Schools will become propaganda machines
this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2026
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I have a kid in preschool and honestly I dread the "pledge of allegiance talk" more than most other common "uncomfortable parent conversations"
"Yeah this is bullshit but you WILL be ostracized if you don't join in. I realized this in middle school and just had to go through the motions for the next 6 years or so but I felt like I was taking crazy pills."
I think it helps that, at least by high school, it wasn't even something (normal) kids argued about. Just another annoying school policy, like when they put "Evolution is Just A Theory" label on biology textbooks and kicked a star athlete off the basketball team for having a boyfriend.
I was just going to reply in a similar way. I read that and thought: They will BECOME propaganda machines? Riiight...
Honestly, I don't see how any state managed educational system, or any educational system controlled by any powerful entity, wouldn't eventually slip in propaganda. If Coca-Cola ran an educational system, I'm sure it'd be increasingly full of subtle and not so subtle propagandas that Coke favors.
I suppose best we can do is argue/decide which "propaganda" are acceptable/useful, and which are not.
Honestly, I don’t see how any state managed educational system, or any educational system controlled by any powerful entity, wouldn’t eventually slip in propaganda.
Propaganda, strictly defined, is information from a slanted perspective.
At a really high level - where schools have limited time in the day/year and have to select their focus of study.
You can always and forever make hay about "what schools AREN'T teaching your kids!!!" because there's always choices being made and people unhappy with those choices.
What's happening in the US, today, is a deliberate effort to reverse historical liberal education regimes.
It's not propaganda people are noticing, but the change in propaganda.
In short, nothing new under the sun.
I mean, it's definitely different
Yes, its different in that's its a change in propaganda. As you said. But that's nothing new. The propaganda changes as the agendas change. What's not new under the sun is institutions compelled to propagandize. That's was my point.
Any system of power or influence, state, corporate, etc. will eventually veer towards the slipping in/introducing of propagandas. If they don't from the jump, which they often do. That's another of my points.
It's a comment fueled by the OPs post with a title ending with "Schools will become propaganda machines." As if they weren't already. Which I obviously think they are / have been for a long time. Some just don't like the changes in propaganda or amount of propagandas. Hence why I say maybe best we generally can do is argue which propaganda may be useful and which are not. For instancd, maybe we feel having children pledge allegiance to a state through the symbol of a flag is useful for the cohesion of a populous via fostering national unity, patriotism, and loyalty to the republic (for U.S). Or maybe we find it to be gross indoctrination, too religion/coded, and fundamentally un-american in original spirit.
And I don't think propaganda is define as simply a "slanted perspective". Propaganda is communication of info/ideas/etc that is deliberately and primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda. And it'd often very systemic. I may have a bias or slant towards an opinion, but doesn't make it propaganda. I think there are more characteristics needed.
"Will become" I've got some bad news for ya
There was a really good podcast about how the state of Texas basically controls textbooks across the country. Yall have been this way
Morons, idiots and suckers of trump's butthole have done what?
"will become"...
ARE... and have been intensifying since Reagan.
Schools have always been propaganda machines. That is the primary purpose of education. To instill loyalty to the state over all else into every single person from the earliest age.
In a democracy the government gives students the opportunity of giving information of multiple sources. That is why in Germany we have many self research tasks for history, politics and other social related academic subjects. For science academic subjects we do it too, but more rarely.
The reason why you think "Schools have always been propaganda machines" is that the USA was never a real democracy. It is a Empire with 2 big oligarchy factions: Democratic Party and Republican Party. Because of First-past-the-post voting and the Electoral College it is easy to bribe/threat a small size of people to cheat the vote outcome. Also because they want to be votes again they just go with the popular parties again thus USA is a 2 party system. The Democratic Socialists party and Green Party do exist in the USA but they have no power, so some work the Democratic Party.
Oligarchs stay rich by staying in power. They make the poor even more poor so they do not have time or money to even go to demonstrate. They simply want the majority to stay dumb even at the cost of the world which is going to burn because of climate change.
The USA made sure to fix these issues in Germany after the Nazi regime's end. But they did not for themselves.
USA has subject states:
quasi-protectorates:
- 🇫🇲 Federated States of Micronesia
- 🇲🇭 Marshall Islands
- 🇵🇼 Palau
2003–2011 U.S. Occupation and Direct Control of Iraq: Today it may still is under the hood with CIA's control. The CIA is very able to install vassals into another country.
NATO: Just like any other Empire. It has military bases all over the world. While it is not or mostly not occupation, it is still has power with the threat of suddenly send the army home and leaving the land unprotected from other empires/kingdoms/dictatorial regimes.