On Thursday, April 12 and Tuesday, April 24, 2018, the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley philosophy department held roundtable events on Donald Trump. The first was called “Trump: Money and Propaganda” and the second “Voices of the Valley on Trump.” The talks focused on aspects of the Trump administration which are of particular importance to the people of Texas. After the discussions were over, I asked the two speakers, Cory Wimberly and Mariana Alessandri, about their events.
Describe your event, including the details of your presentation.
Wimberly: We are lucky at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) to have an energetic philosophy club, no doubt in large part due to its equally energetic faculty sponsor, Dr. Anthony DeSantis. The club has been looking to hold large and high-profile events on campus. They thought that an event on Trump, propaganda, and money seemed to fit the bill. I presented on the complicated relationship Trump has with the long history of propaganda in the United States and Dr. Paul Jorgenson presented on the role campaign finance played in the election. The event did turn out to be very well attended with around a couple hundred people in attendance.
Alessandri: On April 24 UTRGV’s philosophy department held an event titled “Trump II: Voices of the Valley.” Trump I had taken place two weeks before, centering on an academic interpretation of Trump’s presidency. For Trump II, we wanted to hear from the Rio Grande Valley community. Three local community organizations spoke about their experience working in the RGV community during the Trump administration: LUPE (La Union del Pueblo Entero), Catholic Charities’ Humanitarian Respite Center, and NETA (a multimedia-based platform that reports on the Valley from the perspective of the Valley). They each reported on what they have seen in terms of changes in immigration practices, as well as community responses. Each community organization was asked: “From your experience working in the RGV community, how have Trump’s immigration policies/statements affected immigrants and the RGV?” After their 15-minute presentations we had time for Q&A.
Why did you decide to hold this event?
Wimberly: From what my students tell me, they think philosophy has something really important and valuable to offer students and the community. They were irritated with the high value given to STEM disciplines and the relative lack of value assigned to the humanities and philosophy in particular. To them, again from what they told me, it seems like it was partially their goal to use philosophy to raise the level of understanding and effect change. It was also partially their goal to show the other students on campus just how truly valuable the skills and ideas they were learning are to a good life and contemporary society. Plus, it never hurts that hot-button issue makes a fun discussion.
I share their idealism and their frustration. Also, I think that presenting specifically to students about propaganda is important. Many of us elderly people (people over 30) do not really see or understand the dynamics of the propaganda environment in which teenagers and people in their early twenties are in, especially online. Tumblr feminists, incels, channers, and the like have engaged with the traditions of propaganda and modified them to suit their own perspectives and the realities of life online. I hope to alter the way they engage with those forces and perhaps have more control over who they become at such an experimental and formative time in their lives.
Alessandri: What would it say about a philosophy department on the US-Mexico border if we did NOT talk about Trump? We wanted to address the issue of immigration specifically, including the status of DACA. Many of our students are undocumented and now live in fear of deportation. I wanted them to and others who may not have been aware of how deeply the Rio Grande Valley has been affected by Trump’s presidency to get a sense from nonprofits on the ground. Long before people all over the U.S. got wind of the separation of children from family members, some of us in the RGV knew about it, and we wanted the greater community to also.
The main point of this event was not to tell the public or our students what to conclude, but it was to provide them with information and arguments. I think that is what a good education does. People can draw their own conclusions, and they do.
What are your thoughts on President Trump, his administration, and the state of politics today?
Wimberly: Trump himself is boring. But he is like the tip of a popped pimple where all of the interesting stuff is to be found in the goo and the guts that have erupted to the surface around him. There is so much “goo and guts” now to deal with that I don’t think any single person or line of inquiry can provide a definitive account. To me, as someone who studies propaganda, what is interesting is his complicated relationship with the genealogy of propaganda.
