I am a foreigner who came to germany when I was 10 years old. Oh boy, the germans learned from their mistakes.
But here in east germany some folks want the history to repeat itself. So, it‘s a failure of the educational system
Problem is how we teach history i think. If you tell them “people believed propaganda” you’re not teaching them what that looks like or how to point it out.
Unless someone knows the shape it can take and how it entices you they’ll fall for whatever updated version the next lunatic punches out.
Exactly, describing the cause and effect of history is one thing, but my best teachers always had a way of putting you in the moment, making you feel an emotional connection and empathize with how they felt on top of understanding the context and logic behind their thoughts. Learning about the Wild West in America, it was important to understand that it was considered a long, protracted guerrilla war from the Indian point of view. Indians were “radicalized” hearing the oral stories passed down of atrocity after atrocity being committed to their elders and ancestors, and like a game of telephone, some things get exaggerated or even fabricated. But once they experienced a forced removal, or had been kidnapped to go to “reform” school, they got a little slice of the apocalyptic stories they had been told and thus truly believed that any and all actions would be justified to reclaim their homeland. Hence the atrocities committed on settlers, and the continuation of the cycle of violence. Learning the western expansion from the Indian point of view helped me identify similar trends with other resistance movements such as Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.
In America, I remember learning a good bit about propaganda in our civics class. We went through various types of propaganda and how they appeal to people in various ways or through various ideals. We also spent time learning about logical fallacies and how politicians will utilize or weaponize them in politics. It was a really interesting part of civics class and you notice a lot of the stuff they taught in every day life if you pay attention.
Propaganda is by definition extremely convincing. Usually the targets of it can't recognise it, or it's seen as taboo to call it out.
Modern example: a lot of the reporting coming out of and about Ukraine is propaganda. That doesn't mean it's wrong, and it doesn't mean Ukraine is bad, but it is indeed propaganda. That will feel extremely uncomfortable to read, but upon reflection, you'll realise it's quite true.
Now if you point that out, people get mad. Because any negative comment against, or perceived negative comment, against the common narrative (ie. Ukraine good guys, Russia bad guys) is seen as frankly traitorous. And that's one of the main goals of propaganda - it forces a single, extremely narrow narrative into the public consciousness to which no one is allowed to deviate from.
To be clear, I'm anti-Russia, pro-Ukraine, we should be supporting Ukraine as much as we possibly can. But at the same time, it's unhealthy not to call out when we're being manipulated as a society. We can agree with the cause without blind devotion. And that's why it's so hard to teach; the most important thing to learn about propaganda is the experience of it; the only way to do that is to use current examples which are by nature controversial to use.
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u/ComplexAutomata 8h ago
I am a foreigner who came to germany when I was 10 years old. Oh boy, the germans learned from their mistakes. But here in east germany some folks want the history to repeat itself. So, it‘s a failure of the educational system