Why Americans will Believe Almost Anything!

[Guest guest]

Why Americans Will Believe Almost Anything

 

THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION:

WHY AMERICANS WILL BELIEVE ALMOST ANYTHING

 

- Tim O'Shea

 

http://www.thedoctorwithin.com/index_fr.html?content=/articles/index.html

 

Aldous Huxley's inspired 1954 essay detailed the vivid,

mind-expanding, multisensory insights of his mescaline adventures.

 

By altering his brain chemistry with natural psychotropics, Huxley

tapped into a rich and fluid world of shimmering, indescribable

beauty and power.

 

With his neurosensory input thus triggered,

Huxley was able to enter that parallel universe described by every

mystic and space captain in recorded history.

 

Whether by hallucination or

epiphany, Huxley sought to remove all controls, all filters, all

cultural conditioning from his perceptions

 

and to confront Nature or

the World or Reality first-hand -

 

in its unpasteurized, unedited,

unretouched, infinite rawness.

 

Those bonds are much harder to break today, half a century

later.

 

We are the most conditioned, programmed beings the world has

ever known.

 

Not only are our thoughts and attitudes continually being

shaped and molded;

 

our very awareness of the whole design seems like

it is being subtly and inexorably erased.

 

The doors of our perception

are carefully and precisely regulated.

 

Who cares, right?

 

It is an exhausting and endless task to keep explaining to

people how most issues of conventional wisdom

 

are scientifically implanted in the public

consciousness by a thousand media clips per

day.

 

In an effort to save time, I would like to provide just a little

background on the handling of information in this country.

 

Once the basic principles are illustrated about how our current

system

of

media control arose historically,

 

the reader might be more apt to

question any given story in today's news.

 

If everybody believes something, it's probably wrong.

 

We call that Conventional Wisdom.

 

In America, conventional wisdom that has mass acceptance is

usually contrived:

 

somebody paid for it.

 

Examples:

 

a.. Pharmaceuticals restore health

b.. Vaccination brings immunity

c.. The cure for cancer is just around the corner

d.. Menopause is a disease condition

e.. When a child is sick, he needs immediate antibiotics

f.. When a child has a fever he needs Tylenol

g.. Hospitals are safe and clean.

h.. America has the best health care in the world.

i.. Americans have the best health in the world.

j.. Milk is a good source of calcium.

k.. You never outgrow your need for milk.

l.. Vitamin C is ascorbic acid.

m.. Aspirin prevents heart attacks.

n.. Heart drugs improve the heart.

o.. Back and neck pain are the only reasons for spinal

adjustment.

p.. No child can get into school without being vaccinated.

q.. The FDA thoroughly tests all drugs before they go on the

market.

r.. Pregnancy is a serious medical condition

s.. Chemotherapy and radiation are effective cures for cancer

t.. When your child is diagnosed with an ear infection,

antibiotics should be given immediately 'just in case'

u.. Ear tubes are for the good of the child.

v.. Estrogen drugs prevent osteoporosis after menopause.

w.. Pediatricians are the most highly trained of al medical

specialists.

x.. The purpose of the health care industry is health.

y.. HIV is the cause of AIDS.

z.. AZT is the cure.

aa.. Without vaccines, infectious diseases will return

ab.. Fluoride in the city water protects your teeth

ac.. Flu shots prevent the flu.

ad.. Vaccines are thoroughly tested before being placed on

the Mandated Schedule.

ae.. Doctors are certain that the benefits of vaccines far

outweigh any possible risks.

af.. There is a terrorist threat of smallpox.

ag.. The NASDAQ is a natural market controlled only by supply

and demand.

ah.. Chronic pain is a natural consequence of aging.

ai.. Soy is your healthiest source of protein.

aj.. Insulin shots cure diabetes.

ak.. After we take out your gall bladder you can eat anything

you want

al.. Allergy medicine will cure allergies.

am.. An airliner can be flown into a 100-storey building and

can cause that building to collapse on its own footprint. Twice.

This is a list of illusions, that have cost billions to conjure

up. Did you ever wonder why most people in this country think

generally the same about most of the above issues? Or why you never

see the President speaking publicly unless he is reading?

 

HOW THIS SET-UP GOT STARTED

 

In their 2001 book Trust Us We're Experts, Stauber and Rampton

pull together some compelling data describing the science of creating

public opinion in America.

