this post was submitted on 07 May 2025
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[–] TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world 28 points 1 day ago (1 children)

There were radio, televisions, and books. And while people had overall poor quality of education back then because of lack of access, Noam Chomsky mentioned people still try to educate themselves through reading.

The problem then and now is that mass communication is used by bad faith actors to emotionally manipulate the public into voting against their own interests. Back then, yellow journalism riled up jingoism. Goebbels and the Nazis saw potential use of radio for mass indoctrination, and made conscious effort to make radio cheaper and widely available in Germany.

[–] tauren@lemm.ee -1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

There were radio, televisions, and books.

The modern economic theory is too young for that to matter, and it also includes many lessons we've learnt since 1930s.

[–] TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

Not sure what you mean, but communication itself and its effect on human culture does not change, no matter the media. You can draw a painting to de-humanise and incite hatred towards a group, or you can go on radio and incite hatred towards a group. Either way, both methods can be used to incite hatred.

also includes many lessons we've learnt since 1930s.

Sorry I forgot to address this.

Correct me if I am wrong but I don't see how we learnt since. As we speak, a used to be unknown far-right party gained massive electoral votes in Romania. It turns out that they have been making their presence in social media, where older establishment politicians have no familiarity with. The bigger lesson that democratic and liberal forces should do is knowing to use new forms of media instead. Franklin Roosevelt and Barack Obama knew this very well.