Drove to the market today (Cosentino’s Vegetable Haven on Bascom) when I came across this charming poster:
A Clear Channel poster on a Clear Channel billboard. In case you’re wondering: this is propaganda. It is simultaneously political and commercial propaganda.
What does the sign say? Let’s see: “Working to give local heroes a voice, a stage and a victory.” What does that mean? Nothing, of course. How are they working? And what are they working to do? What are “local heroes”? I know what I’m supposed to think they are, but what specifically does Clear Channel mean?
I definitely like the rhythm of “a voice, a stage and a victory.” Again, totally meaningless, unless you start asking: a victory over what? (Actually, the “victory” thing is definitely the most disturbing tidbit on the poster.) And the first people who go to their local Clear Channel station insisting that they get to use their voice and their stage will be met by the radio engineer, whose sole job is to play whatever signal Clear Channel beams to their “local” broadcast.
The United States as the only landmass on a heart-shaped globe. How many ideas does this single image get across? The heart, indicating warm fuzzies and other soft emotions: check. The United States as sole inhabitant of planet: check.
“Clear Channel cares.” Now, anybody who believes Clear Channel cares about anything besides the bottom line is clearly delusional. But that puts the critic in the position of having to say, “No, Clear Channel is a big meanie corporation!”
I discovered Propaganda Critic, which had some relevant things to say on the subject of modern propaganda:
The information revolution has led to information overload, and people are confronted with hundreds of messages each day. Although few studies have looked at this topic, it seems fair to suggest that many people respond to this pressure by processing messages more quickly and, when possible, by taking mental short-cuts.
Propagandists love short-cuts — particularly those which short-circuit rational thought. They encourage this by agitating emotions, by exploiting insecurities, by capitalizing on the ambiguity of language, and by bending the rules of logic. As history shows, they can be quite successful.
If you peruse the articles on the site, you quickly see that this billboard fits Propaganda Critic’s definition of propaganda. Glittering generalities! Euphemisms! Plain folks!
Christ.