January 11, 2022
Right-wing YouTube channel PragerU specializes in whitewashing historical figures and spreading disinformation to attempt to sway young people to the right. And now it is trying to expand its audience to a new target demographic: kids.
When conservative radio host Dennis Prager launched PragerU back in 2009, he began making short videos that were targeted at teenagers and college students.
These animated videos are full of vibrant colors and graphs that contain little to no factual data and are voiced over by prominent conservative political commentators such as Ben Shapiro, Candace Owens and Charlie Kirk. Prager’s goal is to indoctrinate young people who are submerged in left-wing politics and culture but still susceptible to the disinformation of the right.
To help expand PragerU’s potential audience, it created the PragerForce, a group of over 6,500 teenagers and young adults that organize PragerU events on college campuses and ask students questions. These questions, asked in bad faith, are recorded in an attempt to make the (often left-leaning) students seem uninformed or wrong.
These videos, often with exaggerated titles, rack up millions of views and further spread PragerU’s conservative influence on young people’s political ideologies.
SOURCE : https://warhawknews.com/4020/opinion/right-wing-propaganda-organization-prageru-begins-targetting-children/
1.) PragerU isn’t just fake news, it’s dangerous
Prager University is just fake news done well.
However, that doesn’t mean they aren’t dangerous. If you scroll through your Facebook feed, you will probably see one of their videos.
They feature a pleasant blue background with a reasonable-looking, mild-voiced narrator. Their videos’ titles usually pose questions like, “Who are the racists? Conservatives or Liberals?” and then always fall far right of center with their answer.
The videos’ issues range from one professing their enthusiastic endorsement of fossil fuels to challenging the idea of rape culture on college campuses.
PragerU isn’t concerned with facts and often skirt around making any substantial claims, but they still put on academic airs to benefit the conservative platform.
To understand the videos, you must understand the man behind PragerU, and how, with enough money and slick graphics, any opinion can be made to seem reasonable.
It all started in 2011. Prager’s rise to prevalence in politics as a radio-host established him as an authority in discerning the moral character of political actors.
One certain billionaire with strange hair and a clementine-esque hue drew his attention: Donald Trump.
Believe it or not, he came out against Trump’s botched run in the 2012 election for president, releasing a column on the Jewish World Review on May 3, 2011 criticizing Trump’s speech, which was rife with profanity. In the piece Prager asserts, “the words render him unfit to be a presidential candidate, let alone president.”
However, five years later during the Republican primary when it was becoming increasingly apparent Trump would actually be the Republican nominee, Prager changed his tune.
Just before the general election, he took it upon himself to fund a social media campaign rivaling the Russian Facebook fake ad campaign, not in size, but in persuasiveness.
While Russia might have put out numerous ads bashing Clinton and leftist ideology, they were rather crude and overtly racist.
Most of the videos put out by PragerU were well done, using their panache to sell their views, which would have been considered radical had they portrayed them any differently.
In particular, their views on climate change are problematic.
Despite there being little to no scientific debate on whether or not climate change exists — spoiler: 90 to 100 percent of scientists believe it does according to a Dec. 14, 2016 article from Forbes — PragerU puts out videos insisting there is some matter of argument for the other side.
SOURCE : https://sdsucollegian.com/891/opinion/prageru-isnt-just-fake-news-its-dangerous/
2.) Florida Approved a PragerU Climate Cartoon for Schools. We Asked a Scientist to Fact-Check It.
“I find something like this…to be really dangerous.”
AUGUST 18, 2023
It’s also, apparently, where science goes to die. Last month, Florida became the first state in the nation to approve the use of “educational” videos produced by the conservative organization Prager University Foundation, a group co-founded by right-wing radio host Dennis Prager.
While no school district has announced plans to show any of PragerU’s videos, NPR reports, there’s nothing to stop teachers from independently airing the material. As a Florida Department of Education spokesperson said in a statement, the material aligns with Florida’s revised civics and government standards.
SOURCE : https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2023/08/prageru-climate-skeptic-science-florida-education/
Right-wing propaganda organization PragerU begins targetting children
Right-wing YouTube channel PragerU specializes in whitewashing historical figures and spreading disinformation to attempt to sway young people to the right. And now it is trying to expand its audience to a new target demographic: kids. When conservative radio host Dennis Prager launched PragerU back in 2009, he began making short videos that were targeted...
PragerU: Coming to a Public School Near You?
Not an accredited teaching institution, PragerU just saw its right-wing curriculum approved for use in Florida. Two other states are considering the same, which one historian sees as a way “to replace American history with propaganda and indoctrination.”
PragerU - Bias and Credibility
QUESTIONABLE SOURCE A questionable source exhibitsone or more of the following: extreme bias, consistent promotion of propaganda/conspiracies, poor or no
Ironically when pointing out their deceptive practices it’s about them and not the reader.
Pointing out the unreliability of these businesses is to help, not hurt.