Propaganda In Our Day: Even Its Opposite Is Untrue

Drug Enforcement Agency personnel or terriorists operating in Honduras? You be the judge.
Photo: Rodrigo Abd/AP via The Intercept

It's spring in the 8th grade and we turn to the study of propaganda. The student who considers it his duty to challenge everything I do demanded to know why studying propaganda belongs in English class. I turned his question back to his classmates and the wary silence accompanied by bored inattention was broken by a lone raised hand. "Weasel words is about using words that don't mean what they seem to, and words are what we study in English." Good job. 

Of course we live in an age dominated by images that amplify words or often sidestep words altogether to convey ideas. And a veritable deluge of false narratives like Russiagate conveyed by any means. It makes for an interesting perspective for this old teacher reflecting that there is hardly anything new under the sun.

(This reminds me to show them the Assyrian relief on display at my alma mater with cuneiform exalting King Ashurnasirpal as he's blessed with the gift of fertilizing -- there's tree pollen in the winged spirit's handbag.)

Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine

We've considered lots of advertisements, for that is the very air a child in the waning days of capitalism breaths from birth. I've also shown a clip from the 1947 U.S. Department of War film "Don't Be A Sucker" pointing out graphically the parallel between a demagogue's claims in Nazi Germany and a demagogue's claims in post-WWII America. Scapegoating, preying on people's fears, and exploiting the unemployed are clumsily demonstrated as a man in the Cold War crowd nervously turns the masonic ring on his finger muttering, "Hey, now they're talking about me." Any resemblance to current events is purely coincidental.

But the real fun began when I asked students to find a short video of any kind that exemplifies at least two of the propaganda strategies we've been focusing on: weasel words, glittering generalities, bandwagon and expert (in 2017 read: celebrity) opinion.

One student turned up an infographic-style video that animates a book on propaganda by evil mastermind Edward Bernays. I wasn't planning to study the history of propaganda but students now saw how it was used on behalf of the corporation United Fruit to effect regime change in Guatemala, and who invented the weasel words "public relations."



I knew this history already so it didn't stick in my craw quite as much as the next offering, a video titled "Propaganda video claims to show ISIS's 'workout program'." 

Screenshot from Daily Mail video

All the men are masked like DEA agents in Honduras, and some appear rather chunky. No voices are heard under the soundtrack of an Arabic (or Dari?) song presumably calling on idealistic notions of faith in the service of killing infidels.

Without an understanding of the words, the appeal of the images was strong for teenagers -- leaping through rings of fire, tumbling through obstacle courses and demonstrating proper knife fighting techniques. "They make it look so fun," one observed.

I will not be sharing this infographic with my students.

It would take an entire course on contemporary U.S. foreign policy to unravel the complicated lies about Islamic terrorism that conceal our lust for wealth and territorial ambitions. The documentary Reel Bad Arabs showed a plethora of Hollywood's efforts to demonize those sitting on top of what U.S. oil companies consider their rightful property. But in a week when corporate news was full of images of the president and Saudi Arabia's leaders dancing together with swords as they sold and bought $110 billion in weapons -- and a suicide bomber allegedly motivated by religion blew up scores of young girls at a concert in Manchester -- the layers of deception are too dense for my 8th grade English class.

As for the "fun" of combat, what empire has not employed propaganda to sell that notion?

When thinking about propaganda I often return to an essay by George Orwell published in 1939 about boys' "penny dreadfuls" sold in England's poorest neighborhoods. An interesting quote:

The American ideal, the ‘he-man’, the ‘tough guy’, the gorilla who puts everything right by socking everybody on the jaw, now figures in probably a majority of boys' papers.

Orwell concerns himself with framing, arguably the most powerful propaganda technique of all. (A question I posed about the "Don't Be A Sucker" film was: Where are all the women?) By directing our gaze to a narrow window on the world, other possibilities are negated. A constricted view offering compelling, false narrative meets the litmus test of truly sophisticated propaganda in that even its opposite is untrue.

