[seertaak]

> If someone spray painted a swastika on your house, how would you react?

Where I live (Görlitzer Park), those kinds of signs are literally everywhere -- only they're the leftwing equivalent, calling for bloody revolution, for the rich to be booted from their homes, racists and xenophobes to be punched, etc. I'm actually pretty relaxed about it -- a bunch of 20 year olds who get their kicks spray painting while drinking copious amounts of booze? Big deal.

And to offer another perspective on the recent emotional concern expressed so histrioniocally by a, politically speaking, suspiciously homogeneous crowd: Last year there was a huge, state financed charity billboard celebrating the life of... Fidel Castro. It was a collab between our Green local govt and the Cuban tourist ministry IIRC. Castro... who was responsible for how many deaths, 50,000? 100K?

By way of comparison, Pinochet had (according to Wikipedia) 10-30K on his account. I guarantee you there were no billboards of him around. Do I need to mention the recent merry festivities surrounding Karl Marx 200th birthday -- ceremony lead by Jean-Claude Juncker? Lest I have my words twisted against: I don't desire either of the these men to be displayed on taxpayer financed billboards!

The point that I'm trying to make is that this kind of legislation, and the so-called journalism and commentary surrounding it, don't fool anyone who's even the slightest bit (like me) conservative. We see right through these tendentiously applied, faux histrionic ("oh pity the poor soul who has endure watching -- and then deleting -- horribly vicious, hate-filled posts") outbursts whose real purpose is totally obvious. Namely to leverage dominance in various domains (journalism, charity, education, civil service) to usurp the electoral beating the left taken in any number of countries over the past two years. A beating meted out by a population who sees through the phony social concern, and sees the manifest and seething hypocrisy, the coziness of those who are insanely rich and the charity, journalistic, and civil service complexes.

In this battle any means to push back against at the barbarians at the gate are deemed appropriate. And so we are treated to the pathetic spectacle of those screeching about the deleterious, democracy damaging impact of fake news happily engaging in its production if it suits their side, the so-called defenders of liberty and free speech engaging in a rampage of censorship, bullying, "calling out", etc. of anyone who has an even slightly different opinion.

Now, don't get me wrong, I understand that those forces have no intention of trying to convince me. That is definitely not the goal, for if it were, the path that's being taken would certainly be recognized as wholly counterproductive. No, the real goal is to set boundaries, to wear out, tire, and demoralize the enemy. In other words, this is a propaganda war, exactly as e.g. Jacques Ellul described it. The very focus on such emotively charged terms as "love" (what we're about) and "hate speech" (what they do) makes this patently obvious.

To finalize, my feeling is that the forces I've described are winning, and I actually think they'll prevail in the battle. The propaganda war won't make any friends, but I believe it will succeed in its purpose, which is to wear out and dissipate the forces currently arrayed against it.

Final note: this is just an opinion. It's a strong one, yes. But I really love being proven wrong, so I'm really happy for the many highly intelligent and well-informed HNers to tear my argument apart. Have fun :)

[s_m_t]

Yep, always funny when protesters think they are somehow rebelling against the interests of power. Protest is primarily an expression of power. Once I understood this things made a lot more sense.

The authentic protest is almost always met with violence, either directly from the state or with the state allowing or aiding in its administration.

I think, at its core, the message of the state sanctioned protest/counter-protest is essentially "these people can be unleashed on you and you will have no recourse".

[vanderreeah]

I don't know if I can prove you wrong, but in my opinion your example of Karl Marx's 200th birthday is misjudged. As far as I know he neither killed nor ordered to be killed anyone. He is no more responsible for people (I assume you have Stalin in mind) twisting his thought than is anyone else. To follow that logic to its conclusion you would also need to express outrage at Christmas, or at the depiction of Jesus on the billboards of churches, because of the deaths occasioned by the Crusades.

[seertaak]

Fair point -- the Marx remark is a little unfair.

[pteredactyl]

If their tactics are patently obvious why do you suppose they'll prevail?

