You are seventeen years old. You live with your mother, and younger sister Mary, in a third story flat in London. Your day begins at half past five, working as a delivery boy, earning twelve shillings a week cycling through London, battling a bicycle with a slipping chain. Recruiting posters follow you everywhere, pasted on walls, sides of buses, shop windows. A little girl asking her father: "Daddy, what did YOU do in the Great War?" Last month you watched searchlights sweep the sky from your yard, you looked up to see Zeppelins floating like silver fish through the beams. The next morning you cycled past streets with windows blown out, glass scattered like stars.
The newspaper speaks of "satisfactory progress" or "strategic withdrawals," but the casualty lists tell the real story — column after column of names, ages, regiments. Boys who lived on the same streets , sat in the same church pews, breathed the same sooty London air.You feel something when you read them. Guilt, duty and fear, tangled together like a fishing line in your chest.
Then, on a Thursday afternoon in April, it happens. You're locking your bicycle when she approaches. An attractive woman in her twenties, her dress floating in the breeze. She meets your gaze, and smiles. She has kind eyes. Her hand extends towards yours, holding a single white feather.
BRITISH FEMALE VOICE 1: "For courage"
As she walks away, you stand there, frozen, feeling each and every sideways glance. The feather trembles in your fingers. You know what it means. Everyone knows what it means. Coward. Shirker. Less than a man.As you ride your bicycle, the feather sits in your jacket pocket, like a coal against your ribs. Every person you pass seems to know.
In your room, you hold the feather up to the lamplight, translucent, delicate. Such a small thing to carry such weight.On Saturday morning, you walk into the recruiting office, the sergeant behind the desk barely looks up from his paperwork.
BRITISH MALE VOICE 1: "Your age?"
You’ve never been a good liar, but whats a few months? You tell him 18.
BRITISH MALE VOICE 1: "Close enough. Your king's shilling."
You sign your name. And just like that, you’re a soldier.
Your new khaki uniform feels stiff. As you take a walk through Hyde park in hopes of breaking it in, you hear a familiar voice.
The same woman stands on a platform addressing a crowd about duty, and sacrifice.
Your heart pounds as you approach the stage. She spots you and calls you up.
The german menace has gone unchecked by our so called allies for far too long, and now it falls to us, our people, as it always does. England shall preserve the glory of greater Europe. For God, For Country, For the Queen, we will rise above and show them why we are chartered with an empire on which the sun never sets. You may say to yourself, Im just one man, what can I possibly do? Well I’ll tell you, (notices the boy) you can rise to your station. For your mother, your sister, your daughter…
BRITISH FEMALE VOICE 1: "Now HERE is a fine example of British courage!"
Standing beside her, you feel the crowd's approval wash over you like warm water. She turns to you, tears streaming down her face, and reaches into your jacket pocket. Her fingers find the feather.
She holds it up for all to see, then rips it in half. Before you can react, she pulls you close and kisses you.
BRITISH FEMALE VOICE 1: "This is what awaits every man who chooses courage over cowardice!"As you float off the stage, other men look at you with respect. Women smile. Children salute. You can’t stop touching your lips where she kissed you.
In two weeks you'll ship out. Tonight you sit by your window listening to Mrs. Henderson play "Danny Boy" on her piano. The war feels both very close and very far away.
You are seventeen years old, and you have learned what it costs to be called a man. Whether that price was worth paying, only France will tell. In England during the Great War, a book called Four Feathers, originally published more than a decade prior, was going through a resurgence in popularity. It told the story of a young military officer who resigned out of fear, and was given a series of white feathers to symbolize his cowardice. The last feather is bestowed by the woman he loves, and is the catalyst he needs to return to battle.
BRITISH FEMALE VOICE 1: 'I do not believe that it is true! You could not look me in the face so steadily if it were true! .. 'three little white feathers and the world's at an end" The officer charged with recruiting British soldiers into the war, Admiral Charles Penrose Fitzgerald, was inspired by the theatrics.He had 30 women hand out white feathers to men in the streets if they were not in uniform.
BRITISH MALE VOICE 1: “Women and Girls of England, you cannot shoulder a rifle, but you can actually serve her in the way she needs most. Give her the men whom she wants… use all the influence you possess to urge him to serve his country.” This stunt, amplified by the press, sparked a movement. Thousands of women across England joined “the order of the White Feather”, shaming men in public for not serving in the war.At first the campaign was celebrated. But then the casualties of war began to hit home.
BRITISH MALE VOICE 4 - He was meeting some mates in the park when a pack of girls saw them. Handing out those damned white feathers. He seemed to take it fine. But a week later he went back to the front. And he never came home.As the death toll rose, and men returned wounded from battle, public opinion began to turn.
BRITISH MALE VOICE 3 I was riding the tram, minding my own, when a girl tried to stick me with the white feather, i rolled up my sleeve, showed her where i lost my hand in the war. stuck it right in her face! That shut her up. But it wasn't the administration who faced the scorn of the public. It was the women of England.
