We’ll look at an example from another US state media outlet: Radio Free Asia
In 2014, Radio Free Asia wrote a story claiming North Korean students were forced to get the Kim Jong Un haircut. The story spread like wildfire. It was on all the news stations, all the talk shows, Kimmel, Colbert, John Oliver. TV commercials riffed on it. The whole American media ecosystem was unanimous, everyone believed this shit. Regular people on the street could tell you about it.
Then it came out that Radio Free Asia made it up. Someone at Radio Free Asia sat down and deliberately wrote a false story with the intent to deceive the public, and then Radio Free Asia published that story as fact in order to smear an enemy of the United States.
Radio Free Asia, like VoA, has excellent scores on all the media bias and fact-checking sites. This is because they sprinkle their bullshit carefully. RFA’s hit pieces are mixed in among hundreds of ordinary, mundane, reputable current events stories. You go to the site and you see headlines like you might see on any other site. But when you go digging, you start to find dozens of unsourced claims about China and North Korea mixed in. The rest is just reputation laundering to support the bullshit.
If you asked an intelligent person, “how would you publish propaganda,” RFA is the format they would come up with.
I briefly researched this and it looks like the initial version of the article (as described by the Washington Post) was indeed wrong. The Diplomat claims RFA updated the English translation of the article and made it more accurate:
The instruction for male students to get the same haircut as their leader is not based on any directive from Kim but on a recommendation from the ruling Workers’ Party, according to a North Korean from North Hamgyong province near the border with China.
So I’m not sure the takeaway is “someone sat down and wrote a bullshit story with the intent to deceive the public,” so much as “an article stub appears to have gotten into the wild and was corrected in translation.”
Certainly it’s easier to believe RFA made an error and/or mispublication here than they’re just publishing propaganda, right? Unless we’re saying the standard for a US-backed media source is “zero errors, and any errors are intentional propaganda.”
But let’s assume that’s true: they don’t make any errors and this is indeed propaganda. Why did they publish it? What would be the utility of false haircut propaganda, except to tip their hands that they are a propaganda outlet, which would certainly make its utility as a propaganda outlet worthless? Wouldn’t they want to get this story right so you believe the really big important stuff?
If you asked an intelligent person, “how would you publish propaganda,” you’d just do it like Russia Times: just straight-up repeat the state’s lies and never bother reporting anything close to the truth. I think the multilayered conspiracy theories required for the assertion that institutions intentionally seed their stories with propaganda are difficult to swallow, and not particularly well-supported. Like there’s no evidence RFA intentionally lied here, at least none that I can find.
Of course, I also think you should be cautious of media sources in general and it’s a fine idea to keep in mind who pays RFA’s bills. But the way to judge whether a place gets it right or wrong is to examine its history and accuracy; dismissing it outright because the US funds it is intellectually lazy.
They changed one unsourced claim to another unsourced claim. Neat.
Why did they publish it?
Because it vilifies an enemy state, which is convenient when you want public support for sanctions against that enemy
If you asked an intelligent person, “how would you publish propaganda,” you’d just do it like Russian Times: just straight-up repeat the state’s lies and never bother reporting anything close to the truth.
Uh, if they’re just going to publish total outright lies, why not just claim they eat babies or something equally horrific? Villifying the state via haircut shaming is certainly not how I’d go about it.
Could you explain why you think this?
Well yeah: it’s easier to do and gets the same results in the end.
Journalists are actually people. Let’s assume that care about what they do and want to do it with integrity (as most of us seek to act). Convincing them to constantly lie and compromise their work for political reasons seems like a lot of work, and they’d just wind up quitting and writing scandalous tell-alls anyway. So why bother to begin with? It’d just cause drama and is frankly a dead-end for your goals in any event. Just hire a bunch of hatchet job propagandists whose explicit goal is lying. Then everyone’s happy and you’ve made your life much much easier.
Of course, you miss out on “truthful articles” that fool people into believing you’re a good institution. But most people will see that you’re publishing intentional lies and have fired your good journalists anyway, so no one is going to believe you’re a reliable journalistic institution even if you cram in some incisive, hard-hitting truths. Again, it’s just a waste of time and effort; people who are smart enough to do the research will see through you in any case. So, just go straight for the propaganda.
