When individuals post photos of their wonderful lives on social media, we do not typically think of this as propaganda – but literally, these are propaganda messages that say “I have a cool life” and you should follow and Like my posts. A new paper comes up with the remarkable (not really) finding that if you have a lot of friends, social media can make you feel better about yourself. Buried at the end: if you do not have a…
Long article (link below) explains how corporations and governments torture language to escape culpability. By carefully crafting the message, these organizations use propaganda to intentionally mislead the target audience – and they get away with it because it works and rarely does anyone call them out for their malfeasance and lies. What became clear to me in this exchange is that the passive voice is itself unsuited for the lexical landscape of United’s email, which itself is part of a…
The 2017 social media meme: 2017 True Story: A Congressman was at a hearing for a request for funding for GOES satellites. He asked the scientist why do we need to spend money on satellites when you can turn on the weather channel and get the weather! TL;DR Summary This quote appears in 2000 and 2007 and 2011 and has nothing to do with events in 2017. As we will see, it appears several people who claim to have been…
As noted on our blog, many users turn social media into a platform for perpetual outage, with their outrage volume set to 11. Why do they do it? A research paper explains: Getting outraged on others’ behalf often isn’t about altruism but soothing personal guilt and asserting one’s status as a good person. Source: Moral Outrage Is Self-Serving, Say Psychologists In other words, the perpetually outraged think they are virtue signaling that they are better than others. And “When people…
Bitter almonds are indeed a cure for cancer – they not all kill the cancer cells, they also kill the host (you!) when you eat them. Duh. 50 bitter almonds is a lethal dose – and they look identical to sweet almonds, which people can safely consume.
My Occupy Propaganda page on Facebook was shadow banned beginning about December 15th, 2016. Read on for the update – and confirmation. (This web site, when it started, was titled Occupy Propaganda, partly making fun of several “Occupy” political groups. I later changed the name to Social Panic. I discontinued cross publishing this web site to Facebook a few months after this shadow ban occurred.)
Just hours after a mass evacuation order was given, the emergency in Northern California turned social media into its usual outrage culture filled with political propaganda. This event has provided a real time illustration of the way that social media is collapsing in on itself. The first and third comments in this screen capture illustrate both sides: Water scientist Peter Gleick says he cannot tell which is worse: “gloating comments” on social media might be worse…
New data from Kaplan Test Prep say admissions officers do look at accounts. Source: Colleges Really Are Looking at Your Social Media Accounts | Best Colleges | US News And what they find can improve admission chances – or rejection. The key takeaway: “College applicants need to be aware of what others can find about them on social networks and make sure it reflects well on them,” said Alpher. “For better or worse, social media has become an established factor…
Dozens of news outlets reported on a purported scam wherein fraudsters supposedly falsify charges by randomly calling people and asking ‘Can you hear me?’ Source: ‘Can You Hear Me?’ Scam Warning CBS News prompted the latest round of this story. As Snopes notes, no one can identify an actual victim of the purported scam. Of course, it is a good idea to say as little as possible to telemarketers. However, it might not be a great idea to share the…
TL;DR Summary The Daily Beast reported the Trump administration deleted references to “climate change”, “LGBTQ”, “health care” and “civil rights” and other topics from the whitehouse.gov web site. Fake news and “real” news web sites promoted the theory that these topics were deleted as part of an upcoming period of darkness under the Trump administration. My Twitter feed was absolutely filled with links to these stories. Reality: As part of the change in administrations, the U.S. National Archives archived the Obama record…