Do We Still Really Need a Propaganda Law?

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For years, governments and other institutions have flooded the marketplace with propaganda. Today, some people lovingly refer to it as "fake news." After World War II, the United States passed the U.S. Informational and Education Exchange Act of 1948, otherwise known as the Smith-Mundt Act. This law prohibited the U.S. Department of State and the Broadcasting Board of Governors from disseminating materials within the United States. The fear was that government produced programming by networks, such as the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe, would "propagandize" the American people. See History of the Smith-Mundt Act.

But with the arrival of the 21st century, came the arrival of 21st century technology, including satellites and the Internet. Material produced by anyone in the world could be accessed anywhere in the world, so the prohibition carried little weight and was actually irrelevant. In 2012, the President Obama and Congress adopted the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act. The new law did not authorize broadcasting or the creation of programming for U.S. audiences by the U.S. government, but it did allow requested content to be released within the United States. Stories produced and released under this new law include important topics such as human rights abuses in Iran and human trafficking in Asia. Smith-Mundt Modernization. Critics argue that this new law makes it legal for the U.S. government to spread "fake news."

So, do we really still need an anti-propaganda law to protect us? Aren't these laws based upon the assumption that we are too stupid to process and analyze the validity of news stories? Unfortunately, I believe that many people in this country actually live in a world of ignorance, and "just because I read it online, it must, therefore, be true." But for the rest of us, we should be offended by this limit on the marketplace of free ideas and encourage the complete abolition of the Smith-Mundt Act, so that all news organizations, publicly funded or not, can be free to distribute their stories around the world, including here in the United States.

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