I'm not going to push my own political analysis on 8th graders. That would be wrong, and not what I agreed to do when I signed my contract. I am going to try and plant a seed of doubt in their minds about their access to real information. Net neutrality is under fire (again), and we live in the sticks -- so online searching may or may not continue to be a uniquely powerful way for my students to find real news. At least I hope they leave for summer vacation realizing it's their own responsibility to find some.

I'll let a teenage girl have the last word here: @angryhijabi's passionate appeal for an unbiased and unhurried examination of actual facts.

Pentagon Drones Kill Civilians in Afghanistan As Protesters Arrested At Beale Air Force Base

Drone protesters Sharon, Chris, Toby, Shirley, Barry, and Cathy.  All but Barry crossed onto the base.

My sister activist Toby Blome connected the dots in an email this morning:

On Tuesday, Sept. 27, the very day that activists were at Beale Air Force Base protesting endless wars and illegal drone killing, a U.S. Drone attack killed 13 civilians and wounded 14 others in Afghanistan.   

Initially the Pentagon claimed that most of those killed were "suspected militants," but a day later they are admitting to most or all being civilians.  (story here)  Who will be next?

Toby pointed me to an account of the arrests and the rationale for being arrested by Sharon Delgado on her blog post "Campaign Nonviolence Action at Beale" which I repost here:

This morning I was arrested with four other women at Beale Air Force Base after crossing onto base property.   We were taken by military bus to a building on base, given citations, and released.  We may be given an arraignment date and we may go to trial, although in recent months all charges for peace activists have been dismissed. 

We were wearing blue scarves and we had #enough written on our hands because we took this action in solidarity the Afghan Peace Volunteers and their blog Our Journey to Smile.  Afghan Peace Volunteers is a group of young people working for peace in Afghanistan.   I became aware of them when peace activist Kathy Kelly came with us to Beale a couple of years ago.  Our blue scarves and the #enough banners and words written on our hands are a response to their invitation “Join us to say #enough.” 

Before we were arrested, each of us explained what we have had enough of.  I explained that I have had enough of drone warfare.  (Beale is the home of the Global Hawk Drone, a surveillance drone that identifies targets for armed Predator and Reaper drones.)  I have also had enough of the U.S. Air Force Vision for 2020, which is geared toward “full spectrum dominance” for the purpose of “protecting U.S. interests and investments” as “the globalization of the world economy… continues, with a widening between “haves” and “have-nots.” 

 I have had enough of the U.S. military enforcing a global order that is enriching the already wealthy, protecting the privileged, exploiting those who are vulnerable, causing massive suffering, and destroying this beautiful earth.  #Enough war. #Enough “accidental” (or incidental) killing of children.  #Enough suffering.  #Enough extrajudicial killing.  #Enough. 

We also took this action in coordination with the Campaign Nonviolence Week of Actions.  Over 700 separate Campaign Nonviolence Actions have taken place in recent days. 

If you want to know more about drones or past demonstrations and trials related to Beale, seemy past blogs on drones.   Follow my blog by clicking the “Follow Sharon Delgado” button at the right or by “liking” the Shaking the Gates of Hell Facebook page.  

I note that yesterday Congress overrode Obama's veto of what's being called the "Sue the Saudis" bill that allowing families of those who died on 9/11 to seek relief in the courts. Obama presumably vetoed it because Saudi Arabia is a key ally of the U.S., a country to whom billions of weapons are shipped regularly. Similar to our other good buddy in the region, Israel, Saudi Arabia has a horrendous record of human rights violations. 

From RT's report on the veto: 

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has argued that allowing JASTA to become law could lead to US being sued in foreign courts and subjected to an “intrusive discovery process.”

Can I get an Amen?


Perhaps some good will come of the "Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism" law. Perhaps a court case will involve some authentic disclosure of facts surrounding the fire bombing of the World Trade Center in 2001. 

Perhaps it will also set a precedent for victims of state-sponsored terrorism and their families to sue the governments responsible -- including their own.

U.S. Allies Lead The World In Repression And Violence

Where to begin. There is such a long list of U.S. allies ruled by regimes dedicated to repression and violence, especially targeting those who effectively resist in word or deed. 

