How To Recognise Propaganda...

If you're feeling a bit confused and don't know what to believe in the media these days, use this handy propaganda tactic identifier to sort fact from fiction...

 

Propaganda Techniques:

Appeals to fear and seeking to build support by instilling anxieties and panic in the general population.

 Bandwagon and "inevitable-victory" appeals attempt to persuade the target audience to join in and take the course of action that "everyone else is taking".

  

The black and white fallacy presents only two choices, with the product or idea being propagated as the better choice.

The "plain folks" or "common man" approach attempts to convince the audience that the propagandist's positions reflect the common sense of the people.

Making individuals from the opposing nation, from a different ethnic group, or those who support the opposing viewpoint appear to be subhuman.

An attempt to influence public perception by disseminating negative and dubious/false information designed to undermine the credibility of their beliefs.

An attempt to justify an action on the grounds that doing so will make one more patriotic, or in some way benefit a country, group or idea the targeted audience supports.

Glittering generalities are emotionally appealing words that are applied to a product or idea, but present no concrete argument or analysis.    This technique has also been referred to as the PT Barnum effect.

Propagandists use the name-calling technique to start fears and arouse prejudices in their hearers in the intent that the bad names will cause hearers to construct a negative opinion about a group or set of beliefs or ideas that the propagandist wants hearers to denounce.

Generalities are deliberately vague so that the audience may supply its own interpretations.    The intention is to move the audience by use of undefined phrases, without analysing their validity or attempting to determine their reasonableness or application.

Favourable generalities are used to provide simple answers to complex social, political, economic, or military problems.

Assigning blame to an individual or group, thus alleviating feelings of guilt from responsible parties and/or distracting attention from the need to fix the problem for which blame is being assigned.

This technique attempts to arouse prejudices in an audience by labelling the object of the propaganda campaign as something the target audience fears, hates, loathes, or finds undesirable.

Putting forward a straw man argument, which is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.
 

Usage of words in the value system of the target audience that produce a positive image when attached to a person or issue.