Fear mongering (or scaremongering or scare tactics) is the use of fear to influence the opinions and actions of others towards some specific end. The feared object or subject is sometimes exaggerated, and the pattern of fear mongering is usually one of repetition, in order to continuously reinforce the intended effects of this tactic, sometimes in the form of a vicious circle.
Famous quotes containing the word fear:
“At bottom there is in Joyce a profound hatred for humanity—the scholar’s hatred. One realizes that he has the neurotic’s fear of entering the living world, the world of men and women in which he is powerless to function. He is in revolt not against institutions, but against mankind.... Ulysses is like a vomit spilled by a delicate child whose stomach has been overloaded with sweetmeats.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)