Life And Psychology

Media has a strong influence on society. The influence of media on people can range from fashion trends, general opinions, and basic habits to large-scale beliefs and attitudes, and even mass hysteria, hate, and justification for violence. This indicates that the media is a strong medium that can impact the human mind and behavior in a deep manner.

The different ways in which media influences society is called mediatization. The communication theorist Marshall McLuhan is often considered to be the founder of the idea of mediatization. McLuhan coined the famous phrase “the medium is the message”, indicating that the medium of the communication itself and not just the content of the message shapes perception - the form of media shapes how people think, feel, and behave, and has a greater impact on society than the content itself. 

In other words, according to McLuhan, media naturally influence behavior, regardless of the content. McLuhan emphasized that media not just reflect society, but actively shape how ideas are produced, circulated, and internalized. Accordingly, the media transform socio-political landscapes by shaping public opinion and reinforcing ideologies.

Considering that the media is such a powerful medium, the authorities that control the media will be able to manipulate the influence of the media on society. In this regard, the economist and media critic Edward Herman and the linguist and political commentator Noam Chomsky proposed the Propaganda Model in their book Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. 

The propaganda model suggests that the mass media do not operate independently, but rather work systematically according to the authorities in politics and the economy. The media, thus, does not just reflect reality, but it also systematically shapes and controls reality by presenting information in ways that manufacture public consent. The narratives that are presented through the media are about developing a collective perspective within society that reflects political and capitalist agendas. The eventual purpose is to make individuals within society become puppets of political parties and corporations, voicing perspectives that reinforce their interests.

The propaganda model helps in understanding the spreading of disinformation (false, inaccurate information deliberately spread to mislead and deceive) and developing hate in society. This can be found quite often in what news channels have been doing. Many of the news channels are known to twist facts, give out fabricated information, and create a false narrative. These news channels are owned by big corporate houses that also have associations with political parties. Their job is to repeatedly share that kind of information that suits a political agenda. In doing so, they also emphasize sensationalism, incite emotions of the audience, malign social groups, and try to create an ‘us versus them’ situation.

One of the prominent examples can be found in how the Israel-Palestine conflict has been presented in the media. There has been continuous disinformation about the entire situation, in which even the killings of babies and children have been justified. Information has been presented in such a way that October 7, 2023, is the beginning of the conflict, and Israel had only been defending itself from Hamas. Whereas it has been Israel that has been bombarding Palestine for decades, killing innocent people. 

The news channels keep referring to it as the Israel-Palestine War, when Palestine does not even have an army. It has been a one-sided attack by Israel, completely destroying Palestine, with human rights activists and experts calling it a genocide. Any perspective that suggests Israel is indulging in war crimes, the media are quick to label that as anti-Semitism. Even in the Israel-Iran conflict, media houses and news channels are making out Israel to be the victim when it was Israel that had escalated the conflict, and Iran had retaliated.  

There are also propaganda-based movies. These movies are made in such a way that they portray false history as a depiction of facts. They twist facts to present a false narrative that shows minority sections in a negative light by promoting stereotypes and prejudices. In recent times, many such movies have been made in India. 

For instance, many of these movies show Muslim rulers as barbaric, eccentric, and cruel people, calling them foreigners or invaders, when many of them were born in India. They were like any other ruler, and their actions reflect what any ruler or king would do in those times. This is depicted even in very subtle ways, like showing the Mulsim rulers in a dark and dull background, having intense background music, and showing them as angry or with a grim expression, or having an evil laugh. 

These movies have been able to create a negative, stereotypical image of many of the Muslim rulers, which has elicited strong reactions from the general population, often reflecting hate. The false history depicted through these movies has also transformed the hate towards Muslims living in today’s time. 

In the same manner, for many years, Hollywood movies have also been promoting stereotypes, like showing African Americans as drug peddlers and characters from the Middle East as terrorists. People tend to view individuals of these ethnicities with suspicion, due to which they are often on the receiving end of a lot of hate.  

