--- title: '"Der RIAS merk''s dir armer Tropf": anti-RIAS display-case panel, Leipzig' url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gdr-rias-display-panel-leipzig-1952/ description: 'A painted panel in a shop-style display case: a seated man in a checked suit has a plank hammered onto his head by a sleeve marked with a dollar sign…' section: Collection --- [Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/) [!["Der RIAS merk's dir armer Tropf": anti-RIAS display-case panel, Leipzig](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/gdr-rias-display-panel-leipzig-1952.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/gdr-rias-display-panel-leipzig-1952.jpg) # "Der RIAS merk's dir armer Tropf": anti-RIAS display-case panel, Leipzig A painted panel in a shop-style display case: a seated man in a checked suit has a plank hammered onto his head by a sleeve marked with a dollar sign, next to sacks of flour. The verse calls him a 'poor fool', says the broadcaster RIAS will nail a board before his head, and tells viewers never to tune in again. The dollar sleeve pastes a stigma onto the station. - **Date:** 1952 - **Period:** [Cold War](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=cold-war) - **Made by:** Exhibitor not named in the record; display case photographed in Leipzig by Roger and Renate Rössing (Deutsche Fotothek) - **Region:** [Western and Central Europe](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=western-central-europe) - **Country:** [East Germany](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=east-germany) - **Medium:** [Poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=poster) - **Issuer type:** [Mixed](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=mixed) - **Regime:** [German Democratic Republic](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=german-democratic-republic) - **Leader:** [Walter Ulbricht](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=walter-ulbricht) - **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public) - **Purpose:** [Mobilize or secure compliance](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=mobilize-comply) - **Theme:** [Media and information](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=media-information) - **Event:** [Cold War](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=cold-war) - **Techniques:** [Name-calling](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/name-calling/) [Transfer](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/transfer/) - **Source:** Unidentified Source blurred: contractors, cutouts, buried disclosure - **Source:** [Deutsche Fotothek (SLUB Dresden), df_roe-neg_0006349_025, via Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fotothek_df_roe-neg_0006349_025_Schaukasten_mit_Propaganda_gegen_den_Rundfunksen.jpg), retrieved September 29, 2026 - **Rights:** CC BY-SA 3.0 DE (Deutsche Fotothek release on Wikimedia Commons; file page states the licence) Deutsche Fotothek / Roger und Renate Rössing, df_roe-neg_0006349_025 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 DE ## Text on the object Original (German) · read from the image, not independently checked ``` Der RIAS merk's dir armer Tropf, schlägt dir ein großes Brett vor'n Kopf. So sag' auch du ab heute NEIN! Und stelle nie mehr RIAS ein! [sacks at left: 'Mehl' and one further partly illegible word] ``` English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader) ``` RIAS, note it, poor fool, knocks a big board in front of your head. So you too, from today, say NO! And never tune in RIAS again! [sacks at left: 'flour' and one further partly illegible word] ``` Read from the committed image; 'stelle ... ein' is the radio idiom 'einstellen' (to tune in), translated literally as 'tune in'. [← Freedom-Gram: Help Truth Fight Communism](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/freedom-gram-1952/) [Les communistes pris en flagrant délit de mensonge (The Communists Caught in the Act of Lying) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/communists-caught-lying-1952/) ## Using the same techniques - [Passional Christi und Antichristi: the emperor kisses the pope's foot (leaf 'Antichristus')](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passional-christi-antichristi-emperor-kisses-pope-1521/) (1521 · Name-calling, Card stacking) - [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling) - [Ondersoeckt de Geesten, ofse van den Duyvel syn, of niet (the De Witt brothers as devils)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/ondersoeckt-de-geesten-de-witt-devils-1672/) (1672 · Scapegoating, Name-calling) - [The Highlanders Medley, or The Duke Triumphant (A Loyal Song)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/highlanders-medley-duke-triumphant-1746/) (1746 · Name-calling, Transfer) - [The Bloody Massacre perpetrated in King Street Boston on March 5th 1770 by a party of the 29th Regt.](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/revere-bloody-massacre-king-street-1770/) (Mar 1770 · Name-calling, Card stacking) - [Marche du Dom Quichotte moderne pour la deffence du Moulin des Abus (March of the Modern Don Quixote in Defence of the Mill of Abuses)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dom-quichotte-moulin-des-abus-1791/) (1791 · Name-calling, Transfer) - [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling) - [Exit Liberté a la Francois! or Buonaparte closing the Farce of Egalité, at St. Cloud (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/exit-liberte-buonaparte-gillray-1799/) (Nov 21, 1799 · Name-calling)