Propaganda is as old as humanity, and subtly controlling a storyline goes back to the snake in the Garden of Eden: “Did God really say?” Similarly, propaganda attempts to craft people’s perceptions and actions toward an agenda. There can be a fine line between honest reporting and spreading your prejudice through selection, deception, doubt, distortions, or half-truths.
We may have screens and AI today, but the techniques of propaganda have been refined for thousands of years. The ancient Egyptians mastered it. They controlled the narrative in their empire, minimized or ignored their military losses in the press, maximized their accomplishments and victories, fused the power of media with state control, and conditioned the people to believe in the benevolence and dominance of their kings and gods. They perfected the tools we’re still using today. Here are a few pointers on how to spot spin in our generation.
Look Who’s Talking
Pay attention to who is doing the talking. What do they believe, or what is their bias?
Why were Adam and Eve even listening to a snake? The snake cast skepticism in their minds towards their Heavenly Father. The snake’s divergent worldview changed the narrative of the story Adam and Eve perceived themselves to be in. The disinformation twisted their perspective and sowed the seeds of divisiveness, envy, and ambition. Similarly, the false prophets in Jeremiah chapters 23–28 were crowding out the truth with their propaganda. These false prophets were not trustworthy messengers of truth, but rather imposters with an agenda (Jeremiah 23:25–32).
The first thing we need to pay attention to is who is talking and what’s in it for them. Or, what is their worldview bias? For example, if my homeopathic doctor tells me, “you need medication,” I’m going to trust that he knows and cares for me above his personal bias. But if Big Pharma and their commercials say, “take this drug, it will fix your problem,” I should be skeptical that their solution isn’t greed-driven. Before we can interrogate the truth in the messages we receive, we need to discern the belief system and bias of the people we are listening to.
Labels and descriptions of people can cause disgust, fear, blame, or outrage, but they also reveal the prejudice of the person talking. Like holding a blue screen in front of a flashlight, words chosen in our daily conversations or the news, social media, and entertainment can create a colored lens to view people through. Terrorists can be called “freedom fighters.”Members of the opposite political party can be discredited as “far-right” or “far-left.” Analysts can be labeled “dangerous thinkers.” Notice how a simple word choice in a headline can turn President Trump into a provocateur or hero: “Trump’s Violent Remarks” or “Trump Defends Himself.”
A Quick Detour of History
In U.S. history, the power of propaganda was employed by corporations to condition what people believed about a product to convince them to purchase that product. [Read Edward Bernays’ milestone work, Propaganda.] But with the rise of socialism in the Western Hemisphere, we are seeing an increasing amount of media manipulation fused with political power. The new product is now a “belief” or a “political opinion.” Media, commercials, academic lectures and philosophies, entertainment, social media, even history—think 1619 Project—are all part of the political battlefield now.
The conservative right has documented this media shift in books like Left-Turn: How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind by Tim Groseclose, for example. This decreased trust in mainstream media and increased misinformation have driven conservative viewers to alternative venues. These spaces often contain sensational and conspiratorial theories that echo their own conservative bias (Media Manipulation and Disinformation Online, a 2017 report from UNC’s Center for Information, Technology and Public Life). Both the political left and right are now warring over the landscape of what people see, hear, and believe.
Everywhere in culture, people are trying to condition you to believe what they want you to believe. The puppeteers are Islamic, Socialist, greed-driven, White Nationalist, Libertine, Globalist, or cravers of political power. Current events are retold through the spin of the puppeteers: Hunter Biden, Russian bots interfering with the 2016 election, January 6 Capitol Riots, Pro-Palestinian demonstrations, George Floyd, Charlie Kirk, Global Warming or global agenda, Ukraine war, Iran war, election fraud. You need to know who is talking to know how they are spinning the narrative.
Our fields of media have become less about relaying facts and more about persuading you to believe what they believe about facts. Everything is spin. Everything is manipulated to suit those in power or those with an agenda. They don’t want you to think for yourself; they want you to take their side. The end result becomes the title of Peter Pomerantsev’s haunting narrative: Nothing Is True, and Everything Is Possible—a fascinating look inside Russia’s similar evolution today. As a result, the public lives in the anxiety of never really knowing who to trust or what is real.
Seekers of Truth
Conversely, we want to be a discerning people anchored in the truth of science and Scripture. Paul warns the Ephesian people, “Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is” (5:15–17). Our goal is to perceive and pursue the Lord’s will. Jesus taught that the “truth” is what sets you free (John 8:32). We should not be so aligned with one particular party or interest group that we can’t scrutinize and criticize its flaws and biases. Our goal is to see the world through God’s eyes and in light of God’s will, not through humanistic campaigning. Here are three maxims to keep you heading in the right direction:
- Be a person who’s in the habit of valuing God’s Word more than human opinions.
- Be a person who chases truth and not claims you want to believe to be true.
- Be a discerning person who interrogates the messages you receive and the people you receive them from.
There are many tools of manipulation to coerce you. You’ll want to grow in the habit of interrogating the messages you hear.
Interrogate the Message
A magician’s sleight of hand can slide evidence out of the way with one hand while keeping your attention focused on the other. Propaganda operates similarly. Take, for example, the accusation in a 2014 headline that only 47% of the Palestinian dead were combatants—insinuating that Israel was indiscriminately killing innocent Gazans. But what the news failed to report was that the other 53% of Gazans were being used as human shields by the Hamas terrorists. The first crime was the terrorists’ crime against their own people. The second tragedy is the misinformed reporting that distorted the story. Islamic propagandists have to edit out inconvenient facts to wring out their selective narrative of the conflict. When media is the only funnel through which information reaches us from distant locations, it becomes easier to distort people’s perception of reality.
Hollywood can be a powerful propaganda tool. Million Dollar Baby, while being a well-crafted underdog story, reeked of pushing a pro-Euthanasia agenda at the final curtain. Inherit the Wind did a terrible job conveying the complex arguments behind the 1925 Scopes Trial but a wonderful job at portraying traditional Christian beliefs as ignorant, superstitious, and unscientific. These emotional stories are sculpted by people with opinions about the world. Stories are messages that have the power to normalize deviant behavior or stereotype groups of people. The same can happen in our classrooms and textbooks.
After the George Floyd incident in May of 2020, the Black Lives Matter movement crested, and everyone seemed to be reading: White Fragility and How to Be an Anti-Racist, for example. Unfortunately, the Black Lives Matter movement was exposed for its own Socialist attachments, and the further complexity of the Floyd case cast doubt on implicit racial motivations. The broader public felt manipulated by the media’s political bias and the D.E.I. movement. Unfortunately, a legitimate chance for self-reflection about race relations in America was lost because of the skepticism towards political agendas.
Our news sources seem increasingly politically aligned and complicit in attempting to manipulate people’s emotions. If you want to learn how to spot media manipulation on the right or the left, here’s a list of 52 Tricks to Media Manipulation succinctly summarized.
In the digital world, everyone has access to everyone. That means we are overwhelmed with information and opinions. We need trusted shepherds and gatekeepers to help us interpret events and decode the spin. It is also more important than ever that we ourselves learn to interrogate the belief systems that drive narratives and manipulate the messages we receive. Anyone can spin any story to suit their narrative, perspective, or agenda. It takes wisdom to see through the clutter and to prioritize God’s truth and God’s Kingdom over the human crusading.
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