7 ms·

IMO the most effective and most widely deployed (especially among the supposedly more reputable publications) propaganda tool isn’t outright lies, but rather, s

by oefrha 5y ago

IMO the most effective and most widely deployed (especially among the supposedly more reputable publications) propaganda tool isn’t outright lies, but rather, selective reporting of cherry-picked facts and omission of others to shape stories into their predefined narratives. TFA doesn’t address that at all. It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. Which is of course great for NPR, but doesn’t help when your “trustworthy” media selection decide to suppress all arguments from another side, or remain silent on certain stories altogether. Note: This comment was expanded a few times, but the gist remained the same. Edit: No, I’m not saying “trust NPR, NYT and the like instead of viral content you see on Facebook” isn’t a good takeaway. I’m saying the more effective type of propaganda (at least for people who don’t tend to fall for the obvious crap) isn’t discussed.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
> It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. Which is of course great for NPR. I had some minimal education on scrutinizing sources in high school and that's pretty much what it was. I think we spend maybe 10min talking about yellow journalism. Topics such as evaluating which parties have what direct conflicts of interests or ancillary motivations and how that may affect their reporting were simply not covered. It would have been trivially easy to dig up a few non-controversial historical examples of people peddling very wrong narratives for the benefit of those who fund them.
404mm 5y ago
Yes! This is my pet peeve! There are so many studies and sources that, if taken out of context and pointed correctly, can be used to support your claim. Now combine with the good old “you don’t know what you don’t know” and you have a great tool to mislead the masses. Add a bit of cognitive bias on top (combined with being profiled by “popular search engines” that give you the results you already believe in) and you’re hooked. Underlining story: there is so much need for critical thinking in our schools!!!
- wolverine876 5y ago
  > This is my pet peeve! I'm confused: Isn't this a very common narrative, especially among a certain political group? > Underlining story: there is so much need for critical thinking in our schools!!! That is the solution IMHO and IME: Teach critical thinking, not who is right or wrong. That's what my teachers did almost universally, what other teachers I know of did, and what seems to me is happening in this class.
  - nickthemagicman 5y ago
    >I'm confused: Isn't this a very common narrative, especially among a certain political group. It's common for both political groups... The people who don't think their political group distorts the truth are a prime target for this class.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
throwawayswede 5y ago
Indeed. Jacques Ellul discusses this at length in his book "Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes" [1]. Whenever I reread this book I feel it's more and more relevant than before. > "But modern propaganda has long disdained the ridiculous lies of past and outmoded forms of propaganda. It operates instead with many different kinds of truth— half-truth, limited truth, truth out of context. Even Goebbels always insisted that Wehrmacht communiqués be as accurate as possible." 1: https://archive.org/details/Propaganda_201512 https://archive.org/details/Propaganda_201512
zapataband1 5y ago
Did you people even read the article or do all of you need to take this course? it says right in the article what they're teaching kids and no it's not 'these news sources are the right ones' it's how to analyze the news like the headline says.
- oefrha 5y ago
  First, read the guidelines. Don’t do “did you even read the article” here. Secondly, I did read the article. All it talks about is spotting questionable sources, comparing reports to shake out fake news, etc. As I said, the most effective propaganda tool is omission. You’re not going to compare sources on something you never even read about. After fact-checking a hundred times you’ll decide that NPR does report facts, but do those facts paint the whole picture? Also, comparing sources in this day and age is not helped by biases baked into search engines.
  - wolverine876 5y ago
    > As I said, the most effective propaganda tool is omission. You’re not going to compare sources on something you never even read about. How is that a risk? What are the chances that anyone will only see news from one source? > After fact-checking a hundred times you’ll decide that NPR does report facts, but do those facts paint the whole picture? After fact-checking a hundred times, won't you learn NPR's strengths and limitations? And wouldn't you learn if facts are sometimes omitted? I think we form nuanced, detailed, if often tacit opinions about the sources. For example, I'll articulate a little of mine: * Rule #1: Never trust opinion pieces. * NPR: Quality news, no deception or try to push an agenda, won't always dig deeply. Always present a pleasant tone and has light information density. An inefficient source, but sometimes have stories and facts that others lack - I wish I had more time for them. * NY Times: World-changing revelations are taken for granted. Reporting is nuanced, never satisfying the desire for clarity (which is good - the world isn't clear). Sometimes leave critical questions (IMHO) unaddressed and can be lacking hardcore, expert analysis, and bury key facts in long, wordy reports. Recent, more narrative style is annoying. * WSJ: Never quite trust them: Murdoch demonstrates they'll embrace the Reactionary movement at any cost to truth or society. WSJ reporting looks excellent - up to the standards of the best, like NYT, etc. - and they cover important stories, but a lot of doubt lingers.
wolverine876 5y ago
What basis is there for these claims? > IMO the most effective and most widely deployed (especially among the supposedly more reputable publications) propaganda tool isn’t outright lies, but rather, selective reporting of cherry-picked facts and omission of others to shape stories into their predefined narratives. TFA doesn’t address that at all. That doesn't mean it isn't taught. The article can't cover everything taught in the class. So that is unfounded. > It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. What makes you say that's the main takeaway; can you cite something in the article or elsewhere? The only argument behind it is the unfounded claim above. Are you suggesting people should trust viral content? How should they interact with information about their world and decide what to trust? > doesn’t help when your “trustworthy” media selection decide to suppress all arguments from another side, or remain silent on certain stories altogether. That's not my experience. Obviously, news sources have limited resources and time, so they can't report everything nor will they always make good decisions. They also are there to serve readers, and thus should omit information that lacks foundation in truth - I certainly don't want to waste my time on it. They won't be perfect, but the only core 'mainstream' source (e.g., major national publications, the NYT, WSJ, ABC News, etc.) that I've seen systematically show bias is Fox News (however, I don't watch CNN or MSNBC) and a little in the Washington Post, which I notice few people remark on. In the NY Times, for example, I haven't seen it, despite people repeating ad infinitum that it happens (repetition, I hope they teach, has no correlation with truth). They even have an opinion page with as many conservative writers as anything else, and they are among their most popular columns.
- oefrha 5y ago
  Sorry but I don’t have time to write a case study on NYT biases. Also, you seem to be thinking purely in terms of U.S. politics, Democrats vs Republicans, left vs right. I’m talking more broadly. You’re not going to get a balanced view on a lot of international topics by consuming and comparing an ensemble of U.S. mainstream media (you can even throw British media in there) for instance, however bitterly they fight about U.S. politics.
  - diffeomorphism 5y ago
platz 5y ago
whats your solution
greenie_beans 5y ago
maybe i'm not aware of the curriculum, but propaganda seems like something that would be addressed in any conversation about news literacy? seems to be the very definition of news literacy -- knowing when to weed through reporting and look deeper. also, cherry picked reporting is an insignificant problem compared to knowing how to think critically about reporting. knowing how to think critically about the news would (ideally) fix this problem!
mcphage 5y ago
> It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. Which is of course great for NPR, but doesn’t help when your “trustworthy” media selection decide to suppress all arguments from another side, or remain silent on certain stories altogether. Did they post the syllabus in the article and I missed it? Or did you get on your hobby horse and just make unfounded assumptions?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

