Perspective: Why propaganda is more dangerous in the digital age
James Montgomery Flagg's familiar Uncle Sam poster, used in World War I military recruiting, makes a revival appearance near recruiting headquarters on E street in Washington in 1961. By Albinko Hasic Albinko Hasic is a Bosnian-American attorney, digital analyst and history PhD student whose primary research interests are propaganda, military history and human rights. He is also the founder of BosniaHistory.com.
Partially because of the popularity of Flagg’s Uncle Sam rendering, posters quickly became a wildly popular medium for disseminating information. They were relatively cheap to produce and could be plastered just about everywhere, from post offices to schools to sides of buildings. The government used emotional imagery to draw thousands of volunteers to the armed services and create broad support for the war effort at home.
The poster, officially adopted by the Army in 1917, became an effective recruitment tool to swell the ranks of the military. It was such a resounding success that it would be reprinted during World War II and pops up again and again in popular culture today. This messages reflected one element of why wartime posters were so effective: In the words of William Bird and Harry Rubenstein, propaganda posters were an “agent for making the war aims the personal mission of every citizen.” The posters also capitalized on the ability of psychological messages inherent in visual art to alter the subconscious.
There was an occasional dark side to these posters as well: Many expressed racist, xenophobic and bigoted messages in an effort to demonize the enemy. While this was more common in countries such as Nazi Germany, where Hitler’s brutal regime used propaganda to demonize the Jewish population, American posters were not above stereotypes and bigoted messages, sometimes depicting foes as barbarian brutes with racist depictions of their leaders.
The alt-right in particular weaponized the meme format to spread disinformation through social media. Members of the alt-right turned characters such as Pepe the Frog into symbols for their virulently racist movement, building awareness of and even support for their cause. The meme propaganda came from foreign sources, too, as reports of Russian bots spreading disunity surfaced.
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