PROPAGANDA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 May 1941, Page 6

PROPAGANDA

POWERFUL AND INSIDIOUS WEAPON NEED OF INDEPENDENT STUDY & THOUGHT. DR. SCHOLEFIELD ADDRESSES ROTARIANS. There was a good attendance at the weekly luncheon meeting of the Masterton Rotary Club today, presided over by the president. Mr P. F. Fagan. The speaker for the day was Dr. G. H. Scholefield. Chief Parliamentary Librarian, who took for his subject “Propaganda."

Messrs G. Masters and R. Housley were present as guests. A warm welcome was extended to Dr. J. A. Cowie, an honorary member. Mr Fagan reported that a member, Lieut. C. E. Rogers would be leaving Masterton to take charge of the musketry section in Wellington. It was decided to send a letter congratulating him on his promotion.

A letter was received from the Wellington Club expressing pleasure at the recent visit by Masterton Club members. Archdeacon E. J. Rich was thanked for his address.

Prior to the address, the president took the opportunity to refer to the pleasure it gave them to again meet Dr Scholefield within the circle of their club, of which he was a foundation member and a member of the first board of directors. They had happy recollections of the many interesting addresses given by Dr. Scholefield and he was quite sure that the present talk would be equally as informative as those given on previous occasions. Dr. Scholefield thanked the president for his warm welcome and expressed the pleasure it gave him to bo amongst them, again. In introducing his subject, Dr. Scholefield said that propaganda was so universal and had such a bad name that there was a danger of refusing to believe any information at all for fear it might be propaganda. But propa; ganda was not necessarily untrue or harmful. The motive was the test. He gave several definitions, the effect of which was that any interested information or information given out with a purpose was propaganda. It was simply what somebody wanted to put across, or to have believed. In fact he might call it window dressing. The shopkeeper only put in the window| goods that he thought would be attractive to customers and, needless to say, did not stress points which were to their disadvantage. The best propaganda was always the truth, and the British official news, both in the last war and in this, was based upon truth. There was also such a thing as propaganda by silence; like refusing to confirm bad news for fear of assisting the enemy or discouraging friends. AI celebrated instance of this was the ’ sinking of H.M.S. Audacious in the last | war. “AN ISOLATED FACT."

All debaters were propagandists, most preachers were; many teachers were, and nearly all advertisers. The purposes of propaganda in war were quite well understood by most people today; that was why they were becoming sceptical and inclined to disbelieve even things that were true and perfectly harmless. Propaganda sought to demoralise the enemy, to mobilise hatred against his cause, /to place one’s own cause in a favourable light with neutrals and friends, and to encourage our own people. The trouble about propaganda was that it cut truth out of its context, and a fact taken out of its context could quite easily have the effect of a falsehood. One writer on propaganda had told him that the best definition he knew was “an isolated fact."

After referring. to flagrant propaganda in advertising, Dr. Scholefield said that young people in love were universal propagandists, and of course there was much propaganda in party politics. The whole essence of propai ganda was the marshalling of favour- ' able facts, together with an effort to hide the unfavourable; in fact, it was window dressing pure and simple. When we first became conscious of this new weapon it was directed only to people who could read. As the only media were books and newspapers it was fairly harmless, because the average reader had some intelligence and could size things up calmly. When the movies camo along the field was considerably widened, because even with silent, films though everybody in the cinema perhaps could not read the captions, almost all of them could follow the thread of the story. THE INSIDIOUS RADIO. But when radio camo along the floodgates were opened to the propagandist. Everybody could follow the spoken word, and a great proportion of listeners were apt to be carried away by it. Propaganda was actually brought into their own homes. This was a weapon of tremendous power, because the average person tended to believe what, he was told in a seductive voice. It was a most, insidious weapon. A skilful speaker, by flattering his audience, could make them think they were thinking, and from that point they were glad to allow him to put it across. To make things worse, in the dictatorship countries all the better listening sets were confiscated and a paternal government, presented to the poor and the middle classes for practically nothing sets which would pick up only what they put across. By this means, and by shutting out every other voice, the go-i vernmenls of Germany and Italy and I Russia had completely conquered the' intellectual freedom of their own peo-| pie and reduced them to the status of slaves. They had no will of their own : and were simply led by mass suggestion. LEARNING TO THINK.

The growth of propaganda made it imperati 'e that we must learn to think for ourselves and to resist the temptation to hiental indolence. The only way to defeat intellectual domination was to cultivate the habit of sifting news for ourselves. It was absurd to refuse to believe anything. We were greatly in debt io the experience of the world and the lessons of history, and if we adopted an attitude of universal suspicion towards everything we wore told it would simply be turning the clock back. Everyone could not weigh up news accurately, but most people could ask themselves, when! anything unusual came along, where ill came from. Look at the headings and; see whether it was official or Hot. If it was official, accept it until you had good reason to do otherwise. If not. ask where it came from, and then'

what purpose it was most likely to [serve. The intelligence of a nation should be the aggregate intelligence of its people, but if they allowed others to do their thinking for them they simply cancelled themselves out as a factor for good. Finally they should remember that the conscience of a nation was also the composite conscience of its individual men and women. On the motion of Mr S. L. P. Free. Dr. Scholefield was accorded a hearty vote of thanks.