BRITISH MALE VOICE 5 - They’re sending our sons to their deaths, like it’s some kind of game. They must be sick in the head! Even though they were only doing what their own government encouraged them to do.
BRITISH FEMALE VOICE 2 - We went from being beloved on the home front, to being seen as villains. All the anger over the war, it was focused on us.
The White Feather Campaign had all the elements of effective propaganda.It exploited the insecurities of sexual desire that govern man’s behaviors – reaching in deep and touching an evolutionary nerve.It centered on a clear and memorable symbol that could be imbued with significant depth of meaning, a symbol that already contained a high degree of cultural relevance.And it had virality. It was participatory. It gave women a tangible call to action that comes with the high of being swept up by the groundswell of a social movement.Yet the white feather campaign backfired, spectacularly. The image of the warrior is central to a nation’s identity and mythologies. The mistake the white feather campaign made was to put into question a man’s motivation of serviceAre they doing it for the glory of their nation and to serve others? Or are they doing it to avoid feeling sorry for themselves? Or worse — to get laid?It turned being a warrior from a point of national pride to a point of shame. They were right about how powerful sex and the female gaze are as tools for motivating soldiers.They were only wrong about the execution.If you weaponize shame to motivate the individual, you risk undermining the nation’s identity of what it means to fight for your country.
An ocean away, the people of the United States don’t understand the Great War, and they don’t want to be involved. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson runs for re-election on a platform of keeping us out of the fighting in Europe. But by his inauguration, his position changed. The world must be made safe for democracy. It’s peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty. We are but one of the champions of the rights of mankind.Congress formally declares war on Germany, empowering Wilson to deploy American troops abroad.But Wilson still needs to convince the American people.He forms the Committee of Public Information, a team of journalists, intellectuals, and artists, who come together to launch the first, full-scale propaganda effort across all means of mass communication. The themes they invented to beat the drums of war are still reverberating in our ears to this day:
One. Dehumanize the enemy by associating them with animals. [Destroy the mad brute.]
Two. Present the war as a vehicle for freedom, to spread democracy to those without. [Keeping the world safe for democracy.]
Three. Get men to see enlistment as what real men do. [Gee, if I were a man I’d join the Navy!]
Do women see you as brave? Are they proud of you? Do they desire you?
JOSEPH RIZZI: My girl would show me papers carrying cruelties committed by the Huns. She called me a coward, and said that I was ungrateful by not serving for our country. tormented me with the fact that she would never marry me unless I entered the army. She remained deaf to any of my phone calls and would not answer my letters.
These are the words of Joseph Rizzi.In posters. In newspaper headlines. The drum beats louder and louder.
JOSEPH RIZZI: It was worth the going, just to find out that my girl loved me.
In September of 1917, Joseph Rizzi went to war. Before shipping off to France, Rizzi is sent to Camp Doniphan in Oklahoma.On arrival, he walks past heaps of building materials and half-built barracks.The banging of hammers are relentless, echoing through the camp as they scale up for the influx of young men to follow.Each day he stands in long lines at the mess hall, waiting for standard issue Army beans and a scalding metal coffee cup, its broken handle making it impossible to grip. Each night he collapses into a stiff metal cot, one of many lining the walls of the cavernous shed he will call home for the next six months — a luxury compared to what comes next.
War is hell. But camp is a different kind of hell.
The physical and emotional strain. The monotony. The loneliness. This is the reality of what Rizzi signed up for.Though propaganda may have succeeded in getting him here, how will he endure such hardships? And how do we ensure he pulls the trigger when the time comes?This was a concern of the US Army. It tasked a medical doctor and General by the name of Edward Munson to find the answer. His research led to the creation of the Morale Branch, a first of its kind.On its surface, morale branch activities were about what you might expect: sports, games, theater, dance nights with girls bussed in from the nearby towns — all administered through dozens of government and NGO groups.They also distributed media for the troops, such as Trench and Camp, the military newspaper which included gut wrenching accounts of German atrocities, alongside heart wrenching letters of American wives to their husbands.
“My Dearest John, There’s a strain of old-fashion in my nature which seems to demand masculine protection. I’ve always had such protection; first father’s, now yours.”
But the morale branch’s hidden influence was built on a deeper theory of control.General Munson had spent months developing this theory — what motivates a man to be the best warrior he can be? Beyond the training, beyond the fitness, beyond the weapons, what will best prepare his mind for battle? His answer…
You make him horny.
MUNSON - A healthy sex drive can be channeled into productive service.
But, you make sure he can't get off
MUNSON - A sexually satisfied soldier lacks character. Ejaculation is like short circuiting an electric current, thus depriving the engine of its power.
This can be channeled into obedience and aggression, two prime attributes for the perfect warrior. So you surround them with attractive women, such as the staff at the mess hall.