The fact that he is a talented propagandist is not what I focus on. Gustave Le Bon—a crowd psychologist whose importance cannot be understated—predicted a Trump-like figure in his 1895 “The Crowd: A study of the popular mind.” He predicted that as propaganda became widespread that leaders would emerge from the crowd who intuitively grasped the principles of propaganda. These leaders would also have a certain psychological profile, which almost exactly describes Trump. Le Bon:
The leader has most often started as one of the led. He has himself been hypnotized by the idea, whose apostle he has since become. It has taken possession of him to such a degree that everything outside it vanishes, and that every contrary opinion appears to him an error of superstition. […] The leaders we speak of are more frequently men of action than thinkers. They are not gifted with keen foresight, nor could they be, as this quality generally conduces to doubt and inactivity. […] Contempt and persecution do not affect them or only serve to excite them more. They sacrifice their personal interest, their family—everything. The very instinct of self-preservation is entirely obliterated in them, and so much so that often the only recompense they solicit is that of martyrdom. The intensity of their faith gives them great power of suggestion to their words (see Le Bon, The Crowd, 63-4).
One thing that interests me about the changes in propaganda following Trump is that there has been a shift from propaganda generated by professionals to propaganda generated by just the kind of unreflective, passionate, and conflict seeking individuals Le Bon predicted (e.g. the alt-right, alt-light, and incels). For professional propagandists it has become less about generating content than managing effectively it in the period following Trump—this is also a trend encouraged by social media. Used effectively, this allows political parties and corporations to move public opinion towards positions that they could not advocate for outright because of the fear of wide-spread protest and boycotts.
Alessandri: I think President Trump is divisive, but that may be true of all past presidents. I think he tends to engender hatred in people, which is sad. His presidency highlights the false line between “political” and “apolitical.” I do not think there is such thing as “apolitical.” If the philosophy department did not hold an event on Trump, it wouldn’t mean we are apolitical. Not talking about current events doesn’t make you apolitical. You are choosing to pay attention to something else, and maybe you have a good reason to do so, but I think that many times its just a way to avoid controversy or criticism. Everything is political in one way or another.
What hopes and concerns do you have about where the country, or the world, is headed?
Wimberly: I am particularly concerned about the appeal of the nihilistic positions of the right to white men. The alt-light and incels are particularly nihilistic: there is the widespread belief in these groups that things will not improve and will only worsen; resultantly, lobbing bombs, rhetorically or otherwise starts to make sense as means to express frustration and amuse oneself. These movements have already spawned more than a dozen mass shootings with over 60 killed and wounded. But mass shootings should not be the limit of our concern—even if they are particularly horrific and attention grabbing—we should also be concerned with the bullying, trolling, and the general attempt to transform public discourse. The nihilistic reactions to contemporary life have the potential to be self-fulfilling if Trump and the various trolls, robots, incels, young boys, channers, and the like are able to turn public discourse into a shouting match in which the only aim is to burn the other and even the whole conversation down.
Moreover, the spread of nihilistic and conspiratorial rhetoric with racist, sexist, and classist overtones transforms discourse and subjects to the degree that the farther alt-right positions become attractive; the online culture wars have shaped the perspective of many white men such that the positions on the Daily Stormer and 4chan.org/pol/ seem attractive to them. The propaganda of the alt-right and alt-light make this transition from troll to fascist particularly easy. In graduated steps, from humorous memes, to light conspiracy, to racist and sexist outbursts, to a coherent neo-Nazi ideology, people fall down the fascist rabbit-hole so imperceptibly that there is often not a real moment of reckoning.
Alessandri: I am concerned that there are not many public figures trying to mend the current split in the U.S. Mister Rogers was one such figure—he got criticized by both political parties—and since he died in 2003, there haven’t been many people trying to listen to and respect both sides. I don’t mind people getting angry, but I do mind people who refuse to listen, on both sides. My hope is that human beings begin to see each other as human beings, whether it means the separated children or racists. We are a society full of hurting human beings, and the most valuable work is done by people who refuse to villainize the other.
How does the content of this event connect to your other work?
