Ever since I became conscientious of my own environment and the idea that people live vastly different lives depending on their residency, I have noticed a certain recurring culture that seems to keep the masses on the offensive.
Disclaimer: I respect and commend the people who defend and fight for our country, and nothing I say against war is directed to our military, but is instead aimed precisely at the officials and reporters who propagandize certain aspects of the media in a pro-war way.
It is not right to make people die for their country if the fight was not necessary to begin with.
The Vietnam War is an excellent example because it illustrates how Americans often assume every country wants to be a democratic, capitalist society, which is just not true.
Mass hysteria exploded in the country after the U.S. government peddled the communist versus capitalist dynamic as propaganda. Even though Soviet-style communism was detrimental in many aspects, the government pushed fear into the public in a fallacious way.
Why does it matter if other countries endorse communism? Is America really so insecure in its policies that the spread of communism, the sharing of all wealth equally, is directly threatening to the wellbeing of itself?
Oh, but if only it was that simple.
In reality, the war in Vietnam was never about communism destroying the tenets of America, but instead about insuring the deep rooted idea that we, the Americans, are indeed the chosen ones, and anyone who has not pledged allegiance to America or American ideals is in need of assistance.
The U.S. politicians – and therefore the U.S. soldiers – did not realize that the Vietnamese viewed them as oppressors, not liberators.
The war was a drastic waste of resources and a tragic loss of lives, resulting in over 30 wasted years and no real progress created as a result. This futility can be pinned to communist war propaganda.
In the case of the Iraq war, the media’s distortions and the Bush administration’s lies were a greatly more documented, but after America had already gone to war, of course.
After 9/11, tensions were understandably high in the country. This tension resulted in Bush seemingly starting a war based on false information. There were never any weapons of mass destruction, Iraq was never closely colluding with Al-Qaeda and the world did not approve of the war.
Yet, when the Program on International Policy Attitudes, along with the firm Knowledge Networks, conducted a study of U.S. understandings of foreign policy concerning the Iraq war, the results were more than upsetting.
According to the study and the 3,335 people polled: “49 percent believe that the United States had found evidence that Iraq was working closely with Al Qaeda; 22 percent believed that actual weapons of mass destruction had been found in Iraq; 23 percent believed that world public opinion favored the United States going to war with Iraq.”
All of these ideas were false. The question raised is: why are Americans in some cases so incredibly misinformed?
Many news networks, like MSNBC, CNN and BBC have a bias and deliver news tailored for the demographics that watch; however, no news network does propaganda better than Fox!
Fox is really good at making Americans panic from seemingly negative news. The network does this through ad hominems, othering, selective framing of language, repetition and tailored news to the us versus them mentality.
When Fox invites someone of an opposing opinion onto their network, they act like they are giving the opposition a fair chance to respond, but in reality, they are furthering their biased propagandized news.
For instance, through the use of ad hominems, Fox reduces people to vast generalizations. Once Fox invited an African-American professor on a show to talk about drug use. Bill O’Reilly, in good ol’ Bill fashion, interrupted the Columbia professor and told him he looks like a coke dealer. Yes, this actually happened.
By making that statement, O’Reilly undermined the professor and played into a stereotype of black men. Even though the professor denied ever doing or selling cocaine, the question, which was very unnecessary, played to a bigoted agenda..
If the people don’t pay attention, “the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing,” as Malcolm X said.
Watch an hour of Fox and tally how many times they use phrases like “Radical Islam” or “show of power” instead of “act of repression.” That phrasing is why violence has become synonymous with power in American culture.
If Fox can make war a sporting event, why wouldn’t they? The idea that power is violence makes people feel a false sense of confidence by through futile, violent acts.