Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Propaganda

417 Pages·1991·1.5 MB·English

AGE OF PROPAGANDA
The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion
REVISED EDITION
ANTHONY R. PRATKANIS and ELLIOT ARONSON
University of California, Santa Cruz
To the memory of my parents, Harry Aronson (1903-1950) and Dorothy
Aronson (1901-1989)
They had a wonderfully innocent, childlike trust that, in this country, almost
everything they read (especially if it was between the covers of a book) was
absolutely true.
E. A.
To my son, Tony T. Pratkanis (born 1991)
Chances are, he will grow up with a healthy skepticism but a regrettable
cynicism about the truth of everything he reads, hears, and sees.
A. R. P.
WHY
WE WROTE THIS BOOK
We are of different generations. One of us (E. A.) was born in 1932 and grew up
during World War II. "At that time, I fervently believed just about everything I
was exposed to in school and in the media.
For example, I knew that all Germans were evil and that all Japanese were
sneaky and treacherous, while all white Americans were clean-cut, honest, fair-
minded, and trusting. Perhaps you had to be eleven years old to take seriously
the racial and national caricatures presented in the war movies of the early
1940s. But in those days, most grown-ups—including my parents (to whom this
book is dedicated)—certainly wanted to believe in the basic message of the war
movies and did, in fact, have a childlike trust in the media. They hung on every
word President Roosevelt said in his famous fireside chats and never dreamed of
questioning the nobility of the motives behind our national policy. They thought
(and so did I) that the purpose of commercial advertising was to inform the
consumer."
The world has taken a few turns since then. A. R. P. grew up during the Vietnam
war and was witness to the blatant lying by public officials of that era. "At the
time, I sat riveted to my television screen, scared to death by the images of death
and destruction beamed into my living room from Vietnam, all the while
learning that politicians only lie when their lips move. I came of age during the
Watergate era when a sitting president, Richard Nixon, was forced to resign
when faced with incontrovertible evidence (some of it supplied by his own tape
recordings) of the lying, dirty tricks, and attempted cover-up that he and his
cronies had perpetrated on the American people. For me, commercials, whether
for different brands of products or different brands of politicians, were
entertainment designed to make someone rich or more powerful."
In the first edition of this book, we lamented the fact that there was no White
House tape recorder in use during the 1980s—so that President Reagan escaped
the consequences of deceiving the American people (and the world) by
subverting the Constitution through the covert sale of arms to Iran and the
diversion of the profits from that sale to support the Nicaraguan Contras.1 We
felt (and continue to feel) it to be a sad commentary on our times that, although
the majority of the American people were furious at Nixon and his cronies, by
the time of the Iran-Contra scandal most Americans seemed to have developed a
more cynical attitude about being deceived and did not seem displeased when
Oliver North, John Poindexter, and President Reagan himself succeeded, for the
most part, in "beating the rap." And now, ho hum, other
investigations come along—the savings and loan debacle, the BCCI crisis, Ruby
Ridge, and various shady campaign contributions given to U.S. politicians of
every stripe. Who cares? Business as usual. Such cynicism carries a price. A
cynical electorate is a lackadaisical electorate, as evidenced by the fact that
fewer than 50% of eligible Americans now bother to vote.
And then there was the world-famous slow-speed chase, the media circus of the
century—the trial of O. J. Simpson.2 An international audience sat riveted to
their TV sets as an army of more than 1,000 credentialed reporters plus untold
media pundits went over and over and over every excruciating detail of the case
and the story—from the cost of the trial to the menu at the Mezzaluna Restaurant
to Marcia Clark's topless vacation on the French Riviera.
CNN alone employed 70 correspondents and 250 legal experts to produce 1,530
hours of O. J. trial coverage and commentary. O. J. trinket vendors made more
than $1 billion selling such treasures as novelty Simpson wrist watches, T-shirts,
orange-scented O. J. air fresheners, and Judge Ito Jell-0 molds. From January 1,
1995, until the week after the verdict, television network news spent twenty-six
hours and fifty minutes, or 13.6% of the available airtime, covering the O. J.
story. That is more time than was devoted to Bosnia (thirteen hours and one
minute), the bombing in Oklahoma City (eight hours and fifty-three minutes),
and the U.S. budget (three hours and thirty-nine minutes)—the other top three
"news"
stories—combined.
And after the O. J. verdict was rendered, what was the news media to do?
The trial had been a cash cow. The coverage was relatively cheap to produce,
garnered great ratings, and brought in top advertising revenues. For example, the
television networks charged advertisers ten times their normal rate for thirty
seconds of commercial time during the O. J. verdict. What would top a juicy,
seconds of commercial time during the O. J. verdict. What would top a juicy,
intriguing trial of a prominent athlete? What would keep the advertising revenue
flowing?
