You shouldn't be ashamed, Jody, because in your willingness to believe that kind of thing, you were part of the large majority of humanity. People create that kind of propaganda because it works. It's (grimly) interesting to note that the parallels between this anti-Muslim attack video set in Europe (the first half, as far as I could stomach) and the propaganda attacks on Jews in Germany in the 1920s-30s. Its creators pushed a well-known psychological button, xenophobia, the fear of the unknown, most particularly, of unknown people.

When I recently tore into SDAI-Tech1 for telling you a fable about Harry Truman and Israel, I was criticizing his use of propaganda techniques to persuade instead of inform; to poison the intellectual well, was the phrase I used. Propaganda fills people's heads with false and half-false information and impairs their judgment. I consider it criminal assault upon our minds.

Ya know, Jody, having had your epiphany about propaganda, and being the new moderator of OffTopic (and you should contact me to get the keys to the moderator's lounge), you might consider using your bully pulpit to go after propaganda and its perpetrators. Be a debunker. Expose the lies. Expose the manipulation they try to use on us. The replies you got on this thread are an indication of general interest in the topic, I think. It's come up before, here and there, but nobody's pursued it systematically. Think about it...