PragerU is an American
advocacy group
Advocacy groups, also known as interest groups, special interest groups, lobbying groups or pressure groups use various forms of advocacy in order to influence public opinion and ultimately policy. They play an important role in the developm ...
that creates videos promoting a
conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
viewpoint on various political, economic, and sociological topics.
It was co-founded by
Allen Estrin
Allen Estrin (born June 20, 1954) is an American screenwriter, producer, director, and author. He is known for screenwriting with his late brother Mark Estrin, co-writing a novel with Joseph Telushkin, and his current work with Dennis Prager. W ...
and talk show host and writer
Dennis Prager
Dennis Mark Prager (; born August 2, 1948) is an American conservative radio talk show host and writer. He is the host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show ''The Dennis Prager Show''. In 2009, he co-founded PragerU, which creates five-m ...
in 2009.
Despite the name, short for Prager University, PragerU is not an
academic institution
Academic institution is an educational institution dedicated to education and research, which grants academic degrees. See also academy and university.
Types
* Primary schools – (from French ''école primaire'') institutions where children r ...
and does not hold classes or grant diplomas.
Some of PragerU's videos have been criticised for presenting misleading or factually incorrect content.
As a
501(c)(3)
A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...
nonprofit, PragerU relies on tax-deductible donations, with significant early funding coming from conservative oil billionaires
Dan and Farris Wilks
Dan Howard Wilks and Farris Cullen Wilks, also known as the Wilks Brothers, are American petroleum industry businessmen. Sons of a bricklayer, the brothers established Wilks Masonry in 1995. They went on to found an early hydraulic fracking compa ...
.
History
PragerU was founded in 2009 by conservative radio talk show host
Dennis Prager
Dennis Mark Prager (; born August 2, 1948) is an American conservative radio talk show host and writer. He is the host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show ''The Dennis Prager Show''. In 2009, he co-founded PragerU, which creates five-m ...
and radio producer and screenwriter
Allen Estrin
Allen Estrin (born June 20, 1954) is an American screenwriter, producer, director, and author. He is known for screenwriting with his late brother Mark Estrin, co-writing a novel with Joseph Telushkin, and his current work with Dennis Prager. W ...
,
in order to advocate for conservative views and to offset what Prager regards as the undermining of college education by the left.
The two originally considered making it a brick-and-mortar university, but the idea was revised into a digital product to save money.
PragerU is based in the
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley, known locally as the Valley, is an urbanized valley in Los Angeles County, California. Located to the north of the Los Angeles Basin, it contains a large portion of the City of Los Angeles, as well as unincorporated ar ...
of Los Angeles, California,
and it had around 50 employees as of January 2020.
Marissa Streit is the
CEO
A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...
and has presented some of its videos. PragerU encourages students to join "PragerFORCE", an international student organisation to promote PragerU's videos and ideology, about 6,500 college and high school students promoted its videos as of 2020.
Despite the name, PragerU is not an
academic institution
Academic institution is an educational institution dedicated to education and research, which grants academic degrees. See also academy and university.
Types
* Primary schools – (from French ''école primaire'') institutions where children r ...
and does not hold classes, does not grant certifications or diplomas, and is not
accredited
Accreditation is the independent, third-party evaluation of a conformity assessment body (such as certification body, inspection body or laboratory) against recognised standards, conveying formal demonstration of its impartiality and competence to ...
by any recognized body.
Since a lawsuit over the use of a photograph in 2013, PragerU has used animation in its videos. PragerU reached a billion views in 2018.
![Dennis Prager (32566262648)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/96/Dennis_Prager_%2832566262648%29.jpg)
In July 2019, PragerU representative Allen Estrin attended then-
United States President
The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United State ...
Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
's Social Media Summit, along with other conservative organizations and people such as
Charlie Kirk and
James O'Keefe
James Edward O'Keefe III (born June 28, 1984) is an American political activist and provocateur who founded Project Veritas, a far-right activist group that uses deceptive editing techniques to attack mainstream media organizations and progr ...
.
In the fall of 2020, PragerU started fundraising for PragerU Resources for Educators and Parents (PREP), a program targeted towards kindergarten and school-aged children. PREP released its first content in April 2021.
PragerU's school-age targeted content was later branded as PragerU Kids.
Conflicts with YouTube and Facebook
In October 2016, PragerU claimed that
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
had put 21 of PragerU's videos in the "restricted mode" setting, which ensures content is age appropriate.
