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The first sentence is accurate; you say you want 'honesty' but are unable to deal with very simple factual information yourself, because it's unpalatable? Othe

The first sentence is accurate; you say you want 'honesty' but are unable to deal with very simple factual information yourself, because it's unpalatable? Otherwise, you are misunderstanding the nature of Public Communications. The idea that somehow sidelining some confusing information, to focus on simple messaging is somehow 'dishonest' is wrong and naive. It would cause massive harm. FYI - the strongest example of this is with masks. It's why they told you 'Mask were not necessary' at first (because 300M buying masks in a panic would negate the ability of doctors to get masks), but then, as supplies became available, and the marginal value of masks would make sense for the general public - the CDC turned upside down and told you masks were essential. That's Dr. Fauci doing his job. You have 350 Million people to get vaccinated and you have to communicate to them the availability and safety of vaccinations. About 1/2 of the population has some degree of literacy and education, they watch the news, they roughly believe the government. They watch Dr. Fauci somewhat consistently and roughly understand what he is saying. They are compliant on some level. But the other 1/2 are not. Millions don't have the capacity to parse through the information, either in terms of intellectual foundation, vocabulary, etc.. Millions don't watch any news. Millions don't believe anything the government says. Millions believe in some other conspiracy theory. Millions are lazy and don't care. Millions are in social or work environments that reinforce all of this. Millions - even among the literate camp are unnecessarily skeptical about vaccines. ... We're in the middle of a pandemic mass killing elderly, we finally have a vaccine, it's on the news every single night, on every station in, in Canada - and yet only 1/2 (!!!) of eligible seniors are showing up to get vaccine in Toronto? It's similar elsewhere. That's really bad. I have friends who don't really understand what is being said about the risks of AZ vaccine, others making irrational claims and 'waiting out' for their preferred vaccine which is literally 100% against the often repeated policy of the government and scientific consensus. Dr. Bonnie Henry of BC goes on TV every 2 days and gives an amazingly detailed presentation about COVID updates. I usually watch it. Epidemioligal graphs etc.. You know how many viewers there are? About 10 0000. 10K viewers among 6 million target citizens. Now that particular form of messaging isn't going to be remotely sufficient in getting the word out is it? ... So how do you communicate important information with people that are too dumb, incapable, unwilling, irrationally skeptical, not paying attention, because it's their lives depend on it? Popular individuals with social credibility move masses - not scientists or even 'facts'. Obviously, messaging needs to be truthful and credible, but in a simplified format. You market the idea using communications that will get the message across, by people that have credibility within groups, and who can draw enough attention. Oprah is beloved and respected among huge numbers of people, particularly African American women who are considerably more likely to be vaxx skeptical than other groups - and who are also way more likely to die from COVID. It's similar with politics - do you remember her endorsement of Obama: 'He Is The One' ? Not only that, Oprah and her communications team are Master Communicators. She knows exactly how to say something the right way, to get a message across. Otherwise, entertainers and athletes are who people pay attention to and look up to. You want to get people down to the vax centre: get Michael Jordan there. In some places they are having lotteries - get vaxxed - win a million dollars. That's brilliant. If children were a target of COVID and neededed to get vaxxed then if I were president I would practically 'executive order' Marvel and DC comics hers to make little vax vignettes with Superman getting vaccinated: 'Even Superman Needs His Vaccine, Did You Get Yours? Ask Your Parents'. If the government were more effective in communicating, they'd be addressing the 'bottom 50%' using better methods. To think that we use more effective strategies to sell breakfast cereal and iPhones ... than we do critical, life-saving vaccines is kind of pathetic.

