It is called propaganda because it is advertising which is paid and sponsored by the state. Also propaganda does not try to encourage the sale of a product, service or idea. Propaganda is not bad per see (like in this case - it is actually very nice).

And also this is not "Santa" - it is Дед Мороз (father frost).

If you want to think of propaganda in terms of advertising, it's sort of judgement advertising. Doesn't really matter who pays for it. The purpose is to not let people make their own judgements on certain things. While the purpose of advertising products is to inform public about existence of products. Using propaganda in advertisement is usually illegal too.

>the purpose of advertising products is to inform public about existence of products.

Really? It's not like any of us don't know of the existence of Coca-Cola; I think that the vast majority of advertising we encounter on a daily basis is for products we know about already (even though this is probably less true now than it was towards the beginning of my life.)

> Using propaganda in advertisement is usually illegal too.

citation?

Grandfather Frost, to be pedantic.

Even in Soviet Union no one would bother to print post cards that no one will buy. So these are of popular demand at that time.

That could also be explained by there not really being many other options. I don't think too many people really wanted to send postcards with Lenins and red flags for holidays, but if this is all you have, you'll buy that.

By a similar token, Brezhnev's "memoirs" (Малая Земля etc.) were published in millions, but I have never heard of anyone who wanted to buy, let alone read them.

Propaganda is Advertising in the erstwhile Eastern bloc and the Axis powers when thry existed. In other words our advertising is their propaganda.

I think that a value on a sliding scale 1..10 is determined by the extent to which the package being sold has ideological/political content.

1. For good time call ....

10. War bonds: https://library.ucsd.edu/dc/object/bb25605696/_2.jpg

Disagree. Advertising tries to sell you something. Propaganda doesn't try to get you to buy things, it tries to force you to think/feel certain ways. They're similar media in a lot of ways but very different in thier purpose and outcome.

The father of "public relations", Edward Bernays, basically said as much.

> The entire aesthetic

Do you have any other examples matching such an aesthetic? I quite like it too.

Here is collection of Soviet post cards for International Women's Day celebrated in USSR as Mother's day.

https://kulturologia.ru/blogs/080315/23587/ https://swalker.org/other/1342-sovetskie-otkrytki-na-8-marta...

You probably meant "celebrated in lieu of Mothers' Day" -- March 8th has always been advertised, as it were, as "women's holiday" in USSR, there were no Mothers' (or Fathers') day per se.

Internally this was precisely Mother's day. As 23rd of February, "defender of the Fatherland Day" was Father's day as all us, men, were liable for military service.

I am for example Lieutenant-reserve of USSR's Strategic Rocket Forces ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Missile_Troops )

I got out of serving by going to a college with Военная кафедра [0], but I think we're saying pretty much the same thing -- USA and rest (or most, anyway) of the Western world has non-political Motrher's and Fatrher's day, completely separate from the International Women's Day (let alone Defender of the Fatherland day, which is obviously USSR-specific), while back in the USSR we had a generic women's/men's holidays tacked onto March 8th and Feb. 23rd respectively.

I don't remember them ever being even positioned as specifically Mother's/Father's day; I am sure that you have also given gifts to your female classmates even in elementary school on March 8th, and received some on Feb. 23rd, even though becoming a parent while in school was an extremely rare occurrence.

[0] For the benefit of those who did not have to deal with it, something similar to ROTC in the US, but available only in some colleges/universities, and mandatory in those where it were available. Instead of being drafted for 2/3 years upon hitting the draft age, you'd receive training there, spend some reasonably short time in the armed forces, and get a reserve officer's rank.