The worst thing about propaganda isn’t the telling of lies. Lies can be debunked by any honest, attentive person. The worst thing about propaganda is the form it usually takes: Presenting ONLY the facts which serve the narrative, or lead to the desired conclusion. Children are most vulnerable to propaganda — as are adults, who were intellectually raised as children, without critical, objective thinking to guide them.
Half-truths, rather than fibs, are the defining feature of propaganda. Whether done by a corrupt spouse, boss or family member; or by an entire government, school system or media empire.
We are drowning in propaganda, by that definition. Society reeks of it and drips of it.
Children are so immersed in it by a compliant media and a government-run education system — well, witness the results in the hordes of 30-and-under swarming not just to defend, but to embrace, the nastiest, most sadistic terrorists (Hamas) the world has yet seen. Only the most unbelievably intelligent or unbelievably decent of young people will survive the intellectual and psychological onslaught.
What they’re NOT told is more damaging than what they’re taught.
The good news? Truth is stronger than falsehood. Facts will always prevail, at some point down the road.
But rarely, if ever, has the world been so steeped in self-deception and deception by others as we’re seeing today.