MUNSON - We directed the YMCA to hire college-educated women in their 30s, with a balance of beauty and brains to rebuff any sexual advances.
Or by hosting regular dance nights.
MUNSON - We handpicked the girls and screened them on their moral upbringing before bussing them in.Then make sure there’s no coital betrayal.The building's exits would be locked, ensuring no one could slip out, and risk depleting all that hard earned sexual energy.
The morale branch engineered letter writing campaigns, supported by full page editorials that reached millions, encouraging women to write and remind men of what they were fighting for back home.
AMERICAN GIRL “I know you are out on the front, pressing ahead, steadily, grimly … at night when my eyes are closed I have a vision of you, tall and proud, rushing forward.”
In his memoirs, Rizzi speaks of the power of such motivation.
RIZZI: One night in France, I had a strong desire to enjoy the comradeship of the opposite sex. But I knew military police guarded the entrances to the brothels in the town I was stationed. In my frustration, I took out my mother’s and sweetheart’s pictures to look at. The will to conquer became strong.
The Morale Branches covert edging operation influenced many aspects of Rizzi and his fellow soldiers' experiences at both training camp and abroad. But soon that wasn’t enough — they began exerting control over neighboring towns, then eventually over an entire nation.
Prior to World War I, red light districts were commonplace in American life — dedicated areas where prostitution, gambling, and other vices were contained. At its peak, there were 150 across the U.S.Officials saw them as an unpleasant necessity for urban living, like sewers, or sprawling parking lots. But the Morale Branch saw them as an existential threat to its mission. It did not matter how regimented a soldier's life was within the camps if he could simply go into town, get drunk and hire a prostitute. The growing moral reform movement of America now had an unexpected new ally in the U.S. military. Together they waged a culture war.
TEMPERANCE LEADER - For the first time in our history, men in power are sufficiently interested and sympathetic to furnish legislative authority, money, and moral support for the realization of ideals so long upheld by people with social vision.
MUNSON, TEMPERANCE LEADER - The war and navy departments are a unit in their determination to have a clean army and navy and to use federal authority to wake up those complacent communities which are willing to see both men and women exploited.
The morale branch exerted pressure on neighboring towns to establish dry zones, ban the sale of alcohol to soldiers in uniform, and eradicate their red light districts altogether. As the war hit its peak, even congress got on board. They passed the Chamberlain Khan act of 1918, better known as “The American Plan.” This act granted police, military, and public health officials the authority to arrest women suspected of prostitution. If they tested positive for venereal disease, they would be detained.
MUNSON - But all of our sex offenders are not prostitutes, as that term is generally understood. In some cases she is the daughter of a well-to-do-family. In many cases she is the wife of a man who works at night, or is often away from home. She is usually promiscuous and, therefore, usually diseased.
This broadened definition of sex offender included local girls who had developed “Khaki Fever” a term derived from the uniforms the soldiers wore.
MUNSON - Young girls are flocking to our camp towns, attracted to the khaki. One such girl said that she had never sold herself to a civilian, but felt she was doing her bit when she had been with eight soldiers in a night.
Khaki fever is a direct result of propaganda, framing enlisted men as attractive, and romanticizing soldiers.
GIRL - “I’ll do anything they ask me too! Don’t they face death for us every day?”
MUNSON - These girls must be made to realize the dangers that lie in sexual access to the aviator, who must have a clear eye, a steady hand, and good nerve.
As thousands of women were detained across the country, an internment camp system had to be constructed to house them all.By the end of the war, over 30,000 women were imprisoned simply for the crime of being deemed too promiscuous by the state.
TEMPERANCE LEADER: With the responsibility placed squarely on the public, where it belongs, may we not look forward to the elimination of the grosser forms of vice within our own generation?
By 1920, most red light districts were shut down — 41 states had banned them outright — and the sale of alcohol was prohibited nationally through the ratification of the 18th amendment.The American Plan remained in place through 1952.
The war was over, yet the cultural imprint of the Morale Branch remained. The story of prohibition we are told today is that it was a byproduct of America’s puritanical impulse, driven by wives and mothers. There is no mention of the military's direct involvement. Without the morale branch, would we have had the prohibition chapter of the American story? Would prostitution still be widely legal? Would red light districts still be commonplace? When one advocates for a “return to tradition” sometimes they are advocating for a return to values that never actually existed. A return to beliefs not deeply held by people but engineered by a handful of men as a means of control.
The modern man is a free man. His motivations are less tied to collective goals and more to his own personal desires. So the Great War became a turning point for motivating the warrior. If there’s one organization that knows a powerful weapon when it sees one, it's the United States military. Sex became one of the most prolific and versatile weapons in its arsenal in the century that followed. But the collateral damage is not only borne in the trenches. It impacts everyone. The male ego. The female psyche. The national identity. As these methods become more sophisticated, more obliquely entangled with culture, the blowback intensifies. Growing from hairline fractures through an institution, to social chasms through an entire nation.
This Is Propaganda.