Fight to Win the Propaganda Wars or Die
June 23, 2021
Today, I address my friends on the Right. I was on an election integrity call yesterday where my concerns about the Left spinning a new voter suppression argument were viewed as unimportant. The basic response was, ‘Oh, that’s just the Left, they always say something.’ It’s obvious to me the Left’s rhetoric must always be countered, but it’s not obvious to many of my friends on the Right.
Here’s why I think the Right just doesn’t get it when it comes to the Left’s propaganda: In 2011, I wrote a report on systemic racism warning the idea was taking over civil rights thinking and would soon enter popular thought. I argued people on the Right with influence needed to counter it, or the systemic racism narrative would become a 25-year overnight policy success. I was right about absolutely everything, except it only took nine years. Now you’ve got angry parents standing up at school boards and other people on the Right running around with their hair on fire about critical race theory. Fine. Where were they ten years ago? Where was the professional Right? Where were the think tanks? Where was the Republican Party then? It was stupid to let the idea fester without any challenge for an entire decade. Now we have a huge problem.
Here’s another example: I recently spoke at an election integrity conference in Virginia and led a workshop on the subject in Michigan. My topic was countering the Left’s phony voter suppression narrative on voter ID and similar claims. When it came time for audience participation, the first three people to the microphone were totally off the point. They talked about election reforms, not the Left’s phony voter suppression narrative which was the topic supposed to be under discussion.
To my friends on the Right - both professional and grassroots - you are missing a trick. The Right will not prevail until it systematically deconstructs and counters the phony narratives of the Left. That means devoting resources to the effort, gathering the best minds, and having the discipline to follow through. The Left traffics in phony narratives; they’ve built the machinery and devoted the resources to winning the propaganda wars. They gain mindshare for their crazy ideas, then the policy proposals and laws follow. It’s the same playbook every time. The Right has to get out ahead of it, and head it off at the pass or face huge problems later like we do today with race.
Some of the Left’s ideas are easy to knock down. Do men really give birth? Are there really 57 genders? Only if you succumb to the fairy dust the Left is sprinkling in your eyes. Some narratives are comparatively weak. The Left’s case for assisted suicide is full of holes; all you have to do is look. The Left’s voter suppression narrative is mostly worn out after ten years and most of the recent additions are easy to knock down. Voter ID is the new Jim Crow? That’s ridiculous. The climate change narrative is better built, but nobody on the Right, despite the wealth of ammunition and facts we have on our side, has taken it on systematically. The diversity narrative is the toughest of all. We are losing people, including a Tea Party leader, who were on the Right and went Left precisely because of this narrative. All because the Right was asleep ten years ago when systemic racism theory was being hatched, and before then when left-wing radicals began plotting in the 1950s to deliberately use race to divide America and advance their socialist agenda. We’re in about the 12th iteration of this. Where are the dedicated teams devoted to deconstructing the Left’s phony diversity narrative? Where are the war rooms devoted to pushing countermessages out? And you wonder why we’re losing so badly? I’ve contributed to the effort to deconstruct the race narrative and one parent thanked me for giving her a way to talk about race with her ten-year-old daughter.
So it’s time for the Right to get serious about winning the propaganda wars. The professional Right and the money people need to build the machinery and devote the resources. The grassroots Right needs to bone up on effective messaging. There’s a whole body of propaganda literature out there, starting with books like The Rape of the Mind and The True Believer. There’s also an entire P.R. discipline built around effective messaging and communications. America was built on ideas, but ideas can be subverted. Either the Right fights to win the propaganda wars systematically and effectively, or America is lost. Your choice. At the moment, it doesn’t look good. I’m supposed to win with this army? Not likely, but it doesn’t have to stay this way. Time to get serious about messaging, folks. If you’re on the Right and think you have the chops to help in this effort, contact me at [email protected].
June 23, 2021
Today, I address my friends on the Right. I was on an election integrity call yesterday where my concerns about the Left spinning a new voter suppression argument were viewed as unimportant. The basic response was, ‘Oh, that’s just the Left, they always say something.’ It’s obvious to me the Left’s rhetoric must always be countered, but it’s not obvious to many of my friends on the Right.
Here’s why I think the Right just doesn’t get it when it comes to the Left’s propaganda: In 2011, I wrote a report on systemic racism warning the idea was taking over civil rights thinking and would soon enter popular thought. I argued people on the Right with influence needed to counter it, or the systemic racism narrative would become a 25-year overnight policy success. I was right about absolutely everything, except it only took nine years. Now you’ve got angry parents standing up at school boards and other people on the Right running around with their hair on fire about critical race theory. Fine. Where were they ten years ago? Where was the professional Right? Where were the think tanks? Where was the Republican Party then? It was stupid to let the idea fester without any challenge for an entire decade. Now we have a huge problem.
Here’s another example: I recently spoke at an election integrity conference in Virginia and led a workshop on the subject in Michigan. My topic was countering the Left’s phony voter suppression narrative on voter ID and similar claims. When it came time for audience participation, the first three people to the microphone were totally off the point. They talked about election reforms, not the Left’s phony voter suppression narrative which was the topic supposed to be under discussion.
To my friends on the Right - both professional and grassroots - you are missing a trick. The Right will not prevail until it systematically deconstructs and counters the phony narratives of the Left. That means devoting resources to the effort, gathering the best minds, and having the discipline to follow through. The Left traffics in phony narratives; they’ve built the machinery and devoted the resources to winning the propaganda wars. They gain mindshare for their crazy ideas, then the policy proposals and laws follow. It’s the same playbook every time. The Right has to get out ahead of it, and head it off at the pass or face huge problems later like we do today with race.
Some of the Left’s ideas are easy to knock down. Do men really give birth? Are there really 57 genders? Only if you succumb to the fairy dust the Left is sprinkling in your eyes. Some narratives are comparatively weak. The Left’s case for assisted suicide is full of holes; all you have to do is look. The Left’s voter suppression narrative is mostly worn out after ten years and most of the recent additions are easy to knock down. Voter ID is the new Jim Crow? That’s ridiculous. The climate change narrative is better built, but nobody on the Right, despite the wealth of ammunition and facts we have on our side, has taken it on systematically. The diversity narrative is the toughest of all. We are losing people, including a Tea Party leader, who were on the Right and went Left precisely because of this narrative. All because the Right was asleep ten years ago when systemic racism theory was being hatched, and before then when left-wing radicals began plotting in the 1950s to deliberately use race to divide America and advance their socialist agenda. We’re in about the 12th iteration of this. Where are the dedicated teams devoted to deconstructing the Left’s phony diversity narrative? Where are the war rooms devoted to pushing countermessages out? And you wonder why we’re losing so badly? I’ve contributed to the effort to deconstruct the race narrative and one parent thanked me for giving her a way to talk about race with her ten-year-old daughter.
So it’s time for the Right to get serious about winning the propaganda wars. The professional Right and the money people need to build the machinery and devote the resources. The grassroots Right needs to bone up on effective messaging. There’s a whole body of propaganda literature out there, starting with books like The Rape of the Mind and The True Believer. There’s also an entire P.R. discipline built around effective messaging and communications. America was built on ideas, but ideas can be subverted. Either the Right fights to win the propaganda wars systematically and effectively, or America is lost. Your choice. At the moment, it doesn’t look good. I’m supposed to win with this army? Not likely, but it doesn’t have to stay this way. Time to get serious about messaging, folks. If you’re on the Right and think you have the chops to help in this effort, contact me at [email protected].