Growing up in rural Oklahoma and later working for the oil industry has resulted in having a large number of conservative friends on my Facebook page. I would guess about 40% of the people on my page are conservative, but probably another 40% lean left. It makes for some pretty wild and heated discussions.
But I get so sick of the propaganda and fake information that people push, that I am constantly tackling memes that are either fake or misinform. Lately, the topic has been the wall. I have been trying to make people understand when they are being used to push propaganda. Here’s today’s topic.
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Let me first note that I support strong borders. But, here's a lesson in learning to recognize propaganda and in applying critical thinking. This whole "build the wall" issue is a perfect example in how willing people are to allow themselves to be used to spread propaganda in the name of partisan politics. But being who I am, I have to at least stir the pot a bit and try to force people into thinking for themselves.
The meme below is making the rounds today. I have seen it on my feed three times. Here's what the meme doesn't tell you. This guy was killed in a car wreck by a suspected undocumented immigrant at the end of last year. (No attempt was made to establish how he entered the country). At the time, Republicans had controlled Congress and the White House for two years. Trump had not pushed for a wall in the two years since he had been elected. He hadn't shut down the government. He hadn't asked for Congress to give him $5 billion for a wall, and they hadn't passed any legislation to do so. Yet this meme directs its outrage at Nancy Pelosi, who wasn't in charge of anything when it happened.
Here's a hint for everyone. Just because someone doesn't support a wall (even the libertarian Cato Institute wrote a detailed article explaining why the wall won't work), doesn't mean they favor crime, open borders, illegals, etc. They just know there are better ways of enforcing border security. And those ways have already led to a dramatic decline in the number of illegal border crossings. So we have something that is in fact working.
Now, see if you can see why this meme is propaganda. See if you can spot all of the logical flaws. I pointed out some inconvenient facts to the original poster of the meme, but he deleted them. Mustn't have people thinking for themselves. (Oh, and it goes without saying: Condolences to the friends and family of this young man. His death was tragic, but shouldn't be used to further propaganda).