Dictators and autocrats have a long tradition of lying about their achievements and the crises facing their nations. Donald Trump and Narendra Modi are contemporary textbook examples.
In mass communication, there is never just one audience. The same message travels through multiple echo chambers, filtered by ideology, identity, and emotion. What sounds like an outrageous lie to one group is embraced as gospel truth by another.
Those who are deeply influenced by Trump’s MAGA picture discern every lie as the truth.
‘Alternative facts’ and the collapse of shared reality
During his first presidency, Trump claimed that his inauguration crowd was “the largest ever period,” a claim debunked within hours by photographs and data. Yet his adviser Kellyanne Conway famously dubbed the lie “alternative facts.” That phrase captures the age we now live in, in which reality competes with fantasy on equal footing.
Economic myths and manufactured pride
Similarly, Modi’s repeated assertions about India’s economic strength, job creation, and global standing are often contradicted by official data on unemployment, inequality, and press freedom.
Yet for his devoted followers, popularly known as Bhakts, these claims are not questioned but celebrated as evidence of national resurgence and progress. As Modi once said, “Criticism is the ornament of democracy,” but in practice, criticism is often branded as “anti-national” or “anti-patriotic.”
When loyalty replaces evidence
In such environments, truth is not evaluated on the basis of evidence but on loyalty.
If a fact does not align with the prevailing mindset, it is instantly dismissed as fake, foreign-inspired, or malicious. As Hannah Arendt warned decades ago:
“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction no longer exists.”
Misinformation as political strategy
Misinformation, when repeated often and loudly, becomes a political strategy. Over time, falsity hardens into “truth,” and truth is ridiculed as propaganda. Trump perfected this art by labelling mainstream journalism “fake news.” Modi’s ecosystem achieves the same effect by drowning dissent in nationalism and religious sentiment.
Why facts fail to persuade
Exposing a lie is relatively easy; persuading someone to abandon it is not. Once identity is tied to belief, facts lose their power. As Mark Twain aptly noted:
“It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”
Democracy as a stage-managed illusion
Lies rarely fail when they are professionally packaged and delivered with intensity. In democratic systems, this makes them especially dangerous. They allow autocratic leaders to manipulate public consent without formally dismantling democratic institutions, turning democracy itself into a stage-managed illusion.
In the end, the real casualty is not just truth, but the citizen’s ability to recognise it. And when that happens, democracy survives in name alone.