There are plenty of people (right here in this thread) who will falsely equivocate between your propaganda and actual journalism anyway, so it’s not like you’re even sacrificing that much.
Why not just claim they eat babies or something equally horrific?
They do publish many horrific claims.
gets the same results in the end
No it doesn’t. When your outlet is obvious propaganda, fewer people believe you. RFA’s sheen of reputability was a huge factor in the haircut story’s enormous reach in western media.
Hire a bunch of hatchet job propagandists
…the sort of people who would write this disproven haircut story and dozens of other goofy unsourced claims they’ve published, yes. You can even tell them to write normal stories too just to mix it up.
Convincing journalists to lie seems like a lot of work
Not if some or all of your journalists are US intelligence — Radio Free Asia began as a CIA front operation (google it), and might still be one.
Of course I looked. An anonymous source is actually fine, especially when reporting on a regime known for torturing sources.
You’re right that fewer people believe it; but again, it is obviously propaganda when it is and it’s not a secret. So again why bother with the fig leaf when no one will believe it anyway?
And certainly you have a source for your absurd conspiracy theory that the CIA actually runs RFA, right?
Wikileaks publishes leaks. Their sources provide falsifiable documents, transcripts, photos, and footage — actual evidence we can follow up on. The Panama Papers were evidence. 2.6 terabytes of data. 11.5 million documents. Edward Snowden gave us evidence. He didn’t just say “the NSA totally spies on you dude, trust me bro.”
absurd conspiracy theory that the CIA actually runs RFA
Conspiracy theory sure, but how is it absurd? They’re state funded, the CIA acknowledges it created them, they print a lot of unsourced claims about America’s enemies, you can’t find any information about their authors, etc. Ultimately I’m not sure it matters. Unsourced disproven bullshit is unsourced disproven bullshit, CIA or not. Either way, we can point to Radio Free Asia as an example of less-than-trustworthy US state media.
If we need extraordinary evidence for the haircut story, the monumentally much more unlikely, conspiratorial, and unsupported assertion that actually the CIA controls the RFA definitely needs falsifiable documents, transcripts, photos, and footage. Actual evidence, as you say. For which, as you know, there is precisely zero.
I mean, at least the haircut story has an anonymous source. You don’t even have that.
We’ll look at an example from another US state media outlet: Radio Free Asia
In 2014, Radio Free Asia wrote a story claiming North Korean students were forced to get the Kim Jong Un haircut. The story spread like wildfire. It was on all the news stations, all the talk shows, Kimmel, Colbert, John Oliver. TV commercials riffed on it. The whole American media ecosystem was unanimous, everyone believed this shit. Regular people on the street could tell you about it.
Then it came out that Radio Free Asia made it up. Someone at Radio Free Asia sat down and deliberately wrote a false story with the intent to deceive the public, and then Radio Free Asia published that story as fact in order to smear an enemy of the United States.
Radio Free Asia, like VoA, has excellent scores on all the media bias and fact-checking sites. This is because they sprinkle their bullshit carefully. RFA’s hit pieces are mixed in among hundreds of ordinary, mundane, reputable current events stories. You go to the site and you see headlines like you might see on any other site. But when you go digging, you start to find dozens of unsourced claims about China and North Korea mixed in. The rest is just reputation laundering to support the bullshit.
If you asked an intelligent person, “how would you publish propaganda,” RFA is the format they would come up with.
An interesting story!
I briefly researched this and it looks like the initial version of the article (as described by the Washington Post) was indeed wrong. The Diplomat claims RFA updated the English translation of the article and made it more accurate:
So I’m not sure the takeaway is “someone sat down and wrote a bullshit story with the intent to deceive the public,” so much as “an article stub appears to have gotten into the wild and was corrected in translation.”
Certainly it’s easier to believe RFA made an error and/or mispublication here than they’re just publishing propaganda, right? Unless we’re saying the standard for a US-backed media source is “zero errors, and any errors are intentional propaganda.”
But let’s assume that’s true: they don’t make any errors and this is indeed propaganda. Why did they publish it? What would be the utility of false haircut propaganda, except to tip their hands that they are a propaganda outlet, which would certainly make its utility as a propaganda outlet worthless? Wouldn’t they want to get this story right so you believe the really big important stuff?