 

They trace modern public influence back to

the early part of the last century, highlighting the work of guys

like Edward L. Bernays, the Father of Spin.

 

From his own amazing 1928 chronicle Propaganda, we learn how

Edward L. Bernays took the ideas of his famous uncle Sigmund Freud

himself, and applied them to the emerging science of mass persuasion.

 

 

The only difference was that instead of using these principles to

uncover hidden themes in the human unconscious, the way Freudian

psychology does, Bernays studied these same ideas in order to learn

how to mask agendas and to create illusions that deceive and

misrepresent, for marketing purposes.

 

THE FATHER OF SPIN

 

Edward L. Bernays dominated the PR industry until the 1940s,

and was a significant force for another 40 years after that.

(Tye)

During that time, Bernays took on hundreds of diverse assignments to

create a public perception about some idea or product. A few

examples:

 

As a neophyte with the Committee on Public Information, one of

Bernays' first assignments was to help sell the First World War to

the American public with the idea to " Make the World Safe for

Democracy. " (Ewen)

 

We've seen this phrase in every war and US

military involvement since that time.

 

A few years later, Bernays set up a stunt to popularize the

notion of women smoking cigarettes.

In organizing the 1929 Easter

Parade in New York City, Bernays showed himself as a force to be

reckoned with.

 

He organized the Torches of Liberty Brigade in which

suffragettes marched in the parade smoking cigarettes as a mark of

women's liberation.

 

After that one event, women would be able to feel

secure about destroying their own lungs in public, the same way that

men have always done.

 

Bernays popularized the idea of bacon for breakfast.

 

Not one to turn down a challenge, he set up the liaison between

the tobacco industry and the American Medical Association that lasted

for nearly 50 years.

 

They proved to all and sundry that cigarettes

were beneficial to health. Just look at ads in old issues of Life,

Look, Time or Journal of the American Medical Association from the

40s and 50s in which doctors are recommending this or that brand of

cigarettes as promoting healthful digestion, or whatever.

 

During the next several decades Bernays and his colleagues

evolved the principles by which masses of people could be generally

swayed through messages repeated over and over, hundreds of times per

week.

 

Once the economic power of media became apparent, other

countries of the world rushed to follow our lead. But Bernays

remained the gold standard.

 

He was the source to whom the new PR

leaders across the world would always defer. Even Josef Goebbels,

Hitler's minister of propaganda, closely studied the principles of

Edward Bernays when Goebbels was developing the popular rationale he

would use to convince the Germans that in order to purify their race

they had to kill 6 million of the impure. (Stauber)

 

SMOKE AND MIRRORS

 

As he saw it, Bernay's job was to reframe an issue; to create a

desired image that would put a particular product or concept in a

desirable light.

He never saw himself as a master hoodwinker, but

rather as a beneficent servant of humanity, providing a valuable

service.

Bernays described the public as a 'herd that needed to be

led.' And this herdlike thinking makes people " susceptible to

leadership. "

 

Bernays never deviated from his fundamental axiom to

" control the masses without their knowing it. " The best PR happens

with the people unaware that they are being manipulated.

 

Stauber describes Bernays' rationale like this:

 

" the scientific manipulation of public opinion was necessary

to overcome chaos and conflict in a democratic society. "

-- Trust Us, p 42

 

These early mass persuaders postured themselves as performing a

moral service for humanity in general.

 

Democracy was too good for people; they needed to be told what to

think,

because they were

incapable of rational thought by themselves.

 

Here's a paragraph from

Bernays' Propaganda:

 

" Those who manipulate the unseen mechanism of society

constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of

our country.

 

We are governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed,

our ideas suggested largely by men we have never heard of.

 

This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society

is

organized.

 

Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner

if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. In

almost every act of our lives whether in the sphere of politics or

business in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are

dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand

the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they

who pull the wires that control the public mind. "

 

A tad different from Thomas Jefferson's view on the subject:

 

" I know of no safe depository of the ultimate power of the

society but the people themselves; and if we think them not

enlightened enough to exercise that control with a wholesome

discretion, the remedy is not take it from them, but to inform their

discretion. "

 

Inform their discretion.

 

Bernays believed that only a few

possessed the necessary insight into the Big Picture to be entrusted

with this sacred task.

 

And luckily, he saw himself as one of that

elect.

 

HERE COMES THE MONEY

 

Once the possibilities of applying Freudian psychology to mass

media were glimpsed, Bernays soon had more corporate clients than he

could handle.

