Crystallizing Public Opinion

There is a different set of facts on every subject for each man. Society cannot wait to find absolute truth. It cannot weigh every issue carefully before making a judgment. The result is that the so-called truths by which society lives are born of compromise among conflicting desires and of interpretation by many minds. They are accepted and intole

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.

Two of Lippmann’s ideas were particularly significant as Bernays crafted the job of the “public relations counsel.” The first of these was Lippmann’s argument that people’s view of reality was guided by the “pictures in their heads.” Living within the cocoons of their personal lives, and with minimal direct access to the outer world, most people’s

Realizing the injustice to them of this situation, they built a definite news event by going over the heads of the local law enforcement offices and wired an appeal direct to President Harding, asking for enforcement. This naturally became news of the first order. The opening of a shop by prominent women in which were shown graphic examples of the

Psychological habits, or as Mr. Lippmann calls them, “stereotypes,” are shorthand by which human effort is minimized. They are so clearly and commonly understood that every one will immediately respond to the mention of the stereotype within his personal experience. The words “capitalist” or “boy scout” bring out definite images to the hearer. Thes

The public responds to finer music and better motion pictures and demands improvements. “Give the people what they want” is only half sound. What they want and what they get are fused by some mysterious alchemy. The press, the lecturer, the screen and the public lead and are led by each other.

The very fact that newspapers must sell to the public is an evidence that they must please the public and in a measure obey it. In the press there is a very human tendency to compromise between giving the public what it wants and giving the public what it should want.

“We print,” says the New York Times, “all news that’s fit to print.” Immediately the question arises (as Elmer Davis, the historian of the Times tells us that it did when the motto was first adopted) what news is fit to print? By what standard is the editorial decision reached which includes one kind of news and excludes another kind? The Times its

For the great mass of activities there is no machinery of record whatever. How these are to be recorded when they are important is the real problem for the press. In this field the public relations counsel plays a considerable part. His is the business of calling to the public attention, through the press and through every other available medium, t