Yesterday, 12:41 PM
I begin with a plea: Understand that I will attempt to undertake observation, rather than criticism. Forgive me my... wordiness.
I offer an example of what some might not think is propaganda...
an opinion piece... it's central message echoed nearly everywhere media "informs" or "entertains."
That message is consistent... rather "one note."
The media is actually using the name they "inflamed" over multiple election cycles, as a "trigger alert."
... and no one saw that coming?
Here is a piece recently published at the ArsTechnica site...
[This treatment is made lengthy because the opinion piece itself is lengthy. And very "opinion-as-fact" built.]
The gist of it seems to be that "Education" [meaning the institution] is "under attack" - slathered onto this is some
spurious conspiracy theories about people and agendas...
While apparently coincidentally (obsessively) focused on a single personality, (perhaps even tailor-crafted for the role)...
who's 'villainy' has been given the "media treatment" for decades.
While equal treatment has been provided to raise him to high hopes for "remedies" to "urgencies."
People often recoil with revulsion when they recognize examples of propaganda...
... and I somehow get a sense of smug schadenfreude displayed, especially when it's in a nation we think of as 'bad' somehow.
But, we should never pretend it's not here...
ArsTechnica has been "fully engaged" in the anti-Trump messaging effort. (Not a criticism.)
This is an editorial right, in principle... and an editorial privilege, in practice.
An opinion piece was selected for publication: Resist, eggheads! Universities are not as weak as they have chosen to be.
Here are the first three paragraphs of this opinion:
The wholesale American cannibalism of one of its own crucial appendages—the world-famous university system—has begun in earnest. The campaign is predictably Trumpian, built on a flagrantly pretextual basis and executed with the sort of vicious but chaotic idiocy that has always been a hallmark of the authoritarian mind.
At a moment when the administration is systematically waging war on diversity initiatives of every kind, it has simultaneously discovered that it is really concerned about both "viewpoint diversity" and "antisemitism" on college campuses—and it is using the two issues as a club to beat on the US university system until it either dies or conforms to MAGA ideology.
Reaching this conclusion does not require reading any tea leaves or consulting any oracles; one need only listen to people like Vice President JD Vance, who in 2021 gave a speech called "The Universities are the Enemy" to signal that, like every authoritarian revolutionary, he intended to go after the educated.
It begins by characterizing "the university system" as a "crucial appendage" of America.
1st sentence... I have issues...
The actual beginning of the "system" is debatable... whether it is actually "the American system" is debatable...
Whatever narrative where the university system is "American" eludes me. In fact, it is most renowned for expressly
"Anti-America" postures... if your own media is to be believed.
This crucial Anti-American "appendage" has been extracting pure profit from the money given them to expand knowledge...
it's as simple as that. What's even more egregious is that rather than boast creating new scientists, professionals, and artists...
it's all about research...
The second sentence is just the usual poison... reemphasized to promote faith in it, for it's abundantly willing audience...
The author characterizes the policy sideways, with terms like "waging war"... telegraphing the 'victim' cries to come.
The narrative continues, framing this as an assault (implying violence? perhaps) "beating" the "university system" with the
essentially "MAGA Ideology."
In honesty, I was never about MAGA, I could never commit to an movement I was uncertain of.
(Frankly, I don't "do" movements. Hell... I now have issues with something's I've agreed with at some past point.)
But MAGA, whatever each person believes, is not really an ideology... it appears to be only a 'movement.'
Your characterization of the movement as ideological lacks balance on it's face,
The very things you allege they do is exactly what we've been learning those wishing you to infer victimhood
have been doing all along.
Does that make the posture presented in the narrative seem disharmonious with reality?
As for the last paragraph... "context" is always the key...
I believe in pedagogy as an invaluable trade...
Just no longer as an "entitlement" to abuse.
(I called it "cloistering" once upon a time... it happens to these old institutions... a lot.)
Even the idea of characterization of this being about a "university system" linked to "America" is sideways...
Systems imply order, in the gist...
It's because they have no order that there has been made a public issue.
Certainly, not ALL universities and ALL elements of the institution can be so casually lumped in...
But why are they the exception, rather than the norm? Or perhaps... what sets the Anti-American university apart?
Why exactly, is it tolerant... only of appearing to champion Anti-American sentiment.
__________________________________________________________________________
OK, OK... This thing is too damn long... but if you enjoy spotting 'the bump" in published opinions... it's like a
crossword puzzle for aficionados.
I got to reading this and got that 'itch' that I could not scratch... I mean you can't "talk" to the author.... not really,
It's all constrained, filtered, curated... And the forums are a horror-show of brewing bias and anger (and blessed "bot" activity)...