Depicted above is celebrated environmental organizer Berta Cáceres, who was assassinated March 2, 2016 at her home in Honduras. You remember Honduras: the Central American republic whose elected government was toppled by a military coup enabled by U.S. complicit support in 2009 and since then. 

The illegitimate government of Honduras continues targeting indigenous leaders like Cáceres on behalf of corporations greedy for access to resources.

A taste of Berta Cáceres' wisdom, the kind of message that gets you killed if you get famous enough saying it:

In our worldview, we are beings who come from the Earth, from the water, and from corn. The Lenca people are ancestral guardians of the rivers, in turn protected by the spirits of young girls, who teach us that giving our lives in various ways for the protection of the rivers is giving ourlives for the well-being of humanity and of this planet… Let us wake up! We’re out of time. WE must shake our conscience free of the rapacious capitalism, racism and patriarchy that will only assure our own self-destruction.  Our Mother Earth – militarized, fenced-in, poisoned, a place where basic rights are systematically violated – demands that we take action.

The U.S. has a long history of rapacious policies in Central and South America, perpetrated by regimes with either D or R after their names. 

Reagan, both Bushes -- all were horrible neighbors to the people south of the U.S. border who were standing in the way of profits for their corporate supporters. And both Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have Cáceres' blood on their hands.

Onward to Saudi Arabia. Last weekend CODEPINK held a summit in Washington DC to examine this strange U.S. bedfellow.

Source: Al Jazeera English on Twitter:
"Pope Francis condemns massacre of nuns & workers at Yemen retirement home http://aje.io/nxcu"

As one of the most repressive regimes on the planet, especially for a wealthy country, SA is distinguished by beheading dissidents, imprisoning and whipping journalists and bloggers, and treating all adult women like perpetual children. Even aside from its domestic policies,

the House of Saud has backed and trained ISIS terrorists fighting in Iraq and Syria, and has itself been bombing targets like nursing homes in Yemen.

Let's end our examination of dreadful U.S. allies with Turkey, long a NATO bulwark against Russia's influence in the region. The ongoing civil war in Syria has provided the pretext for Turkey to shell Kurdish units outside its border while a military blockade disguised as a "curfew" has included civilian massacres in Sur, Diarbakir in Turkey's southeast. 
As reported by Figen Yüksekdağ and Selahattin Demirtaş, Co-chairs of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) in the Kurdistan Tribune:

One hundred and seventy-eight bodies have so far been collected from the “Savage Basements” in the Cizre district of Sirnak. Yet, the family members who were asked to identify the deceased report that the bodies were burnt beyond recognition. Furthermore, bodies have been intentionally transported to various other cities in Turkey for autopsy procedures, which in turn have aggravated the suffering of the family members.

Meanwhile, U.S. ally Turkey is making international news for its crackdown on journalists, many of whom have been jailed on criminal charges. Ironically, these charges often include terrorism. Several major media outlets have been closed down entirely. 

Constanze Letsch reporting from Istanbul for The Guardian wrote:

“By lashing out and seeking to rein in critical voices, President Erdoğan’s government is steamrolling over human rights,” said Andrew Gardner, Turkey researcher for Amnesty International. “A free and independent media, together with the rule of law and independent judiciary, are the cornerstones of internationally guaranteed freedoms which are the right of everyone in Turkey.” 

The takeover of Cihan and Zaman follows the same pattern as a government crackdown on the Koza Ipek media group in October last year. The group’s newspaper and television operations have since been shut down entirely.

It would take quite a long time to complete a list of the U.S.'s odious allies and their outstanding crimes against humanity. 

Israel, Jordan, and South Korea spring to mind in this regard. The burning questions U.S. citizens should be asking themselves is why does my government support these regimes, and does this bode well for my own security and civil liberties in the days to come? Most will not ask these questions, because they rely on corporate "news" to bring them what little information about the world they require. Mostly they are served up hype about the presidential primary season plus celebrity gossip. America is so exceptional it doesn't need to concern itself with the actions of its friends. Because, really, who among us can find these countries on a map anyway?