Phony Bureaucracy

Candidate for Deletion 🗑️

This page is a candidate for deletion.
Remember to check what links here and the page history before deletion.
Reason: 'Phony Bureaucracy' primarily describes a recurring trope or thematic element in media, particularly horror, rather than a distinct visual or cultural aesthetic. While it identifies specific visual cues (e.g., official-looking documents, distorted broadcasts), these are representational of a narrative device or mood rather than defining a visual style. The concept significantly overlaps with and is better understood as a component within aesthetics like Analog Horror and Cryptidcore, making a standalone page redundant and unnecessary for this wiki.

Phony Bureaucracy is a term used to describe the aesthetic of unsettling but ultimately phony bureaucratic and informational media. These can include posters, videos, broadcasts, letters, or any other forms of media that follow the aesthetics of official (often government) propaganda, except that they are sinister in tone, ominously describing nightmarish or unworldly events. Many aesthetics, such as Analog Horror and Cryptidcore, contain elements of Phony Bureaucracy as a way of worldbuilding or reinforcing a feeling of "wrongness," but this specific aesthetic can also be found in more humorous contexts, such as the 2011 puzzle-platform Portal 2. There is also some overlap with work from online creators such as Alan Wagner (although not all of his work should be considered Phony Bureaucracy).

The effectiveness of this technique may come from the familiar authority and coldness of authoritative media being juxtaposed with a sinister or threatening scenario. Arguably, the most effective examples of this aesthetic are pieces of media that could be mistaken as real. Fear of emergency alert systems in general may contribute to this feeling of unease.