This isn’t taken from a secondary source but from my own observations. If anyone has studied propaganda I would very much appreciate a post on this sublemmy!

There are two factors to propagandize effectively: volume, and depth.

Volume is simply exposing people to the same ideas over a period of time, with a sustained volume.

Depth is finding arguments that will resonate with your audience.

You can see that facts are nowhere to be seen in this model. Facts are not necessary to propagandize. Scale is also not a factor, you can propagandize this one friend you have or you can propagandize an entire army by dropping leaflets in their camps (like they did in Korea).

Of course as marxist-leninists we are not liars, and we have empirical evidence to present too. I’m instead talking about Fox News, or the mass media. And I distinctly remember this documentary about someone’s father who turned from a ~progressive liberal to a raging neocon just because Fox News was on at work and he started watching it.

The takeaway is that if you repeat something long enough, people will internalise it and start seeing it your way. But finding the right arguments is also important to plant the seed of doubt, so to speak. In your own arguments (preferably in real life) you’ve probably noticed that most of the stuff you said hit a wall, but one or two things went through and made your receiver think about it.

But of course all the propaganda in the world is useless if there is not a goal, but I don’t consider that a factor (of effectiveness) like the other two, but more of an unspoken rule. What are you trying to achieve? In war, we see that demoralizing the enemy so that their performance worsens is an achievable goal. Making them surrender to you just by dropping leaflets is in another league entirely. When trying to pull people into communism, I first try to correct mistakes if they let me speak (and that’s also why I created this sublemmy, so that people will let you speak about communism if it’s not the case already!). Then I try to get them to read theory and let them ask me questions. I believe theory is accessible and is a form of introspection, since you’re the sole actor in this exchange. It gives you time to think about what you’re reading, but then you have to be available to answer their questions lest they reach the wrong conclusions or misunderstand something.