YouTube responded, saying: "We aim to apply the same standards to everyone and we don’t censor anyone. Often it’s not the right approach to say that videos with the same topic should get the same rating. We’ll need to take into consideration what the intent of the video is, what the focus of the video is, what the surrounding metadata of the video explains."
In October 2017, PragerU filed a federal lawsuit against YouTube's parent company,
Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
, claiming that 37 of its videos were unfairly demonetized or flagged so that they could only be viewed with "restricted mode filtering", which limits views based on viewer characteristics such as age.
PragerU claimed that Google's demonetization and flagging violated the
First Amendment
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
by arguing that YouTube was a
public forum
In United States constitutional law, a forum is a property that is open to public expression and assembly.
Types
Forums are classified as public or nonpublic.
Public forum
A public forum also called an ''open forum'', is open to all expression ...
. In March 2018,
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh
Lucy Haeran Koh (born August 7, 1968) is an American lawyer and jurist serving as a U.S. circuit judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She is the first Korean American woman to serve on a federal appellate court in the Unit ...
dismissed the case, ruling that because Google was a private company, PragerU had failed to show that Google had infringed its free speech rights. In February 2020, the
U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals
The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (in case citations, 9th Cir.) is the United States courts of appeals, U.S. federal court of appeals that has appellate jurisdiction over the United States district court, U.S. district cou ...
upheld this ruling.
In 2018, as part of its efforts to counter misinformation, YouTube added fact-checking tags to PragerU's videos about climate change.
In August 2018,
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
removed two PragerU videos from its platform. It later restored the videos, saying that they "were mistakenly removed."
According to Francesca Tripodi, professor of sociology at
UNC-Chapel Hill, there are plausible non-ideological explanations for Facebook's removal of several of the videos. PragerU contended that Facebook had engaged in deliberate censorship.
Finances
The organization depends on donations to produce its content.
Much of PragerU's early funding came from
hydraulic fracturing
Fracking (also known as hydraulic fracturing, hydrofracturing, or hydrofracking) is a well stimulation technique involving the fracturing of bedrock formations by a pressurized liquid. The process involves the high-pressure injection of "frack ...
billionaires
Dan and Farris Wilks
Dan Howard Wilks and Farris Cullen Wilks, also known as the Wilks Brothers, are American petroleum industry businessmen. Sons of a bricklayer, the brothers established Wilks Masonry in 1995. They went on to found an early hydraulic fracking compa ...
.
Two members of the Wilks family sit on PragerU's board.
The next-largest donor is the
Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation
The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, commonly known as the Bradley Foundation, is an American charitable foundation based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that primarily supports conservative causes.
The foundation provides between $35 million and $4 ...
.
Other donors include the Morgan Family Foundation,
Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund,
Donors Trust
Donors Trust is an American nonprofit donor-advised fund. It was founded in 1999 with the goal of "safeguarding the intent of libertarian and conservative donors". As a donor advised fund, Donors Trust is not legally required to disclose the id ...
, the late Republican megadonor
Sheldon Adelson
Sheldon Gary Adelson (; August 4, 1933 – January 11, 2021) was an American businessman, investor, political donor and philanthropist. He was the founder, chairman and chief executive officer of Las Vegas Sands Corporation, which owns th ...
,
Lee Roy Mitchell
Lee Roy Mitchell founded Cinemark Inc., and was its chief executive officer from 1987 to December 2006.
Life and career
Mitchell was working at a Ford dealership in Forney, Texas, when his father, M. Mitchell, who owned theaters in Bastrop a ...
,
and the Minnesota-based Sid and Carol Verdoorn Foundation, led by former
C.H. Robinson
C.H. Robinson is an American ''Fortune'' 200 provider of multimodal transportation services and third-party logistics (3PL). For 2021, it was ranked 5th in the world and 1st in the US among third-party logistics providers by gross logistics reve ...
CEO Sid Verdoorn.
As of 2018, the organization reportedly had a $10 million annual budget, of which it spent more than 40% on marketing.
In 2019, 40% of its budget came from almost 130,000 online donors; the ''Los Angeles Times'' noted that PragerU attracted more donors than some Democratic presidential primary contenders had at the time.
In 2020, PragerU reported to have received about $28 million in revenues, most of it from donations, and reported approximately $28 million in expenditures, with 39% going into marketing.