Wimberly: I recently finished a manuscript that I just started shopping to publishers on the genealogy of propaganda in the United States. Most people’s perception of propaganda is wrong in that they think of it as some kind of fallacious or misleading statement. Propaganda is actually a well defined profession with stable institutions and norms of practice. There are all kinds of false or misleading statements made by many sources and, in fact, falsity or even epistemology generally is not at the heart of what propagandists do.
I argue that contemporary propaganda begins in 1900 and I trace its lineages forward and backward from this moment. I trace its connection back through the political economy of Tönnies and Ferguson and through Crowd Psychology to the French Orléanist movement and the hypnotists of the 19th century. Of course, I also look at 19th century publicity and mass media in the United States. Going forward, I trace the development of propaganda into an apparatus for the government of public opinion. Its main strategy in governing public opinion is not epistemological but rather subjectification: propagandists aim to produce the kinds of subjects who conduct themselves in the ways that their clients want reflexively, without needing to be lied to or hoodwinked. The difference between the epistemological view and my own is that, in short, propaganda’s effects are not just a few false beliefs or false needs but the transformation of our nature as subjects. The critical response you give to propaganda has to be very different on each view.
Alessandri: I consider myself a champion of all things negative, so it connects fairly directly to my work. Whether we are talking about anger, sadness, anxiety, depression, loneliness, guilt, or just complaining, I think we should learn to handle it with mercy and grace. People are flawed, and we make mistakes and say things we wish we hadn’t. But our culture of zero-tolerance for mistakes to me is as bad as a culture with zero-tolerance for gays. People are a disappointment, but this is nothing to be surprised about. The sooner we realize it, the better. I am trained as an Existentialist, so you can see my Sartrean-leaning here. Hell is other people. Yes, now let’s get to work.
What would you like people who attended your event, or are reading this article, to take away from it?
Wimberly: The changes propagandists are making are not just to a few of our ideas. They are changing our relationships of power, knowledge, and even subjectivity. How we relate to each other, what we consider knowledge, and how we conduct ourselves is being transformed in a conscious and deliberate way to further the aims of a small set of elite individuals who can afford a tremendous propaganda apparatus. What is at stake is not just a few ideas—however important they are—but our relationship with each other and ourselves.
Alessandri: It’s one thing to fight for a cause or an idea, but I would like people to remember to treat other people as people, not punching bags. Activism is fantastic, but when it’s coupled with smug self-righteousness it loses integrity. What we really need is more empathy, which we know now is threatened by certain kinds of technology like cell phones. We need to encourage each other and our children to get involved in more face-to-face conversations and communities than “virtual” ones, which I think are often a place for people who refuse to take each other seriously.
How can people today best respond to the problems we face?
Wimberly: The problem is tricky because two of the West’s most powerful apparatuses—the state and corporations—are deeply allied with propaganda and rely on it to govern the publics. All that is to say that any attack on propaganda is likely to draw heavy counter-attacks and support from the state and large corporations. One might throw up their hands at this point and give up or call for a revolution. I don’t think either of those responses is exactly right for the problem of propaganda. Many of us are not ready to just give up, so that answer lacks appeal. Revolution is not a strong answer because there is every likelihood that what ever governmentality supplants our neoliberal one will equally well rely on propaganda unless progress against it is made first. One can just look at the role of propaganda in and after the 1917 Soviet revolution for an example of this.
I think we have to tackle propaganda in the present beginning with where we are; this does not mean to give up further goals or aims but to put this work beside them. I detail a possible strategy and a few tactics in my book. But briefly, I think that conceptually we need to look for ways of democratizing the subjectification of mass subjectivities. Right now, propagandists and their allies in marketing and advertising have significant control over the formation of the publics on the behalf of a very small number of corporations and state agencies. If we want further change, revolution even, then subjects who want those changes will have to be constructed, which means displacing propagandists’ government.
