Drilled

Latest Episodes:

The Origins of Corporate PR Manipulation Feb 25, 2020

Show notes

Sigmund Freud's nephew, Edward Bernays, coined the term "public relations" when propaganda started to become a negative term. His specialty was using psychological know-how to manipulate the masses and orchestrate cultural shifts in his clients' favor (clients like Standard Oil, the American Tobacco Company, and General Motors).

Decades later, W. Howard Chase built onto that foundation with the idea of issues management—predicting an industry's potential issues, and manipulating political, social, and cultural forces to neutralize them. Chase is responsible for one of the best-known examples of greenwashing, the so-called "crying Indian ad," which introduced the idea of "litter bugs" and individual responsibility for pollution.

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Guardian Bans Fossil Fuel Ads: Emily Atkin Talks with CEO Anna Bateson Feb 18, 2020

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We'll be back with more Mad Men tales next week, we promise! While we're out chasing leads, listen to this great interview from Emily Atkin with The Guardian's interim CEO Anna Bateson about that publication's decision to stop taking ads from fossil fuel companies.

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Oil Slick, Part 2: False Equivalence and Free Speech Feb 11, 2020

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In part two of our episode on former Mobil VP Herb Schmertz, we dig into how Schmertz's approach bred false equivalence, and why he pushed so hard for the extension of First Amendment rights to corporations.
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Oil Slick, Part 1: Mobil's PR Mastermind and the Rise of the Corporate Persona Feb 04, 2020

Show notes

Mobil Oil's Herb Schmertz humanized the oil company, creating the "corporate persona," fighting for First Amendment rights to extend to corporations, and laying the groundwork for decades of aggressive media manipulation.
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Psychological Warfare and Big Oil Jan 28, 2020

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Daniel Edelman learned the tools of his trade combating Nazi propaganda in WWII, then came home and put his psychological warfare training to work for American industry, including tobacco and Big Oil.

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The Oil-Nazi-Propaganda Triangle Jan 21, 2020

Show notes

Ivy Lee worked with Standard Oil and the Rockefellers to establish the American Petroleum Institute in 1919, as well as a petrochemicals partnership with German chemical giant IG Farben. That job took Lee to Germany, to meet with Goebbels and Hitler and advise them on dealing with the American press. He was under investigation by Congress for his role in Nazi propaganda at the time of his death. Lee's work building the API was one of his most important contributions to fossil fuel propaganda—it's the foundation on which the next 100 years was built.
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The Father of Public Relations Jan 21, 2020

Show notes

In order to understand Big Oil's propaganda machine, and why it's been so effective, we have to go back more than 100 years to Standard Oil, John D. Rockefeller and his son, a bloody miners' strike, and the very first PR guy who swooped in to clean it all up.

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Coming Soon: The Mad Men of Climate Denial Dec 05, 2019

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Big Oil gave Hitler propaganda tips decades ago and their PR machine has only grown from there. Explore the history of fossil fuel propaganda and the "Mad Men of climate denial" PR strategists that shaped it.
Coming January 2020.

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Youth Climate Suits and Inter-generational Injustice Nov 28, 2019

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Young people around the world are taking governments to court over climate change—and winning global attention in the process. We breakdown the Juliana vs. United States case, where a group of young people sued the government for incentivizing increased fossil fuel dependence, thereby robbing the next generation of the pursuit for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Others, like Greta Thunberg, filed a complaint with the United Nations that top fossil fuel-producing countries were violating the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. As both suits move forward, we take a look at how they differ from climate liability cases, what makes them so compelling, and where they might head next.
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ExxonMobil NY Fraud Trial Recap: What the Verdict Means for Big Oil Nov 08, 2019

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New York's fraud trial against ExxonMobil closed November 7th. Reporter Emily Gertz and Union of Concerned Scientist's Kathy Mulvey bring us their takes on this and Exxon's next fraud trial.

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