PragerU consistently spends more on Facebook advertising than major political campaigns and national advocacy groups.
In 2019, it ranked among the 10 biggest political spenders on the platform.
[
In 2020, PragerU received $704,057 in ]COVID-19
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...
relief loans from the Paycheck Protection Program
The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) is a $953-billion business loan program established by the United States federal government during the Donald Trump administration in 2020 through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES A ...
; this debt was later forgiven in full.
Content
PragerU releases one video per week on various topics from a conservative viewpoint that according to its site "advances Judeo-Christian values
The idea that a common Judaeo-Christian ethics or Judeo-Christian values underpins American politics, law and morals has been part of the "American civil religion" since the 1940s. In recent years, the phrase has been associated with American co ...
." , its YouTube channel included 968 videos. Each video costs between $25,000 and $30,000 to create. Dennis Prager "personally approves every item" and "edits every script" before publication, according to ''Mother Jones
Mary G. Harris Jones (1837 (baptized) – November 30, 1930), known as Mother Jones from 1897 onwards, was an Irish-born American schoolteacher and dressmaker who became a prominent union organizer, community organizer, and activist. She h ...
''. PragerU guests cover a range from the secular right, the far-right, and the theocratic right. Some prominent video presenters have included Ben Shapiro
Benjamin Aaron Shapiro (born January 15, 1984) is an American attorney, businessman, columnist, conservative political commentator, and media personality. At age 17, he became the youngest nationally syndicated columnist in the United States. ...
, Candace Owens
Candace Amber Owens Farmer ( Owens; born April 29, 1989) is an American conservative author, talk show host, political commentator, and activist. Initially critical of United States President Donald Trump and the Republican Party, Owens has bee ...
, Tucker Carlson
Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson (born May 16, 1969) is an American television host, conservative political commentator and writer who has hosted the nightly political talk show ''Tucker Carlson Tonight'' on Fox News since 2016.
Carlson began h ...
, Nigel Farage
Nigel Paul Farage (; born 3 April 1964) is a British broadcaster and former politician who was List of UK Independence Party leaders, Leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) from 2006 to 2009 and 2010 to 2016 and Brexit Party#Leaders, Lea ...
, Charles Krauthammer
Charles Krauthammer (; March 13, 1950 – June 21, 2018) was an American political columnist. A moderate liberal who turned independent conservative as a political pundit, Krauthammer won the Pulitzer Prize for his columns in ''The Washington ...
, Michelle Malkin
Michelle Malkin (; Maglalang; born October 20, 1970) is an American conservative political commentator. She was a Fox News contributor and in May 2020 joined Newsmax TV. Malkin has written seven books and founded the conservative websites Twit ...
, Bret Stephens
Bret Louis Stephens (born November 21, 1973) is an American conservative journalist, editor, and columnist. He began working as an opinion columnist for ''The New York Times'' in April 2017 and as a senior contributor to NBC News in June 2017.
...
and George Will
George Frederick Will (born May 4, 1941) is an American libertarian-conservative political commentator and author. He writes regular columns for ''The Washington Post'' and provides commentary for NBC News and MSNBC.Hadas Gold, Gold, Hadas (May ...
.
Among topics covered, PragerU videos have argued against a $15 minimum wage
A minimum wage is the lowest remuneration that employers can legally pay their employees—the price floor below which employees may not sell their labor. Most countries had introduced minimum wage legislation by the end of the 20th century. Bec ...
, against increased gun control
Gun control, or firearms regulation, is the set of laws or policies that regulate the manufacture, sale, transfer, possession, modification, or use of firearms by civilians.
Most countries have a restrictive firearm guiding policy, with on ...
, and in support of capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for Profit (economics), profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, pric ...
. Although topical, PragerU videos largely avoided mentioning Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
during his presidency. PragerU is pro-Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
, and Dennis Prager has said that "Nothing better identifies incipient evil than anti-Semitism."
Dave Rubin
David Joshua Rubin (born in June 1976) is an American conservative political commentator and YouTuber. He is the creator and host of ''The Rubin Report'', a political talk show on YouTube and on the network BlazeTV. Launched in 2013, his show ...
stated in a video that "racism
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
, bigotry, xenophobia
Xenophobia () is the fear or dislike of anything which is perceived as being foreign or strange. It is an expression of perceived conflict between an in-group and out-group and may manifest in suspicion by the one of the other's activities, a ...