[seertaak]

Because they're in power. I recommend Jacques Ellul's Propaganda. The fact that the tactics are totally obvious is, in fact, exactly the point. They serve not to convince, but remind who has the power.

Ellul has a passage in which ancient Chinese poetry is "analyzed" by communist party members. This was served in classrooms of course. And the analysis was manifestly ridiculous. Anyone who reads it can't help but chuckle at the ham-fisted attempt to suggest that a poem about the sky, actually was referring to the glorious peoples revolution.

But: read that every day, hear in class every year, hear 1000 messages that confirm and reinforce this crazy, idiotic, message, and you can't help but be affected by it.

That is the nature of propaganda. In it's essence, it is a demonstration, an exercise of power. There is nothing subtle about it, and only part of it is covert.

[seertaak]

Here's be passage in question:

```In on article in Pruula in May 1957. the Chinese writer Mao Dun wrote that the ancient poets of Chma used the following words to express the striving of the people toward a better life: The Bowers perfume the air. the moon shines, man has a long life " And he added: “Allow me to give a new explanation of these poetic terms The flowers perfume the air — this means that the flowers of the art of socialist realism are incomparably beautiful The moon shines — this means that the sputnik has opened a new era In the conquest of space Man has a long life — this means that the grout Soviet Union will live tens and tens of thousands of years “

When one reads this ouce, one smiles If one reads i* a thousand times, and no longer reads anything else, one must undergo a change. And we must reflect on the transformation of perspective already suffered by a whole society in which texts like this I pub- lished by the thousands) can be distributed and taken seriously not only by the authorities but by the intellectuals This complete change of perspective of the Weltanschauung is the primary totali- tarian element of propaganda.

```

[eksemplar]

I view it a lot less like a battle between the establishment and the barbarians at the gate, and much more a struggle to take away the megaphone from the village idiot.

We’ve always had people who called vaccines dangerous against better evidence, but platforms like facebook, allowed these people to construct their own realities, and as a result people are now dying from diseases that have been extinct for more than 50 years.

As I’ve said, there have always been village idiots, but social media marks the first time in human history, that we’ve actually had to take them seriously.

[seertaak]

This comment is rather amusing -- probably unwittingly so -- when juxtaposed with (your) preceding post. In one, you ask us to empathize with the feelings of one group of people, those who are flustered by seeing (horrible) extremist propaganda. In the very next, not only are those finely-tuned emotional antennae manifestly off, but... well, suggesting a rather large cohort of people are mentally disabled? This from the person that wishes to portray themselves as the adult who needs "take their megaphones", which I understand as code for "let's have any comments they make on FB or other social networks erased". A little childish, perhaps?

What do I make of these two comments? How I read them is as follows: you're so utterly sure of your position -- because you're likely inclined to believe it, and because you've been bombarded with messages confirming it ("the others are stupid") -- that you're quite literally failing to engage your brain. Instead, you're making lazy, emotive arguments.

So thanks for proving my point: the claims that one should consider so-and-so's feelings, the supposed humanism. That's just BS, isn't it?

[eksemplar]

What on earth gave you the impression that I was some sort of liberal lighthouse?

On parts of Facebook the value of a professor in medicine counts for less than the experiences of an average soccer mom, and you’re seriously telling me to accept that as a new norm because it might hurt someone’s feelings if I didn’t? Right.

[KozmoNau7]

There's a big difference between kicking downwards (ala fascism), and kicking upwards (ala socialism).

[s_m_t]

"kicking" is an interesting euphemism. Even if it were true that fascism "kicked" downwards and socialism "kicked" upwards, what the egregious socialist and fascist governments of the 20th century did wasn't just kicking. It was often quite literally rape, torture, murder, enslavement, and genocide.

[KozmoNau7]

Socialism by definition takes care of everyone equally.

You can tell those regimes didn't actually believe in socialism, by how they oppressed the poor, the weak and those who were different (religiously, sexually and so on).

[Eridrus]

> Socialism by definition takes care of everyone equally.

I think this is far harder to implement than people assume. We still have many things in life that are non-fungible, the most obvious of which is probably housing location.