My View

Propaganda has existed for about as long as civilization itself has. Alexander the Great allegedly ‘marketed’ himself as the embodiment of a living god in an attempt to justify his conquests and terrorize his enemies. The real ‘Battle for people’s minds’, however, didn’t begin until the early twentieth century, with communication technology allowing propagandists to spread messages quickly and to a massive audience. New propaganda techniques built on psychological manipulation were created in Nazi Germany by the ministry of propaganda, and further refined by other nations during and after World War 2. These techniques were quick to be adopted because of how important it is for the state to have a unified and agreeable base. This applies to all types of governmental systems, from illiberal (and in some cases liberal) democracies to feudalistic monarchies. Unless most people agree that the people who rule over them (whether they be kings or elected politicians) are making just and sound decisions, revolution is inevitable. At least until you add propaganda to the equation, in which case any form of injustice and corruption can be justified.

In Hungary, Viktor Orban uses a combination of negative and positive propaganda to skirt corruption accusations. “Years ago, a high-ranking Fidesz politician, a communications guy, told me the following: if we can make the voter see that the opposition is just as corrupt as we are, in the end they won’t care about who steals and how much. All they will care about is who does more for the country, who is more patriotic. So, the strategy is crystal clear: let’s talk about values and morals instead of corruption” (Panyi, 2020). By vilifying LGBT people and immigrants under the pretense of upholding and protecting Christian values, corruption has been allowed to run rampant. In addition to using negative propaganda to attack opposing political parties and scapegoating innocent people, Orban also likes to stir nationalistic fervor by romanticizing a bygone Hungarian empire.

Democracy, which comes from the Greek word ‘demokratia’, means “rule by the people”. Propaganda is, by definition, antithetical to democracy. The people cannot be expected to rule reasonably when they are being manipulated. One might make the argument that propaganda is a necessary evil only during wartime, but that argument falls like a house of cards when one deliberates on why people need to be lied to and riled up emotionally to enlist in the first place. When people’s lives are at stake, it is of paramount importance for the layman to think critically about if/why war is necessary, and how much their elected officials have to gain by starting one. By creating nationalistic propaganda, normal people can be deluded into seeing war as a game, where doing whatever it takes to ‘win’ (like systematic genocide) becomes their new normal. It would be naïve (and ironically undemocratic) to suggest that all propaganda needs to be made illegal overnight. If democracy is to have a chance in the twenty first century, people need to be able to look for clues in the media they’re consuming and ask themselves one question: Que Bono?

Sources used: BIRN. (2020, December 3). Corruption Couldn’t Shake Orban’s Credibility; a Sex Scandal Just Might. Balkan Insight. https://balkaninsight.com/2020/12/03/corruption-couldnt-shake-orbans-credibility-a-sex-scandal-just-might/