Vintage Propaganda for Today’s Truths (No. 24)

If you want go directly to the Propaganda Poster Click here

Propaganda can be very effective when trying to instruct and motivate a population to achieve your goals. Propaganda as art typically caricatures an opponent in a simple, evil manner, exaggerating their features and focusing on a potential danger they pose if not defeated, while written or spoken propaganda casts everything the opponent does in a negative, threatening light. Those working to stop the opponent are portrayed as patriotic, hard-working and heroic, motivated to sacrifice and work until the opponent is defeated.

Propaganda has always been with us and continues today, whether subtly included in Advertising and Marketing, revealed as electronic Censorship by Government and Social Media, or incorporated into memes, text messages, and “News” by the Liberal Press and anyone trying to advance an agenda.

And I thought: What if World War II and Cold War Propaganda posters were reimagined for today’s topics? What would they look like?

Presenting the Twenty-fourth in a Series of
Vintage 2024 Election Season Propaganda Posters

Socialism Throttles the USA
(click image to enlarge it)

(click here to see the original 1909 UK poster)

Did you know the first permanent English settlements in North America, at Jamestown, VA and Plymouth, MA, were not just Christian but also Socialistic? All colonists contributed to a “common store”, had no private property, and couldn’t work for themselves.

Each almost failed, until they turned to a Free Market economy which allowed private property and individual profit, after which they flourished. Although America’s government changed in 1789 – from Parliamentary to Constitutional – it fundamentally kept its’ Free Market system, with the occasional Socialist groups.

Fast-forward to 1848, when the Communist Manifesto argued the Free Market was oppressive, re-named it “Capitalism“, and spawned numerous Workers Movements and Unions seeking not just to overthrow their greedy bosses but to pressure their governments to protect workers through legislation.

Thus began what some call the “Red Century“, where country after country became Communist (the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, China, North Korea, central Africa, and Vietnam), or at least heavily Socialist (India, and the “Banana Republics” of Latin America).

And after the Civil War socialism gradually infused its’ way into America: Initially, laws covering labor, health, safety, then expanding to social security, vocational training, unemployment, public housing, food, etc., and on to subsidies for basic needs, higher education, medical care, children and more, with an income tax system created in 1861 (designed to pay for the War) expanded over time to pay for Socialism’s expansion.

Today, America’s spends over 60% of its’ total budget on mandatory social programs. Social programs which Liberals argue should expand in cost and reach, and, perhaps, throttle America’s prosperity as the Middle Class becomes more burdened with taxes, pressuring them to use taxpayer-funded social programs, in a potentially destructive cycle.

Background: My poster was modified from a poster released by the British Conservative Party in 1909 illustrating the perils of Socialism. The original poster shows a beast attacking Prosperity after she has dropped her shield emblazoned with the Union Jack. The author is unknown. Click the poster to enlarge it, or click here.

Note my version of the original poster is claimed as a Derivative Work, please see my Legal Notice regarding Copyright and Use.