by oefrha 5y ago

throwaway0a5e 5y ago

> It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. Which is of course great for NPR. I had some minimal education on scrutinizing sources in high school and that's pretty much what it was. I think we spend maybe 10min talking about yellow journalism. Topics such as evaluating which parties have what direct conflicts of interests or ancillary motivations and how that may affect their reporting were simply not covered. It would have been trivially easy to dig up a few non-controversial historical examples of people peddling very wrong narratives for the benefit of those who fund them.

404mm 5y ago

Yes! This is my pet peeve! There are so many studies and sources that, if taken out of context and pointed correctly, can be used to support your claim. Now combine with the good old “you don’t know what you don’t know” and you have a great tool to mislead the masses. Add a bit of cognitive bias on top (combined with being profiled by “popular search engines” that give you the results you already believe in) and you’re hooked. Underlining story: there is so much need for critical thinking in our schools!!!

wolverine876 5y ago
> This is my pet peeve! I'm confused: Isn't this a very common narrative, especially among a certain political group? > Underlining story: there is so much need for critical thinking in our schools!!! That is the solution IMHO and IME: Teach critical thinking, not who is right or wrong. That's what my teachers did almost universally, what other teachers I know of did, and what seems to me is happening in this class.
- nickthemagicman 5y ago
  >I'm confused: Isn't this a very common narrative, especially among a certain political group. It's common for both political groups... The people who don't think their political group distorts the truth are a prime target for this class.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

throwawayswede 5y ago

Indeed. Jacques Ellul discusses this at length in his book "Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes" [1]. Whenever I reread this book I feel it's more and more relevant than before. > "But modern propaganda has long disdained the ridiculous lies of past and outmoded forms of propaganda. It operates instead with many different kinds of truth— half-truth, limited truth, truth out of context. Even Goebbels always insisted that Wehrmacht communiqués be as accurate as possible." 1: https://archive.org/details/Propaganda_201512 https://archive.org/details/Propaganda_201512

zapataband1 5y ago

Did you people even read the article or do all of you need to take this course? it says right in the article what they're teaching kids and no it's not 'these news sources are the right ones' it's how to analyze the news like the headline says.

