Detecting Propaganda in Discussions about Raw Milk
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I would disagree this is propaganda. The component of raw milk of concern is the bacteria count, in particular the concern of long standing around brucellosis. How applicable that is to a modern herd I don't know.
The question is whether we can detect an attempt to persuade us of a conclusion as opposed to having an open discussion.
There are several indicators or propaganda and one prominent one is the use of techniques to "guide" our thinking. To control the narrative. The significant event is this: "may destroy a small amount of certain nutrients in milk, she said, it’s not enough to make a real difference in how nutritious it is."
The place we are supposed to look is "nutrients". Hmmm. Is that the substantial issue about milk? We can think about this by wondering why most recommendations for mothers are to breast feed their children. Why would this be the case if pasteurized milk only differed from mother's milk by "a small amount of nutrients"? In fact we find no substantial recommendation that mothers pasteurize their milk before feeding it to children. There are certainly other reasons this is not recommended, but still if there is an issue of safety, one would expect in a reasonable discussion that this issue would be addressed.
Perhaps what we are possibly is some effort to limit the discussion to "nutrients". Are there possibly other components of raw milk that are in fact affected by pasteurization would affect the discussion?
I am not arguing here for or against raw milk. Instead I am interested in how to detect propaganda. I personally believe the raw milk discussion has become sensationalist. But this kind of "directed" discussion makes me wonder cui bono? And why is the NYT producing such shoddy reasoning?
I am increasingly aware of efforts to "guide" discussion with a range of techniques and wondering if other people see the same thing.