When Emotion Replaces Fact

We live in a world where humans are more interconnected than ever. Information spreads in seconds and is accessible to anyone. News, images, and opinions reach millions, unconstrained by editors, expertise, or verification. These developments are revolutionary, but they expose a serious vulnerability. Emotional reactions increasingly outweigh facts, leaving populations more susceptible to manipulation.

In the past, the spread of information was slow, costly, and centralised. Today, an internet connection and an email address are enough to access platforms such as X, TikTok, and Instagram, where unfiltered opinions, half-truths, and propaganda circulate with minimal friction and limited accountability. Engagement, and not accuracy, drives visibility and viewership. As a result, popularity is substituted for credibility, and influence for expertise. These dynamics primarily arise in Western democracies, where free speech is most protected. It is in these societies that the threat of indoctrination may arise.

This shift may not merely alter how Western democracies communicate; It risks changing how they think. Short-form content replaces depth and critical reasoning, reducing information to slogans and thirty-second clips. The result is not just misinformation. Audiences are gradually conditioned toward ideological indoctrination.

Few historical figures illustrate the mechanisms of propaganda as clearly as the infamous Adolf Hitler. His book ‘Mein Kampf’ offers insight into how propaganda functions, not as a moral comparison, but as an analytical case study of technique. He wrote:

“[t]he art of propaganda lies in understanding the emotional ideas of great masses and finding, through a psychologically correct form, the way to the attention and thence to the heart of the broad masses.”

He further explained that humans struggle to retain information, requiring propaganda to use slogans, so that even the ‘least member of the public’ can understand what they want.

Few communities have felt the consequences of hateful speech and propaganda as the Jewish people have. Following the October 7, 2023, massacre, Israel found itself facing not only a multi-front military threat but an unrelenting information war. Social media platforms became tools to distort the truth and share anti-Israel propaganda. Terrorism was reframed as “resistance,” violence was rationalised as justice, and Israel was cast as the villain, reducing the conflict into a binary analysis of ‘oppressed’ and ‘oppressors.’

This reframing was not accidental. Through selective information, some replaced factual and accurate narratives with incoherent and factually ignorant ones. Genocidal slogans became excusable and diluted. Groups shouting, “globalise the intifada” and “from the river to the sea…” were stripped of their historical meaning and presented as benign calls for liberation, despite referring to violence and murdering Jews. Jew hatred remoulded into anti-Zionism, being disassociated from antisemitism.

The consequences were quickly visible. Australia provides a clear illustration. On October 9, 2023 –  just two days after the October 7 massacre – protesters gathered outside the Sydney Harbour Bridge, chanting “Where are the Jews,” “Globalise the Intifada,” and someone shouting, “we’re going to kill them all.” These voices represented the open extremist actors. What followed, however, was an example of the indoctrination affecting politically uninformed individuals who became echo chambers. But they did not remain echo chambers. The normalisation and justification of hostilities following October 7 contributed to an environment that allowed violence to be reframed as ‘resistance’, a pattern observable across Western democracies.

Over the last two years, Jews and pro-Israelis had warned Western democracies about the rhetoric used and the violence that was emerging. They warned societies about third-party actors who deliberately exploited social media to radicalise people against Israel and Jews. Yet these warnings went without notice.

The results have been the steady erosion of moral clarity. Following the Chanukah attack in Bondi, 2025, media commentary focused primarily on pointing towards a hostile actor and their involvement. This framing avoided a more uncomfortable question: how prolonged tolerance of violent rhetoric had helped normalise the mindset that precedes violence. Similar trends were observed with the Manchester Synagogue stabbing, the Washington DC Israeli diplomat shooting and other acts of violence against Jews over the last two years.

Decision makers must not be deceived; history teaches us that hostilities towards the Jews rarely stop with them. Western democracies are at risk of normalising violence on their streets, where indoctrinated individuals have been nurtured by inaction. Countering this reality requires more than symbolic statements after a tragedy occurs. It requires serious actions addressing widespread indoctrination. This is not only necessary for the safety of Jews, but for the stability of democratic values in society.

Countries around the world should adopt proactive and defensive measures, rather than reactive condemnation and responses, before the activism gets out of control. Indoctrination is not merely this generation’s challenge; it is the test to determine whether free societies continue to exist as we know them.

While action does not necessarily mean censorship, distinguishing between free speech and direct incitement to violence is necessary to preserve internal security. If democratic societies continue to treat indoctrination as mere speech, they may discover too late that radicalisation rarely remains rhetorical.