oefrha 5y ago
First, read the guidelines. Don’t do “did you even read the article” here. Secondly, I did read the article. All it talks about is spotting questionable sources, comparing reports to shake out fake news, etc. As I said, the most effective propaganda tool is omission. You’re not going to compare sources on something you never even read about. After fact-checking a hundred times you’ll decide that NPR does report facts, but do those facts paint the whole picture? Also, comparing sources in this day and age is not helped by biases baked into search engines.
- wolverine876 5y ago
  > As I said, the most effective propaganda tool is omission. You’re not going to compare sources on something you never even read about. How is that a risk? What are the chances that anyone will only see news from one source? > After fact-checking a hundred times you’ll decide that NPR does report facts, but do those facts paint the whole picture? After fact-checking a hundred times, won't you learn NPR's strengths and limitations? And wouldn't you learn if facts are sometimes omitted? I think we form nuanced, detailed, if often tacit opinions about the sources. For example, I'll articulate a little of mine: * Rule #1: Never trust opinion pieces. * NPR: Quality news, no deception or try to push an agenda, won't always dig deeply. Always present a pleasant tone and has light information density. An inefficient source, but sometimes have stories and facts that others lack - I wish I had more time for them. * NY Times: World-changing revelations are taken for granted. Reporting is nuanced, never satisfying the desire for clarity (which is good - the world isn't clear). Sometimes leave critical questions (IMHO) unaddressed and can be lacking hardcore, expert analysis, and bury key facts in long, wordy reports. Recent, more narrative style is annoying. * WSJ: Never quite trust them: Murdoch demonstrates they'll embrace the Reactionary movement at any cost to truth or society. WSJ reporting looks excellent - up to the standards of the best, like NYT, etc. - and they cover important stories, but a lot of doubt lingers.

wolverine876 5y ago

What basis is there for these claims? > IMO the most effective and most widely deployed (especially among the supposedly more reputable publications) propaganda tool isn’t outright lies, but rather, selective reporting of cherry-picked facts and omission of others to shape stories into their predefined narratives. TFA doesn’t address that at all. That doesn't mean it isn't taught. The article can't cover everything taught in the class. So that is unfounded. > It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. What makes you say that's the main takeaway; can you cite something in the article or elsewhere? The only argument behind it is the unfounded claim above. Are you suggesting people should trust viral content? How should they interact with information about their world and decide what to trust? > doesn’t help when your “trustworthy” media selection decide to suppress all arguments from another side, or remain silent on certain stories altogether. That's not my experience. Obviously, news sources have limited resources and time, so they can't report everything nor will they always make good decisions. They also are there to serve readers, and thus should omit information that lacks foundation in truth - I certainly don't want to waste my time on it. They won't be perfect, but the only core 'mainstream' source (e.g., major national publications, the NYT, WSJ, ABC News, etc.) that I've seen systematically show bias is Fox News (however, I don't watch CNN or MSNBC) and a little in the Washington Post, which I notice few people remark on. In the NY Times, for example, I haven't seen it, despite people repeating ad infinitum that it happens (repetition, I hope they teach, has no correlation with truth). They even have an opinion page with as many conservative writers as anything else, and they are among their most popular columns.

oefrha 5y ago
Sorry but I don’t have time to write a case study on NYT biases. Also, you seem to be thinking purely in terms of U.S. politics, Democrats vs Republicans, left vs right. I’m talking more broadly. You’re not going to get a balanced view on a lot of international topics by consuming and comparing an ensemble of U.S. mainstream media (you can even throw British media in there) for instance, however bitterly they fight about U.S. politics.
- diffeomorphism 5y ago

platz 5y ago

whats your solution

greenie_beans 5y ago

maybe i'm not aware of the curriculum, but propaganda seems like something that would be addressed in any conversation about news literacy? seems to be the very definition of news literacy -- knowing when to weed through reporting and look deeper. also, cherry picked reporting is an insignificant problem compared to knowing how to think critically about reporting. knowing how to think critically about the news would (ideally) fix this problem!

mcphage 5y ago

> It seems to me that students’ main takeaway from this course would be to trust NPR, NYT and the like, rather than viral content. Which is of course great for NPR, but doesn’t help when your “trustworthy” media selection decide to suppress all arguments from another side, or remain silent on certain stories altogether. Did they post the syllabus in the article and I missed it? Or did you get on your hobby horse and just make unfounded assumptions?

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]