On a model of escalating propaganda

I'm not a student of political science, and I don't care how often Academia.com thinks that references to David Cameron are actually to me. (Also, there's a marine biologist who shares my name, go figure.)

So I don't know if I'm going over well-tilled ground with this.

It's just that as we're all watching the last few years on Twitter, mostly out of the US, and the last few weeks out of Russia, then we've seen lots and lots and lots of propaganda, and I've been noticing patterns. And other people have been reacting with various levels of "Lolwhut? that doesn't even make sense! Are they on drugs or are they really that dumb?"

Don't get me wrong, some of the people making those tweets may be that dumb. But still, that's not to say they're not serving a very specific purpose: they're not random stupidity, they're very deliberate and targeted stupidity.

So let's try and categorise the levels of propaganda as we're seeing it in the world around us.

Stage 0 Propaganda: It's not propaganda. It's just advertising.

AKA: It's true.

You're not being told anything that is false or misleading. There's going to be spin, but it's not actively lying. Everything that's said is verifiable and most reasonable people would agree that it's accurate. This isn't quite the same as a plain information campaign, but they often are forced to do double duty, and there's usually at least some overlap between the informative and the aggrandising.

Stage 1 Propaganda: You are meant to believe it.

AKA: It's plausible.

If you dig into it, or you know something about the subject, then you might see that it is wrong, or even a flat out lie. But if it's done properly then there's always some wriggle room for them to say that were mistaken in good faith, or that you've misinterpreted it, or that they misinterpreted it, or it's true according to some set of stupid assumptions or under some abstruse technicalities. But it's still a bald-faced lie, and when they say it's not a lie, that's another lie.

e.g., Mitch McConnell stating "We are negotiating in good faith", or "This anti-Abortion bill is about protecting life", or "This religious freedom bill has nothing to do with entrenching Christian supremacy".
Australian examples: "These grants for railway carparks are not porkbarrelling." "There is no leadership challenge being planned and the Prime Minister has my full support." "This religious freedom bill has nothing to do with entrenching Christian supremacy"

Stage 2 Propaganda: You are not meant to understand it.

AKA: It's bewildering.
AKA: You can't tell what's true or not, or what "true" even is any more.

It doesn't make any sense, and it's not meant to make sense. It's word salad, intended to make you doubt your own ability to tell what is true or false, or what "truth" or "falsehood" mean, or even how language works in the face of statements like:

"You millennial leftists who never lived one day under nuclear threat can now reflect upon your woke sky. You made quite a non-binary fuss to save the world from intercontinental ballistic tweets."

You can't fact check it because it's like catching smoke with tongs. It consists entirely of dogwhistling and boo-words and gibbering squamous madness.

eg.: Trump's twitter feed, when he still had one. Or Q. Or pretty much the entirety of the GOP at this point.
Australian examples: Clive Palmer, Craig Kelly, and the One Australia Party. Or Pauline's One Nation Party. Or Bob Katter. Or Barnaby Joyce on his more deliberately obtuse days. (Barnaby is not nearly so stupid as he pretends to be.)

Stage 3 Propaganda: You are not meant to believe it.

AKA: It's a joke, but nobody is laughing.
AKA: It doesn't matter what's true or not.

It's clips from a video game in 2011, in a tweet labelled "Our troops' glorious victory yesterday". It's declarations of victory released the day before the battle. It's statements that "Historically, Marseilles has always been an integral part of the territory of Ecuador."

There are two levels of message: the surface level is so obviously and clearly stupid and wrong that it's not fooling anyone (well... except see stage 4), but that's not the core message. The core message is in that the surface message is so transparently and ridiculously unconvincing, and the Core message is "you'll pretend you believe this if you know what's good for you, because you know we're watching, and we know where you live." It's a loyalty test. If it was convincing, it wouldn't be much of a test to make people act like they believe it, would it?

e.g., Russia or China, from outside those countries. Within those countries as well, but very quietly, in private, with the windows closed and the doors locked and among only people you trust, and discretely.

Stage 4 Propaganda: You are meant to believe it.

AKA: There are five lights.
AKA: "He loved Big Brother."

When people have been soaking in stage 3 propaganda for long enough, it has effects. Like brainwashing in a cult or an abusive prison "school": repeat a lie often enough, and people will believe it, even if only because they haven't got the physical or mental or spiritual resources left to hold on to the hard, lonely truth in the face of the relentless, incessant barrage of lies. And there are places where it's not enough to act like you believe the transparent lies. They demand that you actually believe it. And they can make you believe it. They've had practice. And they're motivated.

And if they don't have to make you believe stupid things, all so much the better. In that case it's working exactly like Nigerian Prince emails: that it's obviously a fraud is the point: that weeds out all the people with any critical thinking skills, and anyone left who falls for it can be milked for everything. And will be.

eg., North Korea. Increasingly, Russia or China if you're inside those countries.