, homophobia
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitude (psychology), attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being lesbian, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, h ...
, and Islamophobia
Islamophobia is the fear of, hatred of, or prejudice against the religion of Islam or Muslims in general, especially when seen as a geopolitical force or a source of terrorism.
The scope and precise definition of the term ''Islamophobia'' ...
" are "meaningless buzzword
A buzzword is a word or phrase, new or already existing, that becomes popular for a period of time. Buzzwords often derive from technical terms yet often have much of the original technical meaning removed through fashionable use, being simply used ...
s". In a video about the alt-right
The alt-right, an abbreviation of alternative right, is a far-right, white nationalist movement. A largely online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late 2000s before increasing in popularity during the mid-2 ...
, Michael Knowles argued that it has nothing in common with conservatism and instead is close to leftism, except the left is much larger. PragerU videos also promote the Electoral College, arguing that it thwarts voter fraud
Electoral fraud, sometimes referred to as election manipulation, voter fraud or vote rigging, involves illegal interference with the process of an election, either by increasing the vote share of a favored candidate, depressing the vote share of ...
and that "pure democracies do not work".
Over a dozen videos promote fossil fuel
A fossil fuel is a hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the remains of dead plants and animals that is extracted and burned as a fuel. The main fossil fuels are coal, oil, and natural gas. Fossil fuels m ...
s and dispute the scientific consensus on climate change
There is a strong scientific consensus that the Earth is warming and that this warming is mainly caused by human activities. This consensus is supported by various studies of scientists' opinions and by position statements of scientific org ...
. According to the non-profit think tank InfluenceMap, targeted ads posted on Facebook included misleading material that cast doubt on science, framed climatic concerns as ideological and hysteria and promoted a conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources:
*
*
*
* The term has a nega ...
that "big government control" is the real motivation behind energy policies to reduce gas emissions.
School program
By 2015, PragerU developed two partnership programs to promote its views, including religious material, in public and private schools. PragerU's Educator Program, with 3,000 sign-ups reported as of 2015, supplies teachers with lesson plans and study guides that accompany videos. Secondary school
A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' secondary education, lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) ...
teachers and college professors can register their classes through PragerU's Academic Partnership program, which lets students sign up and allows teachers to monitor their students' progress.
Reception
According to a 2019 report in the ''Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'', PragerU videos have been watched more than 2 billion times and were becoming a staple on college campuses. In its 2020 annual report, PragerU stated that its videos have received over 4 billion lifetime views. PragerU has ranked highly in influence compared to other free-market advocacy organizations, such as ''Reason'' and ''National Review
''National Review'' is an American conservative editorial magazine, focusing on news and commentary pieces on political, social, and cultural affairs. The magazine was founded by the author William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955. Its editor-in-chief i ...
''.
'' Vanity Fair'' said PragerU "packages right-wing social concepts into slick videos" and that PragerU was "one of the most effective conversion tools for young conservatives."
Sociologist Francesca Tripodi has studied PragerU's marketing and messaging for the nonprofit Data & Society. She found that PragerU relies on search engine optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the quality and quantity of Web traffic, website traffic to a website or a web page from web search engine, search engines. SEO targets unpaid traffic (known as "natural" or "Organ ...
and "suggested content" to market its videos. She noted that PragerU was popular among the respondents in her study and that they all either liked or shared PragerU videos on Facebook. Tripodi argued that PragerU allows viewers to dabble in content that "makes connections to" the alt-right's talking points. In this way, viewers identifying as mainline conservatives gain "easy access to white supremacist
White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other Race (human classification), races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any Power (social and polit ...
logic". She also demonstrated an algorithmic connection on YouTube between PragerU, Fox News
The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is owne ...
, and alt-right
The alt-right, an abbreviation of alternative right, is a far-right, white nationalist movement. A largely online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late 2000s before increasing in popularity during the mid-2 ...
personalities.
A ''Buzzfeed News
''BuzzFeed News'' is an American news website published by BuzzFeed. It has published a number of high-profile scoops, including the Steele dossier, for which it was heavily criticized, and the FinCEN Files. Since its establishment in 2011, it ...
