Questions tagged [propaganda]
Questions related to the history of the attempt to influence perception and/or opinion through the use of promoting the spread of information which is neither impartial nor objective, designed to produce a desired result, often also accompanied by withholding or limiting the spread of objective or impartial information which is contrary to the designed narrative.
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Did the Roman Empire lie? [closed]
Some modern countries, including the US, Russia, and the UK in particular are blamed (by the other side, where Russia is confronted to US+UK) to be particularly lying in politics, using their powerful ...
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Did Nazi propaganda really claim that England imposed the war on Germany?
There's a photo circulating online (examples 1,2) allegedly of a congress of the National Socialist Party of Germany (i.e. a Nazi congress) that took place at the Sportpalast in Berlin in late 1942 or ...
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How did US, and the Western world's people react when USSR suddenly became an ally during WWII?
Before the USSR's participation in WWII with the West, it had a non-aggression pact with Germany, invaded Poland, and is basically the super-villain of the Red Scare. But suddenly, after USSR became ...
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Did Nazi propaganda about the USSR change after the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact?
I'm well-aware that Soviet propaganda completely changed its orientation after the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, starting a much more positive portrayal of the Nazis in many aspects up until the German ...
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Did Soviet propaganda assert that the Jews lived badly/poorly in Israel?
To my knowledge, there was a lot of anti-Israel propaganda that emphasized
Israeli militarism.
Suppression of the Arab locals.
Israel being a puppet of the US.
Israel being friendly with the former ...
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How did the Soviet press talk about the opposing forces (mujahideens) during the Soviet-Afghan war?
I've watched and read a fair bit of material on the Soviet war in Afghanistan, but this [in my humble experience] is a topic that's not touched upon much if at all in Western coverage of that war. For ...
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Is there any documentation of the use of scientific knowledge or technology in pagan temples?
One of the great rabbinic scholars from the Geonic period, Rabbi Hai Gaon (939-1038 CE) wrote a responsum wherein he mentions as something "well-known" that that idolatrous temples would set ...
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Why did this anti-communist pamphlet, from the USA in the 1950s, include UNESCO among its targets?
The English language Wikipedia article on McCarthyism includes an image of an "anti-communist" pamphlet, apparently from the 1950s:
I was intrigued by point 4:
RIGHT NOW films are being ...
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Did Joseph Goebbels really say this about German opposition in 1933?
In a video interview (in Russian) with a Putin supporter that surfaced recently, the host asks his guest, "What do you think of this quote?"
Here's the text of the alleged quote:
Opposition ...
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How did Nazi Germany justify the attempted invasion of Britain?
Virtually all modern nations offer a justifying reason why they're engaging in any war, if only to convince their own people that they're fighting on the side of right and justice.
What justification ...
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When, where and why did ascribing insanity to cannabis use begin?
When reading about the historical perceptions of cannabis, especially those of the elite, cannabis is often said to cause insanity. I'm pretty sure there was a point when British elites were talking ...
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What is the context of the use of injustice/unrightousness (不義/fugi) in WW2 era Japanese propaganda?
The Imperial Japanese military song Nihon Rikugun (日本陸軍) begins with the line "天に代わりて不義を討つ" ("defeat injustice in place of righteousness").
What exactly did they consider 不義/fugi ...
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Did the Soviet Union or its satellite states have any broadcast propaganda media for an international audience?
Since 1949, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has been a U.S. Government funded broadcasting service aimed at Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia. During the Cold War, it mainly targeted ...
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What did "Propaganda" mean to Germans during WW2? [duplicate]
The "Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda" was the primary vehicle that the Nazis had used to enforce Nazi ideology and centralise Nazi control of German culture and thinking.
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Is there an example of a civil rights movement supporter with a record of being against it?
I wonder if someone knows any example of a public figure who was (or is now) perceived as anti-civil rights movement in the values or decisions they stood for, but then switched their public agenda ...
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Are there thirteenth century sources linking the Fifth Crusade to the Book Of Daniel?
Are there any thirteenth century sources (Christian, Islamic, or Jewish) linking (the timing of) the fifth crusade to a possibly self-fulfilling prophecy1 from (the eighth chapter2 of) the Book of ...
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In which East European country in the 1980s did people put their TVs in front of windows and turn them facing outside?
Years ago, I read an article about the period during which regime changes happened in Eastern European countries in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It was mentioned in the article that, in one of ...
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Was the Reichspropaganda-Leitung (RPL) known to the Germany public? [closed]
I noticed that the Nazi propaganda department was literally called "Reichspropaganda-Leitung (RPL)", "the propaganda office". Was this the public name of it, or, a secret name used behind closed doors?...
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Why does this London Underground poster from 1924 have a Star of David atop a Christmas tree?
There is currently an exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago displaying posters promoting London Underground transit from the 1920's and 30's.
This interesting piece comes from 1924. A full ...
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Did imperialist propaganda inflate map size?
I'm fairly certain I've seen this in the past and I highly doubt I'm making this up - I'm not sure whether it was of the British Empire or Japan's or maybe even some other nation - but I'm fairly ...
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What is the historical accuracy of the film Valkyrie? [closed]
How historically accurate are films made about Nazi Germany? Since they are made after WW2, are they inherently biased towards the Allies? Taking the movie Valkyrie for example, how historically ...
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Are there any historical examples of (non government-approved) fake news having a strong effect?
Right now there is great concern about "fake news", with calls to regulate journalists and social media to prevent people from seeing or propagating fake news stories. I would like to know what kind ...
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How much did the western world know about the Soviet Union pre-WWII?
This question is inspired by being surprised at the insight of George Orwell's Animal Farm.
For some reason, I had the impression that the western world was in the dark about the horribleness of the ...