 

Global corporations fell all over themselves courting

the new Image Makers. There were dozens of goods and services and

ideas to be sold to a susceptible public. Over the years, these

players have had the money to make their images happen. A few

examples:

 

a.. Philip Morris

b.. Pfizer

 

c.. Union Carbide

 

d.. Allstate

 

e.. Monsanto

 

f.. Eli Lilly

 

g.. tobacco industry

 

h.. Ciba Geigy

 

i.. lead industry

 

j.. Coors

 

k.. DuPont

 

l.. Shell Oil

 

m.. Chlorox

 

n.. Standard Oil

 

o.. Procter & Gamble

 

p.. Boeing

 

q.. Dow Chemical

 

r.. General Motors

 

s.. Goodyear

 

t.. General Mills

 

THE PLAYERS

 

Dozens of PR firms have emerged to answer the demand for spin

control. Among them:

 

a.. Burson-Marsteller

b.. Edelman

c.. Hill & Knowlton

d.. Kamer-Singer

e.. Ketchum

f.. Mongovin, Biscoe, and Duchin

g.. BSMG

h.. Ruder-Finn

 

Though world-famous within the PR industry, these are names we

don't know, and for good reason.

 

The best PR goes unnoticed. For decades they have created the

opinions

that most of us were raised

with, on virtually any issue which has the remotest commercial value,

including:

 

a.. pharmaceutical drugs

b.. vaccines

c.. medicine as a profession

d.. alternative medicine

e.. fluoridation of city water

f.. chlorine

g.. household cleaning products

h.. tobacco

i.. dioxin

j.. global warming

k.. leaded gasoline

l.. cancer research and treatment

m.. pollution of the oceans

n.. forests and lumber

o.. images of celebrities, including damage control

p.. crisis and disaster management

q.. genetically modified foods

r.. aspartame

s.. food additives; processed foods

t.. dental amalgams

u.. autism

 

LESSON #1

 

Bernays learned early on that the most effective way to create

credibility for a product or an image was by " independent

third-party " endorsement.

 

For example, if General Motors were to come

out and say that global warming is a hoax thought up by some liberal

tree-huggers, people would suspect GM's motives, since GM's fortune

is made by selling automobiles.

 

If however some independent research

institute with a very credible sounding name like the Global Climate

Coalition comes out with a scientific report that says global warming

is really a fiction, people begin to get confused and to have doubts

about the original issue.

 

So that's exactly what Bernays did. With a policy inspired by

genius, he set up " more institutes and foundations than Rockefeller

and Carnegie combined. " (Stauber p 45)

 

Quietly financed by the

industries whose products were being evaluated, these " independent "

research agencies would churn out " scientific " studies and press

materials that could create any image their handlers wanted. Such

front groups are given high-sounding names like:

 

a.. Temperature Research Foundation

b.. International Food Information Council

c.. Consumer Alert

d.. The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition

e.. Air Hygiene Foundation

f.. Industrial Health Federation

g.. International Food Information Council

h.. Manhattan Institute

i.. Center for Produce Quality

j.. Tobacco Institute Research Council

k.. Cato Institute

l.. American Council on Science and Health

m.. Global Climate Coalition

n.. Alliance for Better Foods

 

Sound pretty legit don't they?

 

CANNED NEWS RELEASES

 

As Stauber explains, these organizations and hundreds of others

like them are front groups whose sole mission is to advance the image

of the global corporations who fund them, like those listed on page 2

above.

 

This is accomplished in part by an endless stream of 'press

releases' announcing " breakthrough " research to every radio station

and newspaper in the country. (Robbins)

 

Many of these canned reports read like straight news, and indeed are

purposely molded in the news

format.

 

This saves journalists the trouble of researching the

subjects on their own, especially on topics about which they know

very little.

 

Entire sections of the release or in the case of video

news releases, the whole thing can be just lifted intact, with no

editing, given the byline of the reporter or newspaper or TV

station - and voilá! Instant news - copy and paste. Written by

corporate PR firms.

 

Does this really happen? Every single day, since the 1920s when

the idea of the News Release was first invented by Ivy Lee.

 

(Stauber,

p 22) Sometimes as many as half the stories appearing in an issue of

the Wall St. Journal are based solely on such PR press releases..

 

(22) These types of stories are mixed right in with legitimately

researched stories.

 

Unless you have done the research yourself, you

won't be able to tell the difference.