Alessandri: By fasting. By visiting with people you don’t agree with or don’t know. By recognizing that we are all flawed. By fasting, I mean any measure that reminds us that we are not guiltless, and that we have a part to play in our society. Introspection is useful, meditation, etc. Next, we should all realize that we are called to be “helpers” as Mister Rogers said, and that means more than armchair activism. It means giving your time to something or someone on a regular basis. But it doesn’t mean looking over your shoulder to see if other people are also doing the same. What others fail to do doesn’t relieve me of my responsibility. Finally, I think people can respond by knowing their values. What issue feels closest to you? Glennon Doyle suggests that we ask ourselves “what breaks my heart?” and then that we go out and do something about it. It’s not difficult, we’re just good at distracting ourselves.
To see a video clip with images from the two events, click here.
Cory Wimberly is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. He specializes in social and political philosophy and continental philosophy, focusing on questions of propaganda and power.
Mariana Alessandri is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. She studies Kierkegaard, religion, gender, and Mexican-Americans.
Although I am certainly aware of the danger presented by President Trump and the reactionary political positions of his constituency—which are part of a world-wide reactionary trend in international politics also evident, for example, in Britain or Italy—I am afraid that stigmatizing Trump supporters as ‘pus’ or ‘goo’ and stereotyping them as bomb-lobbing fascists is equally—or more—propagandistic than what I hear coming out of the Trump camp. And this demo-leftist-liberal hate-mongering propaganda is likely to result in another reactionary backlash like the one that—along with the Russians—got Trump elected, in the first place.
The demo-liberal-left could have responded to the Trump election by challenging the results of the electoral college, calling for an investigation of fraud and corruption in the polling, lobbying for a constitutional amendment to invalidate fraudulent elections, or amending the US Constitution to permit votes of no confidence in Congress, and so on. Instead, the demo-liberal-left is engaged in stereotypical hate-mongering against their supposed fascist racist nazi etc. enemies on the right wings, further polarizing the political spectrum and provoking more rightward backlash.
I live in the most Republican state in the Union (Idaho) and have seen all kinds of hate from both left and right, and I know that fifty years ago this small town was the white-est city in the country, maybe still is. But I’ve also seen that in the past twenty years or so, Asians, Blacks, and Hispanics have all become much more visible and mostly accepted, despite the few pimple-heads who drive around in big trucks spewing out black exhaust-smoke and flying Confederate flags. The big problem with Trump and Co. isn’t their pimple-headed-ness, it’s their comparative ignorance of people different than themselves. And I don’t think screaming fascist! fascist! is going to make things any better.
Propaganda, like ideology, is always somebody else’s propaganda, except when its mine, and then its the trendy, politically correct viewpoint all liberal college professors simply must subscribe to, if they want to get published or get tenure. But I’d just like to caution the demo-liberal-left, once again, against stereotyping and stigmatizing the opposition, least those stereotypes boomerang back at you and blow up in your face, like an exploding pimple full of demo-liberal-leftist goo. And, as a result, the demo-liberal-left loses another election, like the fraudulent election that put those reactionary factions in the White House and Congress, the last time around…
PS: And if you’d like to respond intelligently to Trump’s propaganda, I’d also suggest reading and critiquing his recent address to the United Nations General Assembly (Sept. 25th, 2018), which certainly can be critiqued as an exercise in reactionary political philosophy. But at least it’s clumsily straightforward and more-or-less honest, which is more than can be said for the 450+ speeches delivered by ex-President Obama, who still gets swoony, starry-eyed adulation from the brainwashed leftists who believe his statements that he never made a mistake in office, despite the half-million or so Syrian civilians who have suffered and died as a direct result of Obama’s self-righteous policies.
Eric: Good stuff.
One marvels at the lack of self-awareness on the part of professional scholars, who outright engage in propaganda while criticizing propaganda.
Seems to me that if Trump and his supporters are such a bunch of ignorant dullards, the most interesting question is how did us geniuses manage to lose to them? But asking that question would also require some self-awareness.
I also find somewhat troubling the casual assumption that everyone is just obviously on one’s own side. There’s a good chance that amongst the students of these folks are Trump supporters or students with families that supported Trump. Scholarship and teaching should never be politicized in this way, for this very reason (and of course, for others, as well).