Every time someone not following the face mask meme contracts Covid-19, the media makes the lack of face masks the story. Yet when a large group of health care workers, with 100% face mask compliance is diagnosed with Covid-19, mention of face masks vanishes. According to the CDC, 90% of those diagnosed with Covid-19 were face mask wearers – suggesting the media’s focus on face masks or lack of one as the cause of contracting Covid-19 is propaganda messaging.
Social media content companies actively engage in censorship using a wide variety of approaches. Their censorship regimes are vastly larger and more powerful than most realize.
You don’t need to imagine – log in to Facebook and enter “vaccine” in the search box.
This poster is false. Death counts are always months behind – we will not have a decent number until probably spring of 2021.
Google has selected an odd assortment of science “subgroups” to emphasize on its Google News page. This choice, by Google, has ramifications for your attention and perspective on issues – and may even steer you away from learning about other areas of science. In effect, Google News may be operating a subtle propaganda outlet, intentionally steering our attention to topics that Google wants us to see, while steering us away from topics Google would prefer we not see.
This chart is making the rounds on social media. It leaves out so many things as to be declared False by me.
While too early to tell, it seems that the 3rd wave of Covid-19 may have peaked, nationally, in the past week. There will continue to be regional growth areas, however, as the entire nation does not peak simultaneously. There is much good news at this point – but as the linked fear porn news item illustrates, the media’s sole purpose is to keep you in a frightened state, scared to step outside. As the new cases curve subsides, the media’s attention will focus on hospitalizations and deaths – numbers which lag the new cases peak by 1-4 weeks, typically – while hiding the new cases curve. This is effectively media propaganda intended to keep you scared.
Blast from the past: the social media propaganda poster that led to the birth of this blog and web site.
A fake study cherry picks the start date of the pandemic to make a false claim that billionaires became far richer due to the pandemic. The actual purpose of the “study” is propaganda messaging using the methods of cherry picking, appeal to authority, and emotion. The errors made are large enough to be treated as lies, as well.
The headline comes from a survey finding consumers are concerned about a future recession. Public opinion polls, particularly when asking people to express an opinion on subjects of which they have neither expert nor first hand knowledge, are primarily measuring the effectiveness of prior propaganda messaging. In this example, 2019 has been filled with a stream of news reports predicting a recession. In fact, these predictions have been underway for years. And they have been wrong – particularly since no one has demonstrated any skill in accurately forecasting future recessions. But they are effective at shaping public opinion, which could result in consumers changing their behavior in ways that reduce economic activity.
The headline story is itself followed by a sequence of upbeat economic news. In fact, 2019 holiday sales are running 15% above the prior year, to date.