| Propaganda (in latin it means subject to propagation) is the propagation of any ideas with the objective of attracting supporters.
The term "agitation" (latin agitato – setting in motion) also has the same meaning – the verbal, printed or visual political activity, influencing the perception and mood of people with the purpose of prompting them for political or other activities. The modern synonym for the same is public diplomacy.
Objectives of propaganda:
Propaganda is one of the main media for political manipulation. Propaganda should never be compared with advertisements. Advertising is closer to self-presentation or the informational genre. Publicity forms the core of business, political and religious information genres. When the initial signal function of reporting concentrates on the elements of expressions (emotional significance) and reprimands, the publicity it turns into agitation. And if this agitated publicity aims to achieve more of a collective action than the individual one, it becomes propaganda. Unlike publicity, propaganda is not restricted by rigid time frames and it can’t be simply expressed. Propaganda first of all plays with the emotions of people. Accordingly, propaganda, like emotions, may be negative or positive.
Positive (constructive) propaganda conveys one or the other messages to the consumer in a lucid form. The objective of the positive propaganda is to facilitate social order, harmony and to educate people about commonly accepted human values. Positive propaganda plays educative and informative functions in society. This is exercised in the interest of those to whom it is addressed, and not in the interest of a restricted number of interested people. Positive propaganda, in contrast to the negative one, does not pursue manipulative objectives.
Negative (destructive) propaganda imposes their ideas on as per the principle “aim justifies the means”. The objective of negative propaganda is to unleash social animosity, the escalation of social conflicts, aggravation of contradictions in the society, inciting the feeling of the inferiority complex in the people and so on. This leads to alienation among people and makes them docile to the will of the propagandist. The techniques of creating the image of an enemy are used for the gathering of people around the propagandist; to impose his convictions and stereotypes on the masses. The main purpose of negative propaganda is the creation of insubstantial and parallel realities with an inverted system of values, convictions, opinions. Negative propaganda actively makes use of low level criticism and the suggestibility of the masses with the objective of manipulating these people in the interests of small group of people.
When the interests of a large number of people and a particular group of people do not coincide or are directed against each other, the propaganda of this group of people harms the society. And what’s more, the propagandist is bound to consciously cheat so as to conceal the actual consequences of those actions, which he urges the people to do. In this context, there is the example of the tobacco firms, which create attractive and courageous images, thereby convincing the consumers that only smart people smoke the cigarettes of such-and-such a brand. At the bottom there is always a warning sign “Ministry of Health warns…..” (Thanks to the legislation “Protection of Consumer Rights”), but the “smart” image always has some influence. This is not an open deception, but nevertheless the omission about the negative consequences of smoking, have been proved by the researches a long time ago. |
May 1 is International Workers' Day, also known as May Day. This holiday is one of the most loved holidays of Communist and Anarchist organizations and their affiliated unions who celebrate this holiday by organizing marches with propaganda posters. Soviet Union was the biggest country that celebrated May Day with nation-wide parades and propaganda posters. These days May Day is no longer an official holiday in Russia and many ex-communist countries, but remaining communist parties still organize parades on May 1. International Workers' Day does remain one of the main communist holidays in China - celebrated with parades and propaganda posters.