How about an impeachment trial of a U.S. president for sex crimes?
And that is what we watched next. Beginning in January of 1998, the nation's
mass media, particularly its news programming, launched around-the-clock
coverage of stories and speculation about then-President Clinton's sexual
misconduct, especially with a White House intern named Monica Lewinsky.3
The number of jokes told about Bill Clinton on late-night TV soared a whopping
111.3 %
during the year of the saga. An estimated 67.6 million Americans watched
Clinton's televised speech on August 17, 1998, in which he admitted an
inappropriate relationship with Monica Lewinsky. In the month just before this
announcement, the network morning news shows devoted 179 segments to the
Clinton sex scandal and only 56 segments to any other news about the Clinton
administration. Much of this coverage bordered on the hysterical, with rumor
chasing gossip chasing innuendo—much like the coverage of the O. J. trial. For
example, a panelist on CNBC stated that the president had had sex with four
other interns besides Lewinsky, ABC News reported that Clinton and Lewinsky
had been caught in the act, possibly by Secret Service agents, and then the
Dallas Morning News followed up with news that an agent was ready to testify
that he saw the president and Lewinsky engage in a sex act. Of course, these still
unsubstantiated rumors were repeated over and over again by the news media,
giving them an air of respectability. Amidst this media roar, President Clinton
infamously shook his finger at the American public and denied having sex with
"that woman."
What were the reactions of Americans to having their news shows turned into
the "All Monica, All the Time" network? Bill Clinton's approval ratings soared
during the period. Newt Gingrich and others who led the impeachment charge
lost favor with the American public (with some being forced to leave
government because of their own revealed sexual indiscretions). Opinion polls
showed that Americans had lost respect for the news media and did not like the
way the saga was covered. We think the most telling statistic of all is this: QVC,
the "All Shopping, All the Time" TV network posted the second-highest sales
week in its history immediately after the August 17 admission by Clinton.
Apparently, many of those 67.6 million Americans who tuned in to hear Clinton
went channel surfing without delay after the pronouncement and settled on QVC
as an alternative to the "news" coverage. It was as if American citizens were
saying, "I am sick and tired of the blather. I am going shopping."
Something needs to change. The mass media respond to our itch for
entertainment and spectacle and create "news" coverage of the ilk found in the
O. J. Simpson trial and the Monica Lewinsky saga. Such "news"
coverage feeds our cynicism about government and the state of our nation. For
example, consider the media coverage of the 2000 U.S.
presidential election. The campaign was marked by a lack of interest from both
citizens and the news media. However, as soon as a possibly entertaining
spectacle emerged—the recount of votes in Florida—then the networks launched
around-the-clock coverage—coverage that feeds our cynicism that things seem
to be out of control.
The losers are those of us who respect democracy. For while we sat glued to the
trial and the saga, we didn't sit glued to stories covering investigations of
campaign finance violations or providing in-depth analysis of issues of great
importance to our country, such as spiraling health care costs, the continued
proliferation of nuclear weapons at the international level, the shrinking middle
class, the expanding number of children in poverty, and the continued
consolidation of mass media power into the hands of a few large firms. This itch
for entertainment carries a price—the information we need to participate in a
democracy is replaced by trivial entertainment, thus making it harder and harder
for us to carry out our responsibilities as citizens.
We wrote this book because we passionately believe that there are more than
two choices: naive acceptance of the fruits of propaganda on the one hand and
total cynicism combined with a lust for entertainment on the other. During an
age characterized by ever more sophisticated uses of propaganda techniques, it is
important, especially in a democracy, that citizens become informed about these
devices, the psychological dynamics of what makes them effective, and how to
counteract their effectiveness without withdrawing into abject cynicism. That's
what this book is about. We are researchers who have been studying the nuts and
bolts of persuasion techniques for a combined total of more than fifty years—
and we believe we know something about what works and what doesn't work
and why. Moreover, we believe we know something about how to guard against
the abuse of these techniques by unscrupulous communicators—including
(especially) those unscrupulous communicators who might be running for the
highest political offices in the land.
In addition, our experience has led us to understand the difference between
persuasion and propaganda. Thus, this book also contains advice for those of you
who might want to be effective communicators in ways that are honest and
above-board. We believe that, in an age of propaganda, the most important thing
for the survival of democracy is the existence of communicators who know how
to present their message clearly and fairly, coupled with an informed electorate
that knows the difference between a fair presentation and a con job. It is toward
achieving these ends that we wrote this book.
