Barking at the Headlines

Don't ask questions, just consume headline and then get angry at the next headline.

Why does the dog bark at the postman? Is it fear? Excitement? It seems like an odd question to ask in an article about news headlines but bare with me. The dog barks at the postman because, through years of conditioning, he believes that doing so is what makes him go away, he believes his display of fury has warded off the invader and his home is now safe. As outside observers (and bipeds cursed with self awareness) we are aware the postman simply has more post to deliver, and that he will continue this routine of coming and going—barking or no barking. The dog (being a quadruped blessed with ignorance) is not aware of this, hence the vociferous woofs.

But what, pray tell, does this have to do with the news cycle? Well the same self congratulation the dog might indulge in after his illusory victory over the postman is exactly what we experience when we shake our fist at the latest silly or ‘woke’ headline. Thousands of people get all riled up on social media; YouTube videos are made talking about how “WokeFeed has been utterly destroyed with facts and logic.” Mission accomplished lads, we gave that think piece a good kicking. It makes us feel good, makes us feel like we’re doing something. When in reality, we’re just barking at the headlines.

I’ve already spoken at length about how leftist activism is supposed to make you angry in my previous article “Permissible Activism” and how the phenomenon of pure reaction serves to resign you to the sandbox of the establishment’s talking points. The phenomenon of the online “counter headline” has become the main vector of reaction by which those who posit themselves as the enemy of the establishment choose to attack it, but simply pointing out the propaganda misunderstands its purpose.

In “Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes” the philosopher and sociologist Jacques Ellul identifies many different types of propaganda, but important amongst them is “Agitation” and “Integration” propaganda. Put simply: Agitation propaganda is designed to create or capitalise on periods of strife and crisis, to stir the populace to action against a perceived enemy in aid of drastic change. It is the brazen kind of propaganda, the kind meant to stir people up and overcome their usual patterns of thought and action for a limited but frenetic period of time. Integration propaganda aims to establish what has been agitated towards as the “new normal” and provides breathing room between periods of agitation.

Ellul explains the purpose of integration propaganda, noting this type of propaganda only came to prevalence in the 20th Century:

“In Western society it is no longer sufficient to obtain a transitory political act (such as a vote); one needs total adherence to a society’s truths and behavioural patterns. As the more perfectly uniform the society, the stronger its power and effectiveness. each member should be only an organic and functional fragment of it. perfectly adapted and integrated. He must share the stereotypes, belief, and reactions of the group: he must be an active participant in its economic, ethical, aesthetic, and political doings.”

Integration and Agitation naturally move in cycles, as those who are in power seek to create change advantageous to them and then reinforce that change as the status quo. The maintenance of a modern “social democracy” or “liberal democracy” requires these cycles of agitation and integration in much the same way as a Soviet state or a Fascist state.

There’s a popular quote by Theodore Dalrymple that puts it thus:

“Political correctness is communist propaganda writ small. In my study of communist societies, I came to the conclusion that the purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, not to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore, the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is in some small way to become evil oneself. One's standing to resist anything is thus eroded, and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. I think if you examine political correctness, it has the same effect and is intended to.”

The ability to humiliate in this manner requires a tight hegemony, the headlines aren't getting “more PC” because “the SJWs are taking over,” the agitation is getting more extreme because it serves the interests of an elite class who have long since already won. The use of insider “woke” language, the insistence that previously fringe practices are established societal norms and the repetition of mantras that fit the zeitgeist of the established political order are all meant to integrate those who already buy into the system and agitate them to action against those who do not. Conversely, this propaganda is meant to alienate those who feel themselves outside of the current system and agitate them to action that serves to reinforce their distinction as “The Enemy.”

Within the parameters of this dialectic, pointing out the propaganda simply fulfils your part of the equation. To parrot the establishment talking points with incredulity but to be powerless to do anything about them is the aforementioned act of impotent fist shaking. It only serves to demonstrate the power their narrative has whilst also serving to further disseminate it. Those in online circles would do well to remember how “The Streisand Effect” works. When the establishment want to counter a piece of information they find damaging, they censor it from view then simply pretend it does not exist. Censorship is only done in an outwardly brash fashion when it’s meant to serve as a show of force and warning to other dissenters, amplifying these cases without a counter use of force once again serves the interests of those in power.

Put it even more simply: the propaganda puts forth the message “You are our enemy and you are being humiliated” and reaction to it simply repeats “We are your enemy and we are being humiliated.”

This toothless stagnation persists because its profitable: they function as “reaction channels,” but instead of 11-year-olds looking at 90s toys, its the online news cycle. Simply pick a Buzzfeed article and go, no insight needed. The realities of power, force and propaganda discussed here do no factor into the prevailing narrative in the supposed “Rational Centre” or “Anti-Woke Right.” Worse still, the profligate talking heads who feed from the trough of this style of content are fiercely defensive of their headline barking—seeing public discussions around the use of force against the power structure as a threat to their income. For the headline readers, the Terms of Service are king. They exist in a middle ground where they trade on anti-establishment credibility but dare not risk saying anything that might effectively challenge the power structure—perpetually shifting with the far edge of the TOS Overton window. Even subjects as tepid as the blatantly fraudulent 2020 U.S. election are now verboten lest the powers that be remove them from their livelihoods. They debase themselves as the house negros of Big Tech, shucking and jiving in the hopes they can remain un-banned for the next round of AdSense pay-outs.

If “owning the SJWs online” was effective, it wouldn’t be allowed. The same logic goes for Cryptocurrency, or any other form of surrogate activism. What most in the “right wing” online debate-o-sphere want is to move from the agitation phase into a more comfortable integration phase, in which they can gain some token crumbs from the political class to bring to their audience and hang out a “mission accomplished” banner. Calls to—or discussions of—action which may be effective are met with performative disavowals and accusations of “radicalism” and “extremism.” They resort to the same enforcement of societal norms that they decry in the media they criticise. They—in effect—function as agents of the system and the last line of integration propaganda, pleading with you not to turn against the system in its totality.

But why wouldn’t they? You can’t criticise a system once it has been destroyed, you can’t make tepid YouTube videos during a violent revolution, you can’t complain about election results if there are no elections. Once a nation or region enters a period of physical conflict, concerns over online media are no longer meaningful and demand for debunking feminists falls to nil. Their financial future is dependent on the existence of the very system they purport to disdain and if meaningfully threatened they will fiercely defend it. This is an attribute they share with the online talking heads of the left, a full on violent Marxist revolution would certainly involve the execution of well paid online activists, but within leftist circles those same activists at least purport to want a revolution —its explicit and implicit threat serving as a basis for ever leftward compromise within the limits of establishment norms.

The solution to this problem is simple: stop doing it. If you regard yourself as an agent of effective change, study and disseminate ideas that you feel deal with universal concepts of power and control, not transient issues that are thrust into the public eye deliberately to soak up political energy. You can just tune out of “clown world” and build yourself inwards, find ways to cut yourself strand by strand from the narratives of the elite and create within yourself a bastion of belief you can share with your fellow man. Be an agent of real life change, not an online megaphone for the latest sideshow of modernity. Our current system and those who preside over it are evil and must be destroyed if we are to see any level of change, unwillingness to state this basic fact without caveat marks out any supposed “dissident thought leader” as useless and still subsumed within the system as its agent—no matter how loudly he barks at the headlines. 

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