---
title: Telling a Friend May Mean Telling the Enemy
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/uk-telling-a-friend-may-mean-telling-the-enemy-1939/
description: 'Four painted head-pairs in a red and cream chequerboard: a sailor and a woman, two women whispering, then the same dark-haired woman and a man with a sly'
section: Collection
---

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3. Telling a Friend May Mean Telling the Enemy

[![Telling a Friend May Mean Telling the Enemy, 1939 UK poster: Four painted head-pairs in a red and cream chequerboard](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/uk-telling-a-friend-may-mean-telling-the-enemy-1939.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/uk-telling-a-friend-may-mean-telling-the-enemy-1939.jpg)

# Telling a Friend May Mean Telling the Enemy

Four painted head-pairs in a red and cream chequerboard: a sailor and a woman, two women whispering, then the same dark-haired woman and a man with a sly look, spelling out the slogan. The tell for fear-appeal is the switch from a trusted friend to a smiling listener, so that an ordinary conversation is framed as a leak to the enemy.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
TELLING
a friend may
mean telling
THE ENEMY

[cap tally:] H.M.S.

Printed for H.M. Stationery Office by J. Weiner Ltd., London, W.C.1. [job number illegible]
```

[← The Telephonist: Be brief, a war call may be waiting](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/uk-telephonist-be-brief-war-call-1939/) [Thank You, says the soldier: Caring for Evacuees is a National Service →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/uk-thank-you-says-the-soldier-evacuees-1939/)

## More propaganda examples that use the same techniques

- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
- [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/) (Dutch Republic · 1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Engraving of a hanged, bare-breasted Taino woman, burning huts and people being killed by Spanish soldiers.
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Kingdom of Great Britain · Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Proclamation de Sonthonax en créole, Cap-Français (Proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax in Creole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sonthonax-proclamation-creole-1793/) (France · Aug 29, 1793 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating). Content note: Colonial-era proclamation on slavery and emancipation in Saint-Domingue; speaks of slaves, whips and 'Nègues' in period terms.
- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
- [Brolej Žemajčiaj! (Brothers Samogitians!): hand-painted broken-cross poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/brolej-zemajciaj-broken-cross-1862/) (Russian Empire · 1862 · Fear appeal, Transfer)