As with any effort of this size, there are a number of people who should be
thanked. First, we would like to thank all the readers of the first edition of this
book who bothered to mail us their opinions or who corresponded with us via
interactive media such as talk radio and the Internet. In this revision, we sought
to respond to your comments by clarifying a misleading or inaccurate point or
even revising our opinion. In addition to these changes, we have also updated the
research (where appropriate), added new chapters on issues of concern to readers
(e.g., the use of hypocrisy in persuasion, what to do about propaganda), and
updated our examples of propaganda.
Some people deserve special thanks. Vera Aronson, Mahzarin Banaji, Susan
Brennan, Jonathan Cobb, Peter Far-quhar, Erika Goldman, Craig Leve, Nathan
Maccoby, Richard Petty and the Ohio State Research Group on Attitudes and
Persuasion, Rosemarie Pratkanis, Michael Santos, Carol Tavris, and our students
at the University of California, Santa Cruz, provided helpful comments. Marlene
Turner provided continuous, invaluable feedback as the book was being written.
1
Our Age of Propaganda
In the early 1990s, seventeen-year-old Demetrick James Walker was
sentenced to life in prison for killing a sixteen-year-old. The reason for the
slaying: Demetrick so badly wanted a pair of $125 Nike Air Jordans like
the ones he had seen on TV that he put a .22-caliber pistol to the head of
Johnny Bates, pulled the trigger, and walked off with a new pair of high-
tops. During the trial, Houston prosecutor Mark Vinson placed some of the
blame on the images created by advertising. Said Vinson, "It's bad when
we create an image of luxury about athletic gear that it forces people to kill
over it."1
The 1990 North Carolina U.S. Senate race was one of the most heated—
and expensive—political contests in recent years. Going into the last
weeks of the campaign, the black Democratic challenger, Harvey Gantt,
held a slight lead in the polls over the white Republican incumbent, Jesse
Helms. Eight days before the election, Helms broadcast an ad dubbed
"White Hands." The spot, created by political consultant Alex Castellanos,
showed a pair of white hands crumpling a letter of rejection. The voice-
over: "You needed that job, but they had to give it to a minority because of
racial quotas. Is that really fair?" Although Gantt was on record as opposed
to quotas, the spot appears to have had its intended effect: Helms squeaked
through and by a slim margin was reelected to the Senate, supported by a
huge majority in white precincts. The tactic worked so well that Helms did
it again in his 1996 rematch with Gantt; this time Helms accused Gantt of
being the recipient of preferential treatment in the awarding of contracts.2
In the 2000 U.S. presidential election, Alex Castellanos again achieved
notoriety when he produced a 30-second ad for the Republican National
Committee. This ad contained the word RATS subliminally flashed across
the television screen.
Some years ago, CBS aired the film Cry Rape. Essentially, the story made
it clear that a rape victim who chooses to press charges against her attacker
runs the risk of undergoing an ordeal that may be as harrowing as the rape
itself. In this case the rapist, exuding boyish innocence, presented a
convincing argument to the effect that he had been seduced by the woman.
During the next few weeks, there was a sharp decrease in the number of
rapes reported by victims to the police—apparently because victims, taking
their cue from the television movie, feared the police would not believe
them.
In October 1982, when seven people in the Chicago area died after taking
Tylenol headache capsules laced with cyanide, the event was widely
publicized by the national news media. Indeed, for several days it was
difficult to turn on the TV or radio, or pick up a newspaper, without
encountering the Tylenol poisonings. The effects of this prominent
coverage were immediate: Similar poisonings were reported in cities
across the country, involving the contamination of mouthwash, eyedrops,
nasal spray, soda pop, even hot dogs.
Dramatically billed as "copycat poisonings," these incidents, in turn, received
widespread media attention. The public reaction spiralled: Many people
panicked, seeking medical aid for burns and poisonings when they suffered from
no more than common sore throats and stomachaches. False alarms outnumbered
actual cases of product tampering by 7 to 1.
What do Demetrick James Walker, the voters of North Carolina, rape victims,
and, indeed, anyone who has ever watched television or read a newspaper or
magazine have in common? Every time we turn on the radio or television, every
time we open a book, magazine, or newspaper, someone is trying to educate us,
to convince us to buy a product, to persuade us to vote for a candidate or to
subscribe to some version of what is right, true, or beautiful. This aim is most
obvious in advertising: Manufacturers of nearly identical products (aspirins, for
example, or toothpastes, or detergents, or political candidates) spend vast
amounts of money to persuade us to buy the product in their package. Influence