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Why did Joseph Goebbels allow an all-Jewish Orchestra to exist and perform in Berlin from 1938 to 1941?
Rehearsal for a performance of Judas Maccabaeus (Handel) in May 1934 by the Kulturbund Deutscher Juden Orchestra, in the (Bernburger Straße) Berliner Philharmonie; conductor: Kurt Singer. Sources: ...
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Are there notable incident(s) where Russia/SU was wrongfully accused by Western powers in the 20th century?
I would like to know incident(s) where SU/Russia was accused to have done something by Western powers where Western historians also came at least now to the conclusion that the accusation was ...
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How did people react to these WWI posters with their 'brutal messages'?
When war broke out in 1914,
the British government, through the Parliamentary Recruiting
Committee, set about producing posters to swell the ranks of Britain's
small professional army with ...
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How prevalent were American disinformation campaigns during the Cold War?
Numerous disinformation campaigns were spread about the US during the Cold War by the KGB. Some notable examples include Operation INFEKTION, which attributed the AIDS virus to the US's involvement, ...
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When was the White Feather first used as a symbol of cowardice?
During WWI in Britain (and in some British colonies), a white feather was commonly given to men who were seen as cowards for not enlisting. The idea of using a white feather comes
supposedly from ...
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What access did people in the Warsaw pact countries have to Western television and radio?
Did people in socialist East Germany and Central Europe really watch Western television as casually as Westerners did, during the cold war? Were there laws against it? Were TV and radio receivers ...
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Who was the first to accuse enemy troops of impaling babies, cutting fetuses from women's bellies, etc.?
In a surprising number of conflicts, propagandists have accused enemy troops of very similar (and appalling) atrocities. Among the most common allegations are claims that babies had been impaled on ...
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Synagogue Scene in Der Ewige Jude: Looking for more information
This question is fairly technical, but I've run into a dead-end and the historians whom I have asked have been unable to help me. If anybody can direct me to something on this subject, I would very ...
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Who made this Sino-Soviet Propaganda Poster?
Who made this Sino-Soviet Propaganda Poster?
And, why was it made so early?
By the left armpit, there is a signature:
The Who:
I believe this says "ВИКТОР ИВАНОВ" which google says translates to "...
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Was there manipulation of racism in the Vietnam war? [closed]
It is fairly well established that racism was taken advantage of by both sides during WW2, especially (from the American perspective) in the Pacific theater (see for example “War without mercy: Race ...
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What did the Allied WW1 propaganda for the Germans say?
I recently came across this passage of Mein Kampf where Hitler praises the effectiveness of WW1 Allied propaganda over the German people:
At first the claims of the propaganda were so impudent that ...
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When did the German people learn that they had a large, powerful military, in violation of the Versailles Treaty?
According to the terms of the Versailles Treaty at the end of the First World War, Germany's military was limited to a force so tiny as to be utterly irrelevant in any major conflicts. When Hitler ...
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Did US propaganda change eating habits in Turkey post WW2? [closed]
There is a story going on here in Turkey about propaganda efforts by the US to change eating habits of the population to sell surplus US corn and corn products to Turkey. Is it possible to find legal ...
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When did the hypocrisy to call a dictatorship "free, democratic, republic etc." start?
If we take a look at country designations, with depressing regularity the most repressive ones call themselves e.g.:
Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)
Democratic Republic of the ...
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Is Snyder's claim about Soviet-German friendship propaganda posters (1939‒41) supportable?
Upon reading Putin’s New Nostalgia article by Timothy Snyder, I was specifically intrigued by one particular historical point he mentioned. Given the charged nature of current events, and Snyder’s ...
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Did the USSR use trotskyism as a bogeyman in the post Stalin period?
In Stalin's time the USSR used Trotskyist as a byword for subversion, sabotage, and all things nasty.
In his 'secret speech', Khrushchev continued to condemn Trotskyist ideas, but depicted Stalin's ...
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In the USSR, did they ever stop 'officially' believing in the future Communist utopia? [closed]
Karl Marx taught of a state which 'withered away' until 'communism' had been achieved: that is a stateless, communal society of prosperity and perpetual peace. To begin with at least, the Soviet Union ...
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At which point in time did the majority of German population become aware of the Holocaust?
I've read the wikipedia pages on Responsibility for the Holocaust and German Resistance to Nazism but the answer is not clear. It's established that large numbers of Germans were aware of the ...
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Was oratory was considered Hitler's fundamental political strength by his contemporaneous friends and foes?
I recently watched a new mini-series on the rise of Adolf Hitler and learnt an insight that hadn't been apparent in other material I had read and watched on the era:
There were many proto-fascists in ...
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Effect of propaganda during the American War of Independence
In what way did propaganda play a part in the solidifying of American identity in the American War of Independence, and how was propaganda used by the British at home to generate support for the war?
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The name of a German Nazi supporter who owned many newspapers
I was wondering if anyone could tell me the name of the Nazi supporter was that owned 53 German newspapers and dedicated all of them to Hitler to use to spread his Nazi message through one of the ...
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Did the German people actually know Joseph Goebbels as the "Minister of Propaganda"?
I've been trying to understand this for some time now. It seems to me that propaganda should only work if the audience doesn't know that it's propaganda. So if the Nazis' goal was to control its ...
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When, where and with what propagation through Europe did the idea of gypsies stealing children occur?
In light of the recent news kerfuffle regarding a child found in a Romani (gypsy) camp; it got me wondering:
At what point in history did the idea1 of gypsies stealing children start?
And from ...
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Why pretend Elser, Thalmann & other dissidents had been killed in air raids?
Richard Evans' The Third Reich at War, like most other substantial histories of the twilight years of Third Reich, paints a picture of quite startling brutality directed against its own population (...
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