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Kings appointed by gods: how legitimacy was manufactured
A 2.25 m stele shows Hammurabi before the god of justice, but its 282 laws contain almost no religion. How rulers borrowed the gods' authority, from Babylon to James I, what it could and could not do, and how to notice it today.
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State religion as a tool: 1,600 years of altar and throne
Soviet open churches fell from 28,560 to 1,744 in a decade, then Stalin needed a patriarch. Documented cases from Rome to Moscow, Bucharest, Washington, Tehran, Riyadh and Beijing of states using religion, and why forced belief rarely works.
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What propaganda is, and what it is not
Propaganda is not just lies. Jacques Ellul showed it mostly uses true facts and hides its falsehoods in intentions and interpretations. Agitation stirs people up; integration keeps them in line. The opening post of How minds are moved.
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Troll farms from every direction: six documented operations
Six covert account operations, from Russia's Internet Research Agency and Iran's Storm-2035 to a Pentagon anti-vaccine campaign in the Philippines: what courts, Senate reports and platform takedowns document, what is disputed, and how little most achieved.
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Making an enemy: the ten principles of wartime propaganda
Every war needs an enemy, and every side builds one with the same ten claims. Ponsonby's 1928 Falsehood in War-Time and Morelli's ten principles, tested on documented cases from Britain, Germany, the US, Kuwait, Russia, Ukraine and Gaza.
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Fear as a lever: how fear narrows thinking
Fear narrows attention and makes us cling to protectors. Research shows fear appeals work, especially with a clear action. From the 1918 flu to the 2020 SPI-B paper, fear was held down or raised on purpose, by every kind of power.
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Say it again: repetition and the illusory truth effect
Hearing a claim again makes it feel truer, even when you know better. From Hasher's 1977 experiment to a headline copied on 362 sites in six hours, how repetition, slogans and repeated phrases work, and how to resist.
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What propaganda cannot do: the limits of persuasion
49 field experiments put the average effect of campaign contact on votes at zero, and the 2016 troll tweets show no measurable effect. Yet radio helped drive genocide in Rwanda. What propaganda can and cannot do, and why fearing it too much is a trap.
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Words that do the work: euphemism and engineered language
Euphemism persuades without arguing: it removes the picture. From Orwell's "pacification" to "special military operation", "enhanced interrogation" and the "year of efficiency", how engineered words work on every side, and how to translate them back.
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Everyone agrees: social proof and manufactured consensus
We judge what is right by what others seem to think. Asch showed how far people follow a group. Today the group can be faked: paid reviews, astroturf, documented sockpuppet networks of Russia, China and the US, and a reported Israeli-funded campaign.
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What it feels like to be persuaded
Persuasion rarely feels like a push. It feels like urgency, belonging, relief or the pleasure of certainty. Kahneman's System 1 and 2 and Cialdini's shortcuts explain why, with cases from shops, scams, groups and states.
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Romania 1990: the mineriads and the power of state television
In June 1990 a president thanked miners who had beaten students in Bucharest. In March, Târgu Mureș was told two opposite stories in two languages. How labels, one TV channel and a call to act turned neighbours into targets.