Calling something a psyop is just a meme. But it is true that everybody has a perspective they want to promote. People have the ability to think and speak more or less objectively to differing levels, but people don’t tend to say things unless the want other people to think those things are true. If somebody makes a claim that is substantially different from your own experience of reality, it’s perfectly reasonable to ask yourself why does that person want me or others to think that that is true?
I can also create a roughly accurate flow chart to demonstrate this: “does this person want me to believe something that aligns with their own agenda/perspective/goals?” -> “yes”.
Use of the word is a meme. But any use of information to try and influence what other people think is basically what a psyop is, and everybody does that all the time. People only tend to call things a psyop if they think the motives are especially sinister, but that's just a pointless distraction imo, as you can never know what somebody's motives truly are. Every statement the government makes is a psyop, or an act of information warfare. Same for journalists, or social commentators, or HN commentators, or anybody else...
I can also create a roughly accurate flow chart to demonstrate this: “does this person want me to believe something that aligns with their own agenda/perspective/goals?” -> “yes”.