All of this false information is also repeatedly shared on social media. In the past decade, social media has become the biggest platform for disinformation. One of the main reasons for this has been the consistent use of cyber troops and paid trolls. 

Cyber troops are individuals affiliated with political parties whose job is to spread false information through large-scale strategic campaigns aimed at influencing public opinion and changing the collective attitude, in line with the agenda of that political party. This can also include developing extremely negative perceptions about different social groups. Like cyber troops, paid trolls also spread disinformation. But they are specifically hired to share conflict-provoking posts, and spread information that incites anger and hate.

The journalist Jamie Bartlett, in his book The Dark Net, writes about how political organizations manipulate public opinion on social media platforms. He suggests that organized groups affiliated with a political party create fake accounts, spread propaganda, flood dissenting voices with abuse, and amplify certain narratives. According to Bartlett, their goal is to dominate the online space and overpower critical perspectives.

In her book, I Am A Troll, the journalist Swati Chaturvedi writes that trolls are hired to spread disinformation, hate, and political propaganda. She suggests that these trolls target dissenting journalists, opposition voices, critics, or anyone who has an alternative perspective, using coordinated attacks, slurs, and fake news.

These cyber troops and paid trolls consistently share posts that create a very toxic and hate-filled environment on social media. They are able to develop prejudices and have been found to successfully enhance negative emotions and create a sense of hate among social media users. All of this goes well in line with the political propaganda. 

What makes it worse is that these hate-filled posts become very engaging, which is then encouraged by the owners of social networking sites. They end up promoting these posts through algorithms that make such posts come up again and again on the user's timeline and social feed.

With news channels, propaganda-based movies, and cyber troops and paid trolls continuously giving out manufactured information that is polarizing and hateful, and algorithms on social networking sites making them more visible and accessible, it creates an echo chamber. 

People get exposed to the same agenda-driven information on both traditional and social media. Their beliefs and prejudices get reinforced and amplified, and they are not exposed to diverse perspectives, leading to heightened hate and polarization. Repeated exposure to the same kind of information creates the illusory truth effect - the cognitive bias that repeated exposure to the same information makes people believe it to be true.

Furthermore, the repeated, false, and manufactured narratives become social representations. The social psychologist Serge Moscovici, in his social representation theory, suggested that people construct a collective understanding of their surroundings, developing a shared knowledge system that influences their thoughts and perspectives. Being continuously exposed to hateful information develops a shared knowledge system of hate in society, making people extremely polarized. These representations are embedded within public consciousness, which makes people view society in terms of us versus them, which further develops a strong social identity. This can be explained appropriately by the social identity theory.

The social identity theory, by the social psychologists Henri Tajfel and John Turner, suggests that people categorize the world in terms of ingroup (us) and outgroup (them). They tend to derive their self-concept and self-esteem from the social group that they belong to. Therefore, to have a positive self-concept and high self-esteem, they associate their group (ingroup) with positive attributes and view the other group (outgroup) in a negative light. 

Due to this, people develop ingroup favoritism, which makes them view their group always in a positive manner, give justifications for every action of their group, and even view them as superior. They also develop a negative bias towards the outgroup, making them view the other group as inferior and always interpreting their actions in a negative manner.

The spreading of hateful and polarizing information by the media developing social representations and social identity, suggests how such information gets deeply ingrained within individuals. In the long run, this makes a society that is full of negativity and toxicity, which passes on through the next generations.

In recent times, with the excessive use of generative AI, it has become extremely difficult to keep a check on disinformation. It has become very easy to doctor images and videos to be presented in a specific way. The creation of Deepfakes has added to the problem, as it can make manufactured information seem to come from credible sources, making it very difficult to distinguish between accurate and false information. 

Deepfakes can generate realistic audio and video content, in which there is a mimicking of the appearance, voice, and mannerisms of public figures. It also makes disinformation campaigns seemingly appear from trustworthy figures and sources, which can easily lead people to believe false narratives as authentic. This can even be for hateful, emotionally inciting, and polarizing information. Therefore, with the rise of artificial intelligence, it has become a lot easier for the media to influence people with disinformation and manufacture hate within society.