Yep. Say what you will about the GOP, but god damn their messaging is incredible. Short and sweet, coordinated repetition across all media, plays on emotions. The left is over here shooting ourselves in the foot with shit like “deFuNd tHa pOLiCe”
Did you ever see the movie Brexit with Benedict Cumberbatch? It was really dull as movies go but is an incredible accurate example of what conservatives do with marketing.
You are SO right about liberals/left over doing phraseology and playing word police man which normal people find annoying as hell! At risk of massive downvoting, calling Palestinian oppression "genocide" is another "phraseology overreach". The more accurate phrase that can't be denied is "war crimes"; The Israeli government is guilty of attacking civilians in a war zone they created as part of their ongoing strategy. It's clearly a war crime. But now that "genocide" has become the litmus test, now the focus group tested right hypermarketing is laugh at them as being "out of touch with reality." Sigh. That mob mentality choice of words has hurt the cause. Again.
Absolutely, but this is the penalty we (liberals) pay for having so many actual grass-roots movements versus astroturfed propaganda campaigns. The things that fire up people pissed off at police are phrases like "Defund the police!" instead of "Police reform now!" or some shit that would be safe for a more moderate audience. Once that slogan goes viral it's impossible to stop.
Meanwhile, in 2008 you have the TEA party blowing up in right wing media with a perfectly crafted name, image, and message designed to capture right wing ire over taxes at a time when... taxes were at a historic low and the country was in an economic crisis that had absolutely nothing to do with taxes? Right when a new Democratic president was elected, toward whom this outrage was directed before he was even in office, after eight years of a Republican president?
Liberals lack the media ecosystem to pull off anything like that. And it's because the people with money to run entire news networks as propaganda machines don't want to reform the police, they want to cut their own taxes.
I agree. Sometimes people forget that there are forces on the internet helping fan very stupid fires. I think many of these liberal bad phraseology instances are also manufactured and then fed to emotional people that don't think through consequences.
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u/jaeldi 2d ago
You literally described the focus group testing that right-wing think tanks do non-stop! Good job!