If you asked an intelligent person, “how would you publish propaganda,” you’d just do it like Russia Times: just straight-up repeat the state’s lies and never bother reporting anything close to the truth. I think the multilayered conspiracy theories required for the assertion that institutions intentionally seed their stories with propaganda are difficult to swallow, and not particularly well-supported. Like there’s no evidence RFA intentionally lied here, at least none that I can find.
Of course, I also think you should be cautious of media sources in general and it’s a fine idea to keep in mind who pays RFA’s bills. But the way to judge whether a place gets it right or wrong is to examine its history and accuracy; dismissing it outright because the US funds it is intellectually lazy.
They changed one unsourced claim to another unsourced claim. Neat.
Because it vilifies an enemy state, which is convenient when you want public support for sanctions against that enemy
Are you serious? Is this really what you think?
Could you explain why you think this?
That claim includes a source.
Uh, if they’re just going to publish total outright lies, why not just claim they eat babies or something equally horrific? Villifying the state via haircut shaming is certainly not how I’d go about it.
Well yeah: it’s easier to do and gets the same results in the end.
Journalists are actually people. Let’s assume that care about what they do and want to do it with integrity (as most of us seek to act). Convincing them to constantly lie and compromise their work for political reasons seems like a lot of work, and they’d just wind up quitting and writing scandalous tell-alls anyway. So why bother to begin with? It’d just cause drama and is frankly a dead-end for your goals in any event. Just hire a bunch of hatchet job propagandists whose explicit goal is lying. Then everyone’s happy and you’ve made your life much much easier.
Of course, you miss out on “truthful articles” that fool people into believing you’re a good institution. But most people will see that you’re publishing intentional lies and have fired your good journalists anyway, so no one is going to believe you’re a reliable journalistic institution even if you cram in some incisive, hard-hitting truths. Again, it’s just a waste of time and effort; people who are smart enough to do the research will see through you in any case. So, just go straight for the propaganda.
There are plenty of people (right here in this thread) who will falsely equivocate between your propaganda and actual journalism anyway, so it’s not like you’re even sacrificing that much.
Yeah, an anonymous source. Did you look at it?
They do publish many horrific claims.
No it doesn’t. When your outlet is obvious propaganda, fewer people believe you. RFA’s sheen of reputability was a huge factor in the haircut story’s enormous reach in western media.
…the sort of people who would write this disproven haircut story and dozens of other goofy unsourced claims they’ve published, yes. You can even tell them to write normal stories too just to mix it up.
Not if some or all of your journalists are US intelligence — Radio Free Asia began as a CIA front operation (google it), and might still be one.
Of course I looked. An anonymous source is actually fine, especially when reporting on a regime known for torturing sources.
You’re right that fewer people believe it; but again, it is obviously propaganda when it is and it’s not a secret. So again why bother with the fig leaf when no one will believe it anyway?
And certainly you have a source for your absurd conspiracy theory that the CIA actually runs RFA, right?
…when they provide evidence.
Wikileaks publishes leaks. Their sources provide falsifiable documents, transcripts, photos, and footage — actual evidence we can follow up on. The Panama Papers were evidence. 2.6 terabytes of data. 11.5 million documents. Edward Snowden gave us evidence. He didn’t just say “the NSA totally spies on you dude, trust me bro.”
Conspiracy theory sure, but how is it absurd? They’re state funded, the CIA acknowledges it created them, they print a lot of unsourced claims about America’s enemies, you can’t find any information about their authors, etc. Ultimately I’m not sure it matters. Unsourced disproven bullshit is unsourced disproven bullshit, CIA or not. Either way, we can point to Radio Free Asia as an example of less-than-trustworthy US state media.
If we need extraordinary evidence for the haircut story, the monumentally much more unlikely, conspiratorial, and unsupported assertion that actually the CIA controls the RFA definitely needs falsifiable documents, transcripts, photos, and footage. Actual evidence, as you say. For which, as you know, there is precisely zero.
I mean, at least the haircut story has an anonymous source. You don’t even have that.
https://youtu.be/2BO83Ig-E8E
Is people travelling there and getting first hand actual proof enough for you?
any evidence at all
than a disproven story?
actually, yes I do. someone told me. /s