Edward Bernays Quotes
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The only difference between 'propaganda' and 'education,' really, is in the point of view. The advocacy of what we believe in is education. The advocacy of what we don't believe in is propaganda.
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In some departments of our daily life, in which we imagine ourselves free agents, we are ruled by dictators exercising great power.
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The invisible government tends to be concentrated in the hands of the few because of the expense of manipulating the social machinery which controls the opinions and habits of the masses. To advertise on a scale which will reach fifty million persons is expensive. To reach and persuade the group leaders who dictate the public's thoughts and actions is likewise expensive.
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We are dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.
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The systematic study of mass psychology revealed to students the potentialities of invisible government of society by manipulation of the motives which actuate man in the group.
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Small groups of persons can, and do, make the rest of us think what they please about a given subject. But there are usually proponents and opponents of every propaganda, both of whom are equally eager to convince the majority.
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If you can influence the leaders, either with or without their conscious cooperation, you automatically influence the group which they sway.
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We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society.
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Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society.
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Once he could read and write he would have a mind fit to rule. So ran the democratic doctrine. But instead of a mind, universal literacy has given him rubber stamps, rubber stamps inked with advertising slogans, with editorials, with published scientific data, with the trivialities of the tabloids and the platitudes of history, but quite innocent of original thought.
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The engineering of consent is the very essence of the democratic process, the freedom to persuade and suggest.
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It is sometimes possible to change the attitudes of millions but impossible to change the attitude of one man.
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I believe that competition in the future will not be only an advertising competition between individual products or between big associations, but that it will in addition be a competition of propaganda.
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In the ethical sense, propaganda bears the same relation to education as to business or politics. It may be abused. It may be used to over-advertise an institution and to create in the public mind artificial values. There can be no absolute guarantee against its misuse.
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The great enemy of any attempt to change men's habits is inertia. Civilization is limited by intertia.
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The minority has discovered a powerful help in influencing majorities. It has been found possible so to mold the mind of the masses that they will throw their newly gained strength in the desired direction. In the present structure of society, this practice is inevitable. Whatever of social importance is done today, whether in politics, finance, manufacture, agriculture, charity, education, or other fields, must be done with the help of propaganda. Propaganda is the executive arm of the invisible government.
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Men people are rarely aware of the real reasons which motivate their actions.
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The counsel on public relations is not an advertising man but he advocates for advertising where that is indicated. Very often he is called in by an advertising agency to supplement its work on behalf of a client. His work and that of the advertising agency do not conflict with or duplicate each other.
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Mass production is only profitable if its rhythm can be maintained.. that is, if it can continue to sell its product in steady or increasing quantity. The result is that while, under the handicraft or small-unit system of production that was typical a century ago, demand created the supply, today supply must actively seek to create its corresponding demand.
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As civilization has become more complex, and as the need for invisible government has been increasingly demonstrated, the technical means have been invented and developed by which opinion may be regimented.
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We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of.
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Look for a situation in which your work will give you as much happiness as your spare time.
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Propaganda is the executive arm of the invisible government.
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The best defense against propaganda: more propaganda.