An imbalanced cure
propaganda (noun): information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a political cause or point of view.
propaganda (noun): information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a political cause or point of view.
According to dictionaries, this is what propaganda means.
Fair enough.
Or is it?
If you call something you happen to dislike propaganda, then there are indeed grounds for moral inspection. After all, what we term good or bad stems from the way our moral compass behaves. And in this age of advanced technology and megaadvanced information, shouldn’t we be more stringent with what we call what? Doesn’t the devil lie in the vocabulary nowadays? Why do you think the world continues to perceive the USA as a picture of perfection—so much so people might badmouth that country but would migrate any given second — despite knowing very well that it only cares about itself? The damage the British empire inflicted pales in front of what the American foreign policies have achieved in countries Americans can’t even pronounce properly. (As an exercise, google “the greatest empires in history” and notice how British empire springs up at top of the list, conveniently forgetting that American empire has far exceeded geographical as well as cultural boundaries in less than no time.) Yet, goodwill is never in short supply as the PR machinery churns out bloated ideas of liberty and equality via Hollywood. We consume what we are offered mainly because we don’t have the means or energy to verify everything we read or watch. At the end of the day, we have to accept that our belief system is a choice made by us. Feelings and facts may not belong in the same boat but the ocean doesn’t care. So to speak of vocabulary, the words we use for stuff we tend to approve of often flow unrestricted when compared to what we disapprove of. All things argued and unargued, our moral compass points to the fact that our feelings are in sync with what we sympathize with. If you feel extremely bad for Tibetans, you will always see China as a big red dragon breathing fire, forgetting the role it has played in alleviating poverty in record time. Similarly, if you empathize with the Palestinian cause, Israel will always be a monster to you, although it has a far better track record on human development index than any of its roaring neighbours-turned-enemies. Since you can’t keep up with these modern-day dragons and monsters thanks to the imbalance in your consumption of information, you’ll resort to the P-word to demerit their status.
So simple, no?