Children and Propaganda

Lyndon B. Johnson's "Daisy" nuclear countdown ad was one of the most controversial political advertisements ever made. It showed a little girl (Birgitte Olsen) picking the petals off a daisy while incorrectly counting each one until a man interrupts her with the countdown of a missile launch followed by a mushroom cloud from a nuclear explosion. It was aired only once, on September 7, 1964.<br>

Munro Leaf's "My Book To Help America," published in 1942 at the suggestion of the U.S. Treasury Department, instructed children on how they could help America win World War II.

Among other lessons, "My Book to Help America" tells children they can save their money in a piggy bank, but the better way is to lend it to America.

This pamphlet, from the second Lebanon war, reveals how Hezbollah raised funds and furthered its indoctrination campaign by stressing the younger generation, according to the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies.

According to the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, Part 2 of Hezbollah's pamplet contained a quiz and and Part 3 contained possible answers to it, both emphasizing "the importance of fighting the Israeli enemy on the basis of Hezbollah 'battle heritage.'"    

Al-Fateh is the Hamas movement's web magazine for children which conveys the Hamas movement's ideology -- including "hatred, disdain, deligitimization and demonization" of the West, Jews, Israel and Zionism -- as well as a call for the annihilation of Israel, according to the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School. In this story, a grandmother tells her granddaughter, on the way to visit Uncle Izz Al Din in an Israeli prison, that the Jews have killed the prophets and messengers of peace, and that the only way to release her uncle and other Palestinian prisoners is for Hamas to abduct Israeli soldiers for a prisoner exchange, the institute says.

This cartoon, featured in the November 15, 2004, issue of Al-Fateh shows an inscription on the wall that reads: 'The Islamic University' and one man telling a group: 'These Jewish Zionists are criminals and cowards and are a like a cancer which has to be gotten rid of.'

This caricature of an "evil" Israeli soldier, merged with a caricature of a Diaspora Jew appears in the the June 2003 issue of Al-Fateh.

This 1937 Soviet Union poster shows children thanking the party and "Dear Stalin" for a "Happy, Joyful Childhood."

"Farfour," a Mickey Mouse look-alike broadcast on Hamas TV, made worldwide headlines for encouraging children to fight Israel and the West. Farfour was "martyred while defending his land" in the weekly show's last episode in June 2007.

American WWI poster tells children to "save wheat for our soldiers."

Chinese propaganda poster shows a girl flanked by, and carrying a book about, Communist revolutionary martyrs.

The League of German Girls was the female branch of the overall Nazi party youth movement, and was the only female youth organization in Nazi Germany.

The Hitler Youth, the Nazi party's youth movement, indoctrinated German youth to perpetuate the "1,000 year Reich," and emphasized activism, physical training, and absolute obedience to Hitler and the Nazi party.

The Manifesto for Greater East Asian Co-operation, from a Japanese propaganda booklet from World War II, details the Imperial Army's plan for dominating the nations of the region.

The Manifesto for Great East Asian Cooperation shows images of what East Asia looked like when America, Britain and the Netherlands did "bad things" to the region and what it looked like after Japan drove away the "enemies."

Der Giftpilz, aka. The Poisonous Mushroom, was sometimes used in German schools to "educate" children about the Jews by explaining how to distinguish Jews from non-Jews, warning children not to trust their Jewish classmates. One of the final chapters blames the Jews for the death of Jesus, who is called the greatest enemy of the Jews of all time.