Natsu 5y ago
I never said it was inaccurate, I said it was terrible. You can't look down your nose at people--even accurately--and expect them to trust you with their health decisions. I explained it in a comment up thread, but the techniques to push things on people via social proof and whatnot smack of manipulation and people are rightfully suspect of that. Right now, half the anti-vaxxers or otherwise hesitant spend their time pointing out all the people encouraging them to vaxx as they're suspect of their motives. You can certainly get some of the people some of the time, but I don't think this is a stable foundation. It doesn't help that accuracy hasn't always been the first goal. I don't think you can fully hide or sideline the confusion and when it comes out, it just create mistrust. So you're right that this is about trust, but... manipulation doesn't lead to long term trust. If you read How to Win Friends and Influence People nowadays, you can see the stereotype of a smarmy old-timey salesman in it. A lot of the techniques there are burnt out and the very first chapter is basically a long-winded attempt to use social proof on you the reader that this book is awesome. Now it is a very insightful book, I won't say otherwise, but you can also see that some of this stuff doesn't hold up over time, especially when it's getting misused.
- jollybean 5y ago
  1) Communicating in terms that people understand is not manipulative. Developing Social Consensus through Medical Propaganda, you could argue is manipulative, yes, but it's an inherent artifact of fighting off an existential threat to the wellbeing of the community. You must herd most of the cats into the pen to get vaccinated or they will die. 2) Get away from the idea that there's something wrong or immoral with identifying that some people are smarter than others, more conscientious, lazier, inept, disagreeable. In a crisis (and otherwise) we need to deal with actual reality. 3) You need to communicate with people at their level. There are plenty of people smarter than you and I who might want to be communicated with in different terms than you and I might expect - the same goes for less literate. Children obviously are not developed, and talking about facts is pointless. So you get Superman to tell them. Oprah has more credibility to 1/2 the population that the media. So you get her to say it in the way she thinks will work best. ... The Scientific Literature is public information, it's openly available, and frankly, the national health advisers are on TV 10x more than they even need to be, they've 'over explained' everything so 'transparency' for the most part has never been a problem. It's not like we're telling people giant wartime lies to keep them onside. If you gave yourself the job of getting everyone vaxxed, and then you realize that 1/2 of people were not showing up, you'd quickly start to alter your plan and arrive at much the same conclusions. We've been doing this since the dawn of time, often in much worse ways, this is Public Communications.

Natsu 5y ago

I never said it was inaccurate, I said it was terrible. You can't look down your nose at people--even accurately--and expect them to trust you with their health decisions. I explained it in a comment up thread, but the techniques to push things on people via social proof and whatnot smack of manipulation and people are rightfully suspect of that. Right now, half the anti-vaxxers or otherwise hesitant spend their time pointing out all the people encouraging them to vaxx as they're suspect of their motives. You can certainly get some of the people some of the time, but I don't think this is a stable foundation. It doesn't help that accuracy hasn't always been the first goal. I don't think you can fully hide or sideline the confusion and when it comes out, it just create mistrust. So you're right that this is about trust, but... manipulation doesn't lead to long term trust. If you read How to Win Friends and Influence People nowadays, you can see the stereotype of a smarmy old-timey salesman in it. A lot of the techniques there are burnt out and the very first chapter is basically a long-winded attempt to use social proof on you the reader that this book is awesome. Now it is a very insightful book, I won't say otherwise, but you can also see that some of this stuff doesn't hold up over time, especially when it's getting misused.

jollybean 5y ago
1) Communicating in terms that people understand is not manipulative. Developing Social Consensus through Medical Propaganda, you could argue is manipulative, yes, but it's an inherent artifact of fighting off an existential threat to the wellbeing of the community. You must herd most of the cats into the pen to get vaccinated or they will die. 2) Get away from the idea that there's something wrong or immoral with identifying that some people are smarter than others, more conscientious, lazier, inept, disagreeable. In a crisis (and otherwise) we need to deal with actual reality. 3) You need to communicate with people at their level. There are plenty of people smarter than you and I who might want to be communicated with in different terms than you and I might expect - the same goes for less literate. Children obviously are not developed, and talking about facts is pointless. So you get Superman to tell them. Oprah has more credibility to 1/2 the population that the media. So you get her to say it in the way she thinks will work best. ... The Scientific Literature is public information, it's openly available, and frankly, the national health advisers are on TV 10x more than they even need to be, they've 'over explained' everything so 'transparency' for the most part has never been a problem. It's not like we're telling people giant wartime lies to keep them onside. If you gave yourself the job of getting everyone vaxxed, and then you realize that 1/2 of people were not showing up, you'd quickly start to alter your plan and arrive at much the same conclusions. We've been doing this since the dawn of time, often in much worse ways, this is Public Communications.