I interviewed Mark Danner, author and professor of Human Rights Journalism at UC Berkeley, on the topic of propaganda, and its effect on media as a whole.
A rough transcript of what we discussed: - (note: this is as exact a transcript as I can construct, we talked on the phone and I took notes during the call, but I couldn't figure out how to record it. This might not be word for word what we said, but is meant to convey the point of what he said, with as much as possible being direct quotes. I apologize in advance for any errors.)
What do you consider propaganda?
Propaganda is often described as falsehood politicized, however some of the most effective is based on truth, so any information used to persuade someone politically is propaganda. For example the COVID Crisis Briefings put on in the White House, though partly informational (Fauci), were also propaganda (Trump). What is your opinion of Manufacturing Consent by Noam Chomsky? Is he correct about the media in the US being largely Bourgeois propaganda? Is the book itself propaganda?
Chomsky attributes intention where the effect is a natural motive, and he wrote it at the end of the Reagan administration and the politics of the time must be considered. This was the beginning of the era of political polarization we are still seeing today. Would you consider journalism propaganda? No, there are profit motives which must be considered. It strikes a balance between simply stating facts, and malicious intent. Whereas for it to be propaganda, the broadcaster has to be intentionally attempting to persuade the audience. How has the role of journalism in modern culture changed in recent years? News media has become much more propagandistic in recent years, especially since the younger Bush presidency, and 9/11. The iraq war reshaped american culture and american journalism into making it financially viable for the news to contain propaganda, but that's just a fact of the profit motive, not a fact of intent.
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