Episode 39: Understanding and Countering Propaganda

Send us Fan MailIn this episode, April attempts to unpack the complicated topic of propaganda, a form of persuasion used by corporations, advertisers, pundits, influencers, and political personalities. These days, it's important for critical thinkers to understand that there should be a delineation between propaganda and the kind of rhetoric used in democratic governance, to recognize propaganda and to avoid being influenced by it. If this sounds important--well, it is.Episode 39 Show Noteshttps://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/propaganda--this references the origins of the word propaganda and its original link to religious proselytizinghttps://www.thoughtco.com/propaganda-definition-1691544--Dr. Richard Nordquist's excellent ThoughtCo article about the difference between rhetoric and propagandahttps://researchguides.uoregon.edu/medialiteracy/propaganda --University of Oregon's Media Literary Research guide's deep dive into propaganda has some great information about how to determine if something is propagandahttps://researchguides.uoregon.edu/medialiteracy/propaganda --the Naab Research Center gives examples of positive uses of propagandaEmotional Campaigning in Politics: Being Moved and Anger …--a pdf of Gruning and Schubert's article about the use of emotion in political campaignshttps://www.yourdictionary.com/articles/glittering-generalities--YourDictionary.com has a great article with examples of glittering generalitieshttps://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Loaded_language--the list of "snarl" words is at the bottom of this wiki page devoted to loaded languagehttps://www.allsides.com/sites/default/files/AllSidesMediaBiasChart-Version2.jpg--an updated version of the AllSides Media Bias charthttps://mediabiasfactcheck.com/--a great source for checking the bias of any news source, as well as whether it has failed any fact checkshttps://disinformation-nation.org/combat-propaganda/--great article about ways to combat propagandahttps://www.shortform.com/summary/thinking-fast-and-slow-summary-daniel-kahneman?utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=531475976&msclkid=704335b2e9371134f6f7526e8cdafb8c--a long web address leading to a short summary of Daniel Kahneman's book Thinking Fast and Slowhttps://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/think-act-be/202003/can-you-be-abundantly-cautious-and-fearless--while this article was written about the Covid pandemic, the ideas in it still resonatehttps://www.neuroandcounselingcenter.com/single-post/informed-protect-peace--good ideas from certified mental health counselor Amanda Levison, about how to keep your cool and not get overwhelmed with news