Welcome to WOMANTalk with Sharon Hughes | The Center for Changing Worldviews

I was thinking the other day about how hard it is to watch the many shifts that are taking place in our nation. Probably one of the most surprising, yes I'll admit it, surprising, shifts to me has been in the thinking of the American people that socialism is not such a bad idea.

I admit that it feels like a bad dream to me, of which I keep hoping I'll wake up from!

However, it's not a dream. And yet no one, not those who I have conversations with in person, or on my radio show, or on Facebook, wherever, are able to give me one example of where socialism has worked successfully.

And so why would anyone want to try it here? In a word...propaganda.

The word itself is pretty powerful, but so is the definition.

In Latin, propaganda means "propagating." In the broadest sense propaganda is information that serves a particular agenda, which could be true or false. If true, it may be one-sided and fail to paint a complete picture.

In the narrower and more common use, the term refers to deliberately false, or misleading, deceptive information that supports a political cause or the interests of those in power in any institution.

A propagandist seeks to change the way people understand an issue or a situation for the purpose of changing their actions and expectations in ways that are desirable to the propagandist. It includes censorship in which the same purpose is achieved, not by filling people's minds with false information, but by preventing people from knowing true information.

What sets propaganda apart from other forms of advocacy is the willingness of the propagandist to change people's understanding through deception and confusion, rather than persuasion and understanding.

Today more than ever we need to be discerning. Being educated on propaganda techniques would also be good. And looking back at history, at the original records of history, helps us to see through the power of emotional persuasion.

John Adams said, "Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."

And may I add...this is especially important when propaganda is used to make us think that our wishes, or inclinations, or the dictates of our passions will be realized by believing or following or voting for a certain policy...or person.