this post was submitted on 23 Dec 2025
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Leopards Ate My Face
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Far too many people on Lemmy genuinely not understanding the level of propaganda these people are existing in. Breathing it. Eating it. Sleeping in it.
They choose to be. Never been easier to find different sources of information.
which is even more incredibly fucked when you consider the illusory truth effect, or the effect of something seeming more truthful by the mere repeated exposure to it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_truth_effect)
Not a valid excuse antmore. We all have access to the internet and can look any of this shit up.
Facts don't counteract propaganda, at least not on their own. This is well studied.
Yeah they do. Its on the person to verify them. The only time they dont is when the individual decides for themselves to ignore the facts. Its people choosing to hold onto thier own prejudices and assumptions rather than accepting the truth for what it is. This is what propoganda depends on, stereotypes, assumptions, and a lazy mind unwilling to challenge itself.
That's just not borne out by statistical evidence. Study after study (not to mention my own experience) disprove this idea.
Sure, but relying on that to help assumes that the propagandists haven't captured sources of verification, or convinced victims that they're unreliable.
That's literally what propaganda does to someone. It seems like you're thinking of just standard misinformation. Propaganda is a whole different thing; it has been intentionally crafted by very intelligent people who have been paid a lot of money to make you believe what they want you to believe. It's not just a choice someone makes, it's a virus that they're infected with.
Your mind isn't magically immune to propaganda, either. You likely have a stereotype of conservative people as dumb and uncurious, for instance (and, to be sure, many are), but in reality many are quite clever; that intelligence is just turned toward selfishness, or some other warped view of reality.
A lot of propaganda works on that exact kind of binary, black and white view that dehumanizes other people. Propagandists know that you can be convinced to act more easily if you can first be convinced that others are fundamentally worse than you in some inherent way.
This is what I mean about "intentionally crafted." Propagandists have been honing enough messages that they can likely tailor one to you. The only way you can escape one is if you (1) know it's happening, and (2) are willing to think about it critically and with nuance. I'm probably being targeted by propaganda right now without realizing it.
The mental gymnastics required to believe some of the things that propagandized people accept actually require more mental work, not less. You can call it cult programming, or even mind control, but it's not laziness.
Then why haven't you fallen for the propaganda? Obviously there's more at play here. Like a willingness to question things or an unwillingness to reject things just because you don't like it.
These people are not infants.
I did fall for it. I was a vehement conservative/Republican all through high school and the first year or so of college; I bit down hard on the propaganda and bought it fully. What got me out of it was meeting people not like me and learning that they aren't as evil as the conservative media machine says they are. Once I realized that that was a lie, it was just a process of investigating the other lies. In the meantime, friends from the conservative world started to insult and even threaten me for voicing questions, while progressive folks welcomed me to hang out with them and talk about what I was learning.
That process started in about 2006 or so.By the time Trump came down the escalator, I was fully deprogrammed. At this point, I more or less identify as a democratic socialist.
My experience matched pretty well with the research: it's almost exclusively personal relationships that break people out of the bubble.
It's important to remember that none of us are immune to propaganda. Doesn't matter how smart we are, we can still fall for it.
No. Propoganda depends on a lack of willingness to question your own assumptions. Its a laziness of the mind that allows this.
That's why they like to get em young!
Absolutely true. I like to think of myself as pretty intelligent, at least. Definitely not someone who would fall for something obvious. But propagandists are subtle and good at their craft.
So proving OP's point that you genuinely don't understand how powerful propaganda actually is and the level of it these people are drowning in.
Heavens Gate got a group of people to commit mass suicide. It's clear you have no idea how powerful propaganda can be and what it can make people do.
Sounds like you need to listen to the audio recordings. A large amount were not suicides
Most of them are too distracted by the endless stream of propaganda and brainrot to take the time to look into things. There's also an excessive amount of denial and it takes character to be open to change your beliefs.
That's what's called an opinion. I agree with it. Just doesn't make it true because you want it to be or because it's easier.