Propaganda is a highly controversial and debatable topic for the effects it can have on society and the outcomes of different situations where it has been used. Propaganda is the use of pictures, symbols, or dialect to express influence or persuasion against or for a topic that is being debated at hand. Dialect and words are thrown around to influence the majority vote and cause the majority opinion to believe what they see and hear. Propaganda has caused the changes in situations that people have gone through during the years. Examples of how propaganda has been used and changed the outcome of situations would be in war, in elections and public affairs, and changed the effects of different revolutions.
As an opening statement, propaganda is mainly used for its ability to convert and persuade people’s common opinions and beliefs and gain the influence from them. Propaganda has existed since the time of the Greeks when Aristotle wrote about the importance of understanding what motivates audiences when preparing his speeches and his explaining his beliefs and ideas hoping to convert people. Propaganda has changed the course of history by adopting people’s opinions through advertising and influencing larger powers.
Propaganda is spread using the press, radio, television, film, computers, fax machines, posters, meetings, door to door canvassing, handbills, buttons, billboards, etc. Propaganda is a powerful tool and people are so susceptible of it The main way that propaganda can change people’s opinions is by using powerful leaders such as Donald Trump, and having him be in an ad of some sort talking about an issue. An example would be when Donald Trump began talking about the Russia investigation and in order for him to not be accused of any wrongdoing, he goes out of
127 our experts are availableright now
his way to create propaganda and he plays himself as innocent and says that Russia has not changed the election results. The results of these allegations have caused people to become weary of Donald Trump and have had tried to be impeached multiple times. As there is currently no evidence, the propaganda media he has used has worked and that allowed him to stay at the current president. Propaganda has a powerful influence on people and it caused people to change by having a powerful and influential power.
In addition to how propaganda influences people’s opinions, the next topic to address would be explaining how propaganda has changed the outcomes of war situations. Propaganda has been used in many wars to promote the cause and allow recruitment into the cause. One of the biggest wars that utilized the use of propaganda was World War 1.
This was the first war that it was employed at a global scale and as stated by Ian Cooke in, ”Propaganda as a Weapon? Influencing International Opinion,” he directly states that, ”modern wars required propaganda to mobilize hatred against the enemy; to convince the population of the justness of the cause; to enlist the active support and cooperation of neutral countries, and to strengthen the support of allies.” This means that propaganda is modernly used to recruit soldiers into the war by creating positive posters such as Uncle Sam’s, ”I need you!” This type of propaganda allows the country to feel the hatred against the opposing country and encourages them to fight for what is right, and which in this case would be your country.
In terms of how propaganda was used in World War 1, as reading the article titled, ”Propaganda In World War 1: Means, Impacts and Legacies,” by Ian Cooke, he states that,”For many countries, advances in political representation meant that a greater…perceived as not acting in their interests.” This quote from the article is explaining that when propaganda became widespread in World War 1, it leads to a term called, “Total War,” meaning that people should maintain their countries army by having all means of production such as food and clothes to go to them and keep the country working. To acquire people to work for the production line and have them join the armies, a common type of propaganda used was posters.
Posters allowed people to be persuaded and allowed the audience to shape the international opinion and gave them the idea of recruitment to serve and protect your country. This was geared towards men while women saw posters representing them to go to the factories and keep the men fed and clothed. Another common tactic used by the government of the country was to buy war bonds which allowed them to continue production and manufacturing of goods for the soldiers and that allowed people to continue fighting. A common poster used for women was the “Women! Help America’s Sons Win the War, Buy US Government Bonds.” The use of propaganda in war allowed America to succeed and achieve greatness in the war with the use of posters, ads, and industrialization.
Moving forward, it would be a good time to address how propaganda has changed the outcomes of different revolutions. Propaganda has been used to change the course of revolutions and how they happened such as the American Revolution,Revolutionary revolution and the Boston Massacre. The American revolution was one of the biggest wars that had the influence of propaganda. As stated in the article titled, ”Propaganda from the American Revolution,” the author begins to explain that Benjamin Franklin and Paul Reverse were examples of people who created artwork and propaganda to inspire people to fight for their countries independence. Propaganda at the time was created in papers and pamphlets.
The images consisted of examples of the Boston Massacre which was a patriotic call to arms and inspired people to fight against the British armies and take their colonies back. The American revolution was sparked after the Boston Massacre occurred. The Boston Massacre was a deadly riot at King Street in Boston on 5 March 1770. It started as a street battle between American colonists and a lonely British soldier but quickly became a chaotic, bloody massacre. The conflict stimulated anti- British feeling and paved the way for the revolution. After the attack that happened, the colonies got influence from propaganda created by revolution leaders to revolt against the British and English rulers.
Moving along, propaganda has been used for decades and has changed the outcomes of how elections and public affairs have played out. Propaganda is used during elections to create public attention to the candidate to gain followers or viewers. They want to gain as many votes as possible to win by creating ads and social media ads to allow people to get a good idea what their ideas are to change the country if they are elected. Examples would be during President Obama running for president. He created ads saying that he will change the countries with health care and creating public bonds that will make taxes lower.
Propaganda is good for making ads but it can also come at a cost of people create bad ads that are targeting people against them. Starting with the Hillary Clinton email scams, she was deleting emails and the media created propaganda against her saying that she is a dirty liar and that created negative attention. It worked enough that she was losing the election and then eventually lost to Donald Trump. Propaganda has been used for ages and that allowed people to use it in public elections and affairs.
In summary, Propaganda has been used and developed hundreds of years ranging from the Greeks when Aristotle used it to convey his public speaking messages hoping to change and convert to beliefs, to as recently as the nuclear war messages about Kim Jong Un and his nuclear testing program that causes Donald Trump to release messages and propaganda that he will get rid of North Korea if they attack. Propaganda has had many forms of use ranging from posters, ads, emails, etc. They are all users of different tactics to influence you, the reader, to change your opinion about a debatable topic at hand. Propaganda has changed the outcomes of war, how the revolutions came to be and as well as elections and public affairs.