'' article published in 2018 attributed PragerU's success to the quality of its production values compared to similar outlets and to its use of popular presenters with established audiences. The article also noted that it had received comparatively little attention from news and media analysts due to PragerU's lack of coverage of topical issues, such as Donald Trump.
In an August 2019 article written by Drew Anderson of GLAAD
GLAAD (), an acronym of Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, is an American non-governmental media monitoring organization originally founded as a protest against defamatory coverage of gay and lesbian demographics and their portrayals ...
, an LGBT
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is a ...
media monitoring Media monitoring is the activity of monitoring the output of the print, online and broadcast media. It is based on analyzing a diverse range of media platforms in order to identify trends that can be used for a variety of reasons such as political, ...
organization, Anderson noted PragerU's ties to white supremacy and white supremacists, and also noted PragerU's "Horrific Anti-LGBTQ
Anti-LGBT rhetoric comprises themes, catchphrases, and slogans that have been used against homosexuality or other non-heterosexual sexual orientations in order to demean lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people. They range from the ...
Record".
''Reason
Reason is the capacity of consciously applying logic by drawing conclusions from new or existing information, with the aim of seeking the truth. It is closely associated with such characteristically human activities as philosophy, science, ...
'' has criticized PragerU's claims of being censored by big tech
Big Tech, also known as the Tech Giants, refers to the most dominant companies in the information technology industry, mostly located in the United States. The term also refers to the four or five largest American tech companies, called the Big ...
companies for being false, as the company's content had not been removed from any social media platforms, and that they indicate a misunderstanding of the First Amendment
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
as protecting a party from any type of censorship, when that law merely protects content from censorship by the government.
Climate Feedback
Climate Feedback (CF) is a web-based content annotation tool that allows qualified scientists to comment on stories online, adding context and noting inaccuracies. It is one of three websites under the Science Feedback parent organization that f ...
, Reuters
Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world.
The agency was estab ...
and the Weather Channel
The Weather Channel (TWC) is an American pay television channel owned by Weather Group, LLC, a subsidiary of Allen Media Group. The channel's headquarters are in Atlanta, Georgia. Launched on May 2, 1982, the channel broadcasts weather forecast ...
have found that PragerU's videos promote inaccurate and misleading claims about climate change.
PragerU's coverage of COVID-19 has been criticized for spreading false and misleading information about the pandemic.
In 2019, Mike Gravel
Maurice Robert "Mike" Gravel ( ; May 13, 1930 – June 26, 2021) was an American politician and writer who served as a United States Senator from Alaska from 1969 to 1981 as a member of the Democratic Party, and who later in life twice ran for ...
, a former United States Senator
The United States Senate is the Upper house, upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives being the Lower house, lower chamber. Together they compose the national Bica ...
from Alaska
Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S., ...
, launched The Gravel Institute, a progressive left-leaning think tank
A think tank, or policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, technology, and culture. Most think tanks are non-governmenta ...
, to counteract PragerU.
''Mother Jones'' said PragerU videos assert that there is no gender pay gap
The gender pay gap or gender wage gap is the average difference between the remuneration for men and women who are working. Women are generally found to be paid less than men. There are two distinct numbers regarding the pay gap: non-adjusted ...
, and that there is not discrimination in policing of African-Americans.
On race, Pam Nilan, in her 2021 book ''Young People and the Far Right'', says that PragerU "pretends to sidestep" white supremacy, but that "the message is always that white culture is better than other cultures."
Criticisms of videos
According to Joseph McCarthy of The Weather Channel
The Weather Channel (TWC) is an American pay television channel owned by Weather Group, LLC, a subsidiary of Allen Media Group. The channel's headquarters are in Atlanta, Georgia. Launched on May 2, 1982, the channel broadcasts weather forecas ...
, in the 2016 video "Fossil Fuels: The Greenest Energy", fossil fuel proponent Alex Epstein promotes misinformation about climate change, including false and misleading claims.
The paleoconservative
Paleoconservatism is a political philosophy and variety of conservatism in the United States stressing American nationalism, Christian ethics, regionalism, and traditionalist conservatism. Paleoconservatism's concerns overlap with those of the ...
scholar Paul Gottfried
Paul Edward Gottfried (born November 21, 1941) is an American paleoconservative political philosopher, historian, and writer. He is a former Professor of Humanities at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania. He is editor-in-chief of the paleocons ...
, who has written on fascism
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...
