the "especially of a... misleading nature." Some reporting, even if biased, is far more misleading than the rest. So if Oliver presents the facts (_all_ the relevant facts) and then shares his interpretation of those facts, not propaganda I suppose. However, if anything relevant is left out I don't know how you can call it balanced.

ggggtez 8y ago

Once again, it seems like people who read dictionaries missed the boat. Propaganda has a specific legal definition which maybe is more relevant than what you found in Webster.

EpicEng 8y ago
>Once again, it seems like people who read dictionaries missed the boat. Yes, those darn dictionary readers... From Black's Law Dictionary[1]: >A message that is aimed at a specific audience that will try to change their thinking to that of the person releasing such propoganda. It will often contain disinformation to promote a certain view point in politics. Not sure why they chose to use the word they're defining in the definition, but how precisely is that significantly different? We can debate the level of disinformation in any specific context, but this sounds about the same to me. [1] https://thelawdictionary.org/propaganda/ https://thelawdictionary.org/propaganda/

394549 8y ago

> Oliver is biased and he has never pretended to be a journalist. He presents stories he cares about from a specific viewpoint. The definition of propaganda is: >> information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view. I think the key word there is misleading. Having a genuinely-held viewpoint and expressing it through media isn't propaganda, it's opinion and commentary. Things get into propaganda territory when there's an element of deliberate dishonesty or misdirection or when it occurs in the context of coercive censorship of other viewpoints. Oliver's segment was not misleading and it was not dishonest, therefore it was not propaganda. In fact, it is an example of the kind of free exchange of ideas that's required for an open society to operate. Examined on certain axes, it's actually the opposite of propaganda.

EpicEng 8y ago
>I think the key word there is misleading. Having a genuinely-held viewpoint and expressing it through media isn't propaganda, it's opinion and commentary. It's misleading if you omit facts which run contrary to your narrative. I have no idea if this is the case in the China episode, but he has done this previously (specifically thinking about some comments he made on the wage gap, but I'd have to hunt for others.)
- 394549 8y ago
  > It's misleading if you omit facts which run contrary to your narrative. I have no idea if this is the case in the China episode, but he has done this previously Even though I don't know you, I'm sure at some point you've omitted some fact that was contrary to your option or some narrative you were expressing (because literally everyone has). Does that make you a propagandist and everything you write propaganda? Oliver's recent Xi Jinping segment wasn't propaganda, it was an op-ed/satire that was obviously produced under length constraints. If your operational definition of propaganda allows you to label all expressions of opinion as propaganda unless they're ponderously lengthy (so as to never omit a thing that some critic might want to see), then I think your definition is flawed.
  - 8y ago