It's Propaganda Time!: Rhetoric and Responsibility
By Chad A. B. Wilson
Published October 31, 2006, 1:01 pm in Voting & Partisanship.
Yes, indeed, it's voting time, and the propaganda is streaming in. The thing that bugs me more than anything is that everyone assumes that I automatically agree with them and their positions.
Consider this from a Moveon.org email:
"Dear MoveOn member,
Forget the laundry. Let the dirty dishes pile up in the sink. Break out the TV dinners and tell the kids to do their own homework. This week, we've got some calls to make.
We've got seven days--that's 168 hours--to make our mark on this election. And for everything we care about--our kids, our Constitution, our world--we've got to make it huge.
We're off to a strong start. Yesterday we smashed our goal and topped 83,555 calls to Democratic-leaning folks who might not vote. It's important work--work that could change the outcome of some races. And that means we've gotta all roll up our sleeves and dive in.
Can you chip in an hour--or half an hour--or even twenty minutes to make some calls? It's time to jump in."
Or this from Focus on the Family Action:
"Dear Friends,
On the eve of an historic election, I'm writing to share with you two new developments that should give every social conservative all the motivation they need to go to the polls on Election Day. Please take a moment to read this and then pass it along to friends, family and fellow church members.
First, the judicial activists have struck again! Last week, New Jersey's highest court ruled that the state Legislature must create same-sex marriage or civil unions within 180 days. Once again, gay activists and liberal courts have dealt a stunning blow to supporters of traditional marriage. But what does this new ruling have to do with your voting?"
Learn All I Can
Yes, I am members of these organizations, along with several others, and it irks me that they assume I want to work for them or vote the way they tell me. Moveon.org is the worst about this. They never attempt to convince me that they're right because they assume I agree them by virtue of my membership. Notice that the Focus on the Family email does the same thing, although in a different way.
So in this column, I wish to spend some time looking at rhetoric and, well, why these emails bug me so much. But first, I want to say that I consider my membership in these very different organizations to be a good thing. Although anyone who reads my columns on this site can probably figure out which way I lean pretty easily, I still like to keep up with the other side. In the mornings, I may listen to NPR and Democracy Now, the two most leftist radio shows I can get my hands on. Then in the evening I may listen to Flashpoints, or I may just as well turn over to AM radio and listen to Sean Hannity or Michael Savage. Even if I think Amy Goodman from Democracy Now is often a paranoid communist, I still want to know what she has to say. Even if I think Sean Hannity is a sometimes-cruel reactionary, I still want to know what he has to say. I have learned important things from both of them, whether it is news that I wouldn't hear on some other station or whether it is the subtle ways that these people bend the facts to suit their own purposes.
Understanding rhetoric is one of the best safeguards we have, and we can only truly understand it by examining both sides. If I'm stuck in a bubble, I have no idea what I truly feel. That's one thing I can't stand: when a conversation or political discussion is really just a bunch of people agreeing with one another. If everyone agrees, there is no real conversation. There is no debate. And that means there is no learning. Things are static if we can't openly discuss our reasoned opinions in a calm manner. Sure, we all get hotheaded when people don't agree with us, but nothing irks me more than when someone just won't listen to the other side.
So before you go vote, make sure you know both sides of the issue. But man is this difficult. It's hard to know which is the Democratic candidate for governor this year, much less whether the Republican representative in the state congress actually supports gay rights. That's the danger of voting a straight party ticket, too. Sure, I can go in and check the "Vote all Republican" box (which is not actually what it's called), but I run the risk of voting for a fringe Republican who may favor gun control. Unless I know everything about these jokers, I have no choice but to vote the party line. So what can we do? Read and react.
Assumptions and Actions
That's what I'm going to do here. I have taken you through two bills signed into federal law and shown you how these bills use rhetoric that may be defined in dangerous ways. Now let's look at how organizations do this, too.
I don't mean to pick on Moveon.org and Focus on the Family Action here. They're just representatives, and I could have very easily chosen some other left and right groups that would have served the same purpose. Let me say first that I admire both of these organizations for the way they attempt to rile up voters so that they will actually go vote. That's the hardest thing, after all. And I will try to be an equal opportunity iconoclast.
Moveon.org sends out lots of emails to its members, probably far too many to be that helpful. I know I sometimes find myself skipping over one or two simply because they start to pile up. And like I said earlier, all of the emails assume that I agree with their position. Stephen King writes me through Moveon.org and says, "If I know anything, I know scary. And giving this president and this out-of-control Congress two more years to screw up our future is downright terrifying. Thankfully, this national nightmare is one we can end with—literally—a wake up call."
Notice that there is no proof that we have an "out-of-control Congress" or any mention of how they have "screw[ed] up our future." Why? Because I'm a member and absolutely have to agree with that statement already. Perhaps there is nothing wrong with that, but if you think about all of the commentators you hear everyday on the television or radio, it's obvious that people make these statements as if they'r truth. Can I argue that it is not an "out-of-control Congress"? You bet I can. If anything, I would say that it is a "do-nothing" Congress. But if I say that, I have to back it up with proof about what they have not done that they should have. But I don't even have to go that far. I can just ask for the proof that the Congress is out of control and has screwed up our future. The burden of proof is on the speaker, not on the questioner. But then if I counter, I have to provide the proof.
The Focus on the Family message does the same thing, although not to the same extent. In some ways, I like the Focus on the Family message more than the Moveon.org messages because Focus on the Family lays out an argument. What they do that bothers me is they assume that I buy the underlying premises of their argument. Consider this, for example: "I'm writing to share with you two new developments that should give every social conservative all the motivation they need to go to the polls on Election Day. Please take a moment to read this and then pass it along to friends, family and fellow church members." First of all, I'm not sure that I am a social conservative in the same way they would define it, and how do they know I attend church? Does being a member of Focus on the Family automatically mean that I am a churchgoer? Can I not have a focus on my family and not go to church?
Then they rail against "gay activists and liberal courts." Why do I disagree with these things? Can I be the type of person that believes in gay rights? Why is "liberal" a bad word here? They continue that train of thought, too, by chastizing Nancy Pelosi for calling herself a liberal. Then they go through her record, noting all of the liberal things she has done, and then assume that you will go vote her out of office or at least vote Republican to keep her from becoming Speaker. Perhaps I read the laundry list and say, "Yes, I want her to become speaker." But that is unthinkable.
But the underlying assumptions are there. There is no need to argue that gay rights are bad because that's just the way it is. In these kinds of emails, the burden of proof is absent. Once you pick a side, all you get is the call to action: "Go vote becuase X may get into office!" without a real discussion of the underlying assumptions used to say X is bad.
So read the propaganda and enjoy it, but also be wary of it. "Propaganda" and "rhetoric" aren't bad words, but neither are "liberal" and "conservative."
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