, criticized a PragerU video hosted by Dinesh D'Souza
Dinesh Joseph D'Souza (; born April 25, 1961) is an Indian-American right-wing political commentator, author, filmmaker, and conspiracy theorist. He has written over a dozen books, several of them ''New York Times'' best-sellers.
In 2012, D' ...
which stated that fascism was a left-wing ideology. D'Souza maintained that Italian philosopher Giovanni Gentile
Giovanni Gentile (; 30 May 1875 – 15 April 1944) was an Italian neo-Hegelian idealist philosopher, educator, and fascist politician. The self-styled "philosopher of Fascism", he was influential in providing an intellectual foundation for I ...
, who influenced Italian fascism, was a left-winger, to which Gottfried noted that this contradicted the research by almost all scholars of Gentile's work who view him as an intellectual of the revolutionary right.
According to Francesca Tripodi, PragerU's videos advance the conspiracy theory, popular among the alt-right
The alt-right, an abbreviation of alternative right, is a far-right, white nationalist movement. A largely online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late 2000s before increasing in popularity during the mid-2 ...
, that whiteness and conservatism are under attack and many videos on PragerU focus on delegitimizing the mainstream media, accusing it of being based on emotion or opinion rather than fact.
Alex Nowrasteh of the Cato Institute
The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Indust ...
criticized a 2018 PragerU video by Michelle Malkin
Michelle Malkin (; Maglalang; born October 20, 1970) is an American conservative political commentator. She was a Fox News contributor and in May 2020 joined Newsmax TV. Malkin has written seven books and founded the conservative websites Twit ...
that argued for stricter restrictions on immigration. Nowrasteh wrote that the video was full of errors and half-truths and omitted relevant information.
In 2018, the PragerU video "The Suicide of Europe" by Douglas Murray argued that Europe is "committing suicide" by allowing mass immigration. The Southern Poverty Law Center
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal advocacy organization specializing in civil rights and public interest litigation. Based in Montgomery, Alabama, it is known for its legal cases against white su ...
(SPLC) described the video as a "dog whistle
A dog whistle (also known as silent whistle or Galton's whistle) is a type of whistle that emits sound in the ultrasonic range, which humans cannot hear but some other animals can, including dogs and domestic cats, and is used in their training ...
to the extreme right". Mark Pitcavage of the Anti-Defamation League
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), formerly known as the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, is an international Jewish non-governmental organization based in the United States specializing in civil rights law. It was founded in late Septe ...
described it as "filled with anti-immigration and anti-Muslim rhetoric". "Why Did the Democratic South Become Republican?" is another video that the SPLC says contains such dog whistles. In this video, Vanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and rail magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school its initial $1-million ...
professor Carol M. Swain
Carol Miller Swain (born March 7, 1954) is a retired professor of political science and Law of the United States, law at Vanderbilt University. A frequent television analyst, she is the author and editor of several books. Her interests include ra ...
argues that the Southern strategy
In American politics, the Southern strategy was a Republican Party electoral strategy to increase political support among white voters in the South by appealing to racism against African Americans. As the civil rights movement and dismantling of ...
, the political strategy which saw the Republican Party exploit racial tensions to appeal to white Southerners, was false revisionism. History professor Kevin M. Kruse said that the video presented a "distortion" of history, "cherry-picked" its evidence, and was an "exercise in attacking a straw man".
In June 2020, Snopes
''Snopes'' , formerly known as the ''Urban Legends Reference Pages'', is a Fact checking, fact-checking website. It has been described as a "well-regarded reference for sorting out myths and rumors" on the Internet. The site has also been see ...
criticized the video "How To End White Privilege". The video argued that white privilege
White privilege, or white skin privilege, is the societal privilege that benefits white people over non-white people in some societies, particularly if they are otherwise under the same social, political, or economic circumstances. With roots ...
is a myth because a black police officer's race did not provide a barrier to his success. According to Snopes, the video is inaccurate as recent history and statistics indicate that white privilege still exists.
In October 2020, Gita Jackson of ''Vice'' noted that "There's already a cottage industry of YouTuber
A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006.
Influence
Influent ...
s trying to debunk PragerU."
References
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{{authority control
2009 establishments in the United States
Organizations established in 2009
American conservative websites
Internet properties established in 2009
501(c)(3) organizations
Conservative political advocacy groups in the United States
Student political organizations in the United States
YouTube controversies
Climate change denial