Just humble side offering of mind-bending by the Bene Gesserit press... ever present to "exemplify how you should think."
I offer an example of what some might not think is propaganda...
an opinion piece... it's central message echoed nearly everywhere media "informs" or "entertains."
That message is consistent... rather "one note."
The media is actually using the name they "inflamed" over multiple election cycles, as a "trigger alert."
... and no one saw that coming?
Here is a piece recently published at the ArsTechnica site...
[This treatment is made lengthy because the opinion piece itself is lengthy. And very "opinion-as-fact" built.]
The gist of it seems to be that "Education" [meaning the institution] is "under attack" - slathered onto this is some
spurious conspiracy theories about people and agendas...
While apparently coincidentally (obsessively) focused on a single personality, (perhaps even tailor-crafted for the role)...
who's 'villainy' has been given the "media treatment" for decades.
While equal treatment has been provided to raise him to high hopes for "remedies" to "urgencies."
People often recoil with revulsion when they recognize examples of propaganda...
... and I somehow get a sense of smug schadenfreude displayed, especially when it's in a nation we think of as 'bad' somehow.
But, we should never pretend it's not here...
ArsTechnica has been "fully engaged" in the anti-Trump messaging effort. (Not a criticism.)
This is an editorial right, in principle... and an editorial privilege, in practice.
An opinion piece was selected for publication: Resist, eggheads! Universities are not as weak as they have chosen to be.
Here are the first three paragraphs of this opinion:
The wholesale American cannibalism of one of its own crucial appendages—the world-famous university system—has begun in earnest. The campaign is predictably Trumpian, built on a flagrantly pretextual basis and executed with the sort of vicious but chaotic idiocy that has always been a hallmark of the authoritarian mind.
At a moment when the administration is systematically waging war on diversity initiatives of every kind, it has simultaneously discovered that it is really concerned about both "viewpoint diversity" and "antisemitism" on college campuses—and it is using the two issues as a club to beat on the US university system until it either dies or conforms to MAGA ideology.
Reaching this conclusion does not require reading any tea leaves or consulting any oracles; one need only listen to people like Vice President JD Vance, who in 2021 gave a speech called "The Universities are the Enemy" to signal that, like every authoritarian revolutionary, he intended to go after the educated.
It begins by characterizing "the university system" as a "crucial appendage" of America.
1st sentence... I have issues...
The actual beginning of the "system" is debatable... whether it is actually "the American system" is debatable...
Whatever narrative where the university system is "American" eludes me. In fact, it is most renowned for expressly
"Anti-America" postures... if your own media is to be believed.
This crucial Anti-American "appendage" has been extracting pure profit from the money given them to expand knowledge...
it's as simple as that. What's even more egregious is that rather than boast creating new scientists, professionals, and artists...
it's all about research...
The second sentence is just the usual poison... reemphasized to promote faith in it, for it's abundantly willing audience...
The author characterizes the policy sideways, with terms like "waging war"... telegraphing the 'victim' cries to come.
The narrative continues, framing this as an assault (implying violence? perhaps) "beating" the "university system" with the
essentially "MAGA Ideology."
In honesty, I was never about MAGA, I could never commit to an movement I was uncertain of.
(Frankly, I don't "do" movements. Hell... I now have issues with something's I've agreed with at some past point.)
But MAGA, whatever each person believes, is not really an ideology... it appears to be only a 'movement.'
Your characterization of the movement as ideological lacks balance on it's face,
The very things you allege they do is exactly what we've been learning those wishing you to infer victimhood
have been doing all along.
Does that make the posture presented in the narrative seem disharmonious with reality?
As for the last paragraph... "context" is always the key...
I believe in pedagogy as an invaluable trade...
Just no longer as an "entitlement" to abuse.
(I called it "cloistering" once upon a time... it happens to these old institutions... a lot.)
Even the idea of characterization of this being about a "university system" linked to "America" is sideways...
Systems imply order, in the gist...
It's because they have no order that there has been made a public issue.
Certainly, not ALL universities and ALL elements of the institution can be so casually lumped in...
But why are they the exception, rather than the norm? Or perhaps... what sets the Anti-American university apart?
Why exactly, is it tolerant... only of appearing to champion Anti-American sentiment.
__________________________________________________________________________
OK, OK... This thing is too damn long... but if you enjoy spotting 'the bump" in published opinions... it's like a
crossword puzzle for aficionados.
I got to reading this and got that 'itch' that I could not scratch... I mean you can't "talk" to the author.... not really,
It's all constrained, filtered, curated... And the forums are a horror-show of brewing bias and anger (and blessed "bot" activity)...
Just humble side offering of mind-bending by the Bene Gesserit press... ever present to "exemplify how you should think."
