'Actually dangerous’: Samantha Bee’s denunciation of PragerU shows liberals still don’t get the allure of the forbidden

Liberal comedian Samantha Bee has said she fears YouTube powerhouse PragerU is brainwashing kids by disguising right-wing propaganda as educational content – but her fear is the best endorsement the outlet could hope for.

Calling the popular conservative channel “actually dangerous,” Bee warned it was “trick[ing] kids into thinking their videos are educational” in a tweet posted on Wednesday night. The post was a teaser for an entire segment about PragerU on her show ‘Full Frontal’, in which she warned that the channel was netting “billions of views” from “middle and high school children” who were unwittingly being programmed with right-wing dogma.

While many parents might be surprised to hear their children are deliberately seeking out educational programming – even if it turns out to be conservative propaganda in disguise – Bee repeated well-worn talking points to scare her audience, remarking on the “veneer of respectability” PragerU’s rotating cast of D-list celebrities were placing over reactionary ideas like “Planned Parenthood wants to abort as many babies as possible.”

PragerU didn’t seem too broken up about Bee’s critique, retweeting her video on its own account. Run by conservative radio host Dennis Prager, PragerU has indeed racked up billions of views by meting out bite-sized morsels of conservative doctrine to the all-important younger audience, but the liberal establishment, rather than attempt to compete with their own politicized internet-age version of ‘Schoolhouse Rock’, have thus far merely raged at the existing model.

Bee’s supporters came out in force to lay the smackdown on PragerU. The deep-pocketed outlet was brainwashing young kids with racist, sexist propaganda, they said.

Conservatives hit back, insisting the pseudo-educational channel only “shows and explains facts exactly how they are, whether we like it or not.”

Several managed to cut through the partisan bickering to the heart of the matter: if the material PragerU broadcast wasn’t routinely shut out of the mainstream, it would quickly lose its allure.

Until then, the best publicity PragerU could hope for is that an establishment-approved, liberal-centrist comedian like Bee should pillory them on her show. The channel attracted national attention when it called out Facebook and YouTube for suppressing their content.

If you like this story, share it with a friend!