The Petrol Price Propaganda Machine

Today, I viewed more than 70 different accounts on X tell people, in nearly identical words, why they should put expensive petrol “in perspective”.

They were not simply sharing an original post. They were publishing versions of the same lengthy text as though the observations, comparisons, and jokes had come from themselves. Different accounts but the same argument, down to the punchlines.

Are these bots amplifying a message? If so, who is paying them? Those questions deserve answers. What I witnessed establishes the repeated publication of a common script. Whether it was automated, paid for or centrally directed remains to be established. But we can already examine what that script is asking people to swallow.

The posts concern American petrol prices, using US dollars and gallons. They begin by acknowledging complaints about gasoline costing more than $4 a gallon, then invite the reader to reconsider. A gallon can propel a heavy car almost 30 miles, carrying its driver, groceries, and assorted belongings. Viewed that way, the message suggests, the price is rather impressive.

Then comes the shopping list. Wine costs much more per gallon. So does coffee. Bottled water, energy drinks, maple syrup, and vanilla extract follow. Some versions finish with a joke about expensive printer ink. The implied instruction is unmistakable: stop getting so worked up about the price at the pump. Look at all these other liquids that cost more.

Dominic Michael Tripi drew attention to the repetition by publishing screenshots of four accounts running versions of the text. His verdict was blunt: “Damage control talking points have been issued.”

Writer Igor Chudov replied with one word, “Also:”, and two more examples. These were posts from accounts named Michael Richardson and Tom Hoffman, again reproducing substantially the same argument.

The text was appearing under still more names, dressed up as personal commentary.

My own observation of more than 70 accounts takes that question well beyond the handful captured in those screenshots. How does a lengthy passage, complete with the same sequence of products and the same jokes, acquire so many apparently independent authors?

A repost allows you to see that someone is passing along another person’s words. Publishing those words under your own name, without identifying their source, gives a different impression, and that impression is that bots are spreading propaganda.

What's worse is that the propaganda is a form of "let them eat cake," suggesting that struggling households need to change their attitude towards an essential expense. The argument itself falls apart the moment it encounters an ordinary working week.

Nobody needs a tankful of vanilla extract to get to work. A tradesman cannot leave his tools at home and commute on printer ink. A parent cannot explain to the petrol pump that the school run ought to be cheaper because they have stopped buying takeaway coffee.

People buy these products in different quantities, for different purposes, with radically different degrees of choice. Comparing them by the gallon supplies a punchline while evading the household budget. A family can abandon restaurant wine altogether. It may have very little room to reduce the fuel required for employment, school, shopping and caring for relatives.

Nor does the usefulness of petrol settle whether its price is affordable. Something can be extraordinarily useful and still become an expense that breaks a household. Indeed, its necessity is precisely why price increases hurt.

For Australians watching this American discussion, the tactic should be immediately recognisable. The person complaining about an essential cost is invited to regard the problem as a failure of perspective. The bill stays the same. The complainant is expected to improve.

Meanwhile, another post raises a much more serious question about the fuel market. Alexander Stahel published a chart of global seaborne diesel and gasoil exports, comparing weekly volumes across several years.  The 2026 line repeatedly sits below the previous five-year range, but by September, the chart absolutely bottoms out.

Diesel keeps trucks, tractors, and heavy equipment working. Pressure on its availability reaches far beyond motorists, into the movement of food, the operation of farms, and the cost of supplying businesses. That's the reality, and it is alarming and cannot be swept away with stupid comparisons.

There is also a political danger in teaching people to accept deteriorating conditions as a problem with their own expectations. Once hardship is normalised, demands for accountability become easier to dismiss. People asking why essential goods are becoming unaffordable can be waved away as unreasonable. People questioning restrictions can be told they still do not appreciate the emergency.

A shortage does not entitle the government to control ordinary journeys. An expensive tank of petrol does not become affordable just because someone has calculated the per-gallon price of a latte.

The public deserves answers about supply, cost, and responsibility. It also deserves to know when apparently personal commentary is copied from a common source.

More than 70 accounts repeating the same script should prompt scrutiny, especially when the script tells the public to take rising costs on the chin. Are we watching bots? Organised political propaganda? Who wrote the original, how did it spread, and did money change hands? The accounts publishing it could begin by explaining where they got it.

Until then, there is no reason to mistake a chorus of copied words for independent public judgement. And no reason for a working family to apologise for wanting fuel it can afford.

“Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.”
– Edward Bernays