---
title: Watch yourself pal! Be careful what you say or write!
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/watch-yourself-pal-1945/
description: Security poster with a photograph of a large guard dog with a chain collar, whose speech balloon says 'Watch yourself pal!'.
section: Collection
---

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3. Watch yourself pal! Be careful what you say or write!

[![Watch yourself pal! Be careful what you say or write!, 1945 US poster: Security poster with a photograph of a large guard dog](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/watch-yourself-pal-1945.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/watch-yourself-pal-1945.jpg)

# Watch yourself pal! Be careful what you say or write!

Security poster with a photograph of a large guard dog with a chain collar, whose speech balloon says 'Watch yourself pal!'. The banner below reads 'Be careful what you say or write!'. The technique is faint: the dog's wary look implies a warning, a mild fear-appeal that readers are being watched.

## 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

```
Watch
YOURSELF
PAL!
BE careful WHAT YOU SAY OR WRITE!
[imprint:] WD Poster No. 32-3, "Pal" Security Poster. Additional copies may be requisitioned as prescribed in AR 310-200, 1 May 1943, as changed by Changes No. 2, 15 September 1945
[imprint:] U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE : 1945-O-625023
[imprint:] DISTRIBUTION: AAF (2); AGF (2); ASF (2); T of Opns (2); Def Comd (2); Sv C (Dir of Intell and Sec) (5); PC&S (2); PE (Intell Off) (2); A (2); CHQ (2); D (1); B (1); R (1); Bn (1); C (1); AF (1); W (1); G (1); S (1); F (1)
```

[← Victory Loan: Buy your extra bonds here](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/victory-loan-buy-your-extra-bonds-here-1945/) [Women... our wounded need your care! Join a hospital company →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/women-our-wounded-need-your-care-wac-1945/)

## 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)