 

So when we see new " research "

being cited, we should always first suspect that the source is

another industry-backed front group. A common tip-off is the word

" breakthrough. "

 

THE LANGUAGE OF SPIN

 

As 1920s spin pioneers like Ivy Lee and Edward Bernays gained

more experience, they began to formulate rules and guidelines for

creating public opinion.

 

They learned quickly that mob psychology

must focus on emotion, not facts.

 

Since the mob is incapable of

rational thought, motivation must be based not on logic but on

presentation. Here are some of the axioms of the new science of PR:

 

a.. technology is a religion unto itself

b.. if people are incapable of rational thought, real

democracy is dangerous

c.. important decisions should be left to experts

d.. when reframing issues, stay away from substance; create

images

e.. never state a clearly demonstrable lie

 

Words are very carefully chosen for their emotional impact.

Here's an example. A front group called the International Food

Information Council handles the public's natural aversion to

genetically modified foods. Trigger words are repeated all through

the text. Now in the case of GM foods, the public is instinctively

afraid of these experimental new creations which have suddenly popped

up on our grocery shelves and which are said to have DNA alterations.

The IFIC wants to reassure the public of the safety of GM foods. So

it avoids words like:

 

a.. Frankenfoods

b.. Hitler

c.. biotech

d.. chemical

e.. DNA

f.. experiments

g.. manipulate

h.. money

i.. safety

j.. scientists

k.. radiation

l.. roulette

m.. gene-splicing

n.. gene gun

o.. random

Instead, good PR for GM foods contains words like:

 

a.. hybrids

b.. natural order

c.. beauty

d.. choice

e.. bounty

f.. cross-breeding

g.. diversity

h.. earth

i.. farmer

j.. organic

k.. wholesome

 

It's basic Freudian/Tony Robbins word association. The fact

that GM foods are not hybrids that have been subjected to the slow

and careful scientific methods of real cross-breeding doesn't really

matter. This is pseudoscience, not science. Form is everything and

substance just a passing myth. (Trevanian)

 

Who do you think funds the International Food Information

Council? Take a wild guess. Right - Monsanto, DuPont, Frito-Lay, Coca

Cola, Nutrasweet - those in a position to make fortunes from GM

foods. (Stauber p 20)

 

CHARACTERISTICS OF GOOD PROPAGANDA

 

As the science of mass control evolved, PR firms developed

further guidelines for effective copy. Here are some of the gems:

 

a.. dehumanize the attacked party by labeling and name

calling

b.. speak in glittering generalities using emotionally

positive words

c.. when covering something up, don't use plain English;

stall for time; distract

d.. get endorsements from celebrities, churches, sports

figures, street people - anyone who has no expertise in the subject

at hand

e.. the 'plain folks' ruse: us billionaires are just like you

f.. when minimizing outrage, don't say anything memorable

g.. when minimizing outrage, point out the benefits of what

just happened

h.. when minimizing outrage, avoid moral issues

 

Keep this list. Start watching for these techniques. Not hard

to find - look at today's paper or tonight's TV news. See what

they're doing; these guys are good!

 

SCIENCE FOR HIRE

 

PR firms have become very sophisticated in the preparation of

news releases. They have learned how to attach the names of famous

scientists to research that those scientists have not even looked at.

(Stauber, p 201) It's a common practice. In this way, the editors of

newspapers and TV news shows are themselves often unaware that an

individual release is a total PR fabrication. Or at least they have

" deniability, " right?

 

Stauber tells the amazing story of how leaded gas came into the

picture. In 1922, General Motors discovered that adding lead to

gasoline gave cars more horsepower. When there was some concern about

safety, GM paid the Bureau of Mines to do some fake " testing " and

publish spurious research that 'proved' that inhalation of lead was

harmless. Enter Charles Kettering.

 

Founder of the world famous Sloan-Kettering Memorial Institute

for medical research, Charles Kettering also happened to be an

executive with General Motors. By some strange coincidence, we soon

have Sloan-Kettering issuing reports stating that lead occurs

naturally in the body and that the body has a way of eliminating low

level exposure. Through its association with The Industrial Hygiene

Foundation and PR giant Hill & Knowlton, Sloane-Kettering opposed all

anti-lead research for years. (Stauber p 92). Without organized

scientific opposition, for the next 60 years more and more gasoline

became leaded, until by the 1970s, 90% or our gasoline was leaded.

 

Finally it became too obvious to hide that lead was a major

carcinogen, which they knew all along, and leaded gas was phased out

in the late 1980s. But during those 60 years, it is estimated that

some 30 million tons of lead were released in vapor form onto

American streets and highways. 30 million tons. (Stauber)

 

That is PR, my friends.

 

JUNK SCIENCE

 

In 1993 a guy named Peter Huber wrote a new book and coined a

new term. The book was Galileo's Revenge and the term was junk

science . Huber's shallow thesis was that real science supports

technology, industry, and progress. Anything else was suddenly junk

science. Not surprisingly, Stauber explains how Huber's book was

supported by the industry-backed Manhattan Institute.

 

Huber's book was generally dismissed not only because it was so

poorly written, but because it failed to realize one fact: true

scientific research begins with no conclusions. Real scientists are

seeking the truth because they do not yet know what the truth is.

 

True scientific method goes like this:

 

1. form a hypothesis

2. make predictions for that hypothesis

3. test the predictions

4. reject or revise the hypothesis based on the research

findings

 

Boston University scientist Dr. David Ozonoff explains that

ideas in science are themselves like " living organisms, that must be

nourished, supported, and cultivated with resources for making them

grow and flourish. " (Stauber p 205) Great ideas that don't get this

financial support because the commercial angles are not immediately

obvious - these ideas wither and die.

 

Another way you can often distinguish real science from phony

is that real science points out flaws in its own research. Phony

science pretends there were no flaws.

 

THE REAL JUNK SCIENCE

 

Contrast this with modern PR and its constant pretensions to

sound science. Corporate sponsored research, whether it's in the area

of drugs, GM foods, or chemistry begins with predetermined

conclusions. It is the job of the scientists then to prove that these

conclusions are true, because of the economic upside that proof will

bring to the industries paying for that research. This invidious

approach to science has shifted the entire focus of research in

America during the past 50 years, as any true scientist is likely to

admit. If a drug company is spending 10 million dollars on a research

project to prove the viability of some new drug, and the preliminary

results start coming back about the dangers of that drug, what

happens? Right. No more funding. The well dries up. What is being

promoted under such a system? Science? Or rather Entrenched Medical

Error? "

 

Stauber documents the increasing amount of corporate

sponsorship of university research. (206) This has nothing to do with

the pursuit of knowledge. Scientists lament that research has become

just another commodity, something bought and sold. (Crossen)

 

THE TWO MAIN TARGETS OF " SOUND SCIENCE "

 

It is shocking when Stauber shows how the vast majority of

corporate PR today opposes any research that seeks to protect

 

a.. public health

b.. the environment

 

It's a funny thing that most of the time when we see the phrase

" junk science, " it is in a context of defending something that

threatens either the environment or our health. This makes sense when

one realizes that money changes hands only by selling the illusion of

health and the illusion of environmental protection or the illusion

of health. True public health and real preservation of the earth's

environment have very low market value.

 

Stauber thinks it ironic that industry's self-proclaimed

debunkers of junk science are usually non-scientists themselves.

(255) Here again they can do this because the issue is not science,

but the creation of images.

 

THE LANGUAGE OF ATTACK

 

When PR firms attack legitimate environmental groups and

alternative medicine people, they again use special words which will

carry an emotional punch:

 

a.. outraged

b.. sound science

c.. junk science

d.. sensible

e.. scaremongering

f.. responsible

g.. phobia

h.. hoax

i.. alarmist

j.. hysteria

 

The next time you are reading a newspaper article about an

environmental or health issue, note how the author shows bias by

using the above terms. This is the result of very specialized

training.

 

Another standard PR tactic is to use the rhetoric of the

environmentalists themselves to defend a dangerous and untested

product that poses an actual threat to the environment. This we see

constantly in the PR smokescreen that surrounds genetically modified

foods.

 

They talk about how GM foods are necessary to grow more food

and to end world hunger, when the reality is that GM foods actually

have lower yields per acre than natural crops.

 

(Stauber p 173) The

grand design sort of comes into focus once you realize that almost

all GM foods have been created by the sellers of herbicides and

pesticides so that those plants can withstand greater amounts of

herbicides and pesticides. (see The Magic Bean)

 

THE MIRAGE OF PEER REVIEW

 

Publish or perish is the classic dilemma of every research

scientist. That means whoever expects funding for the next research

project had better get the current research paper published in the

best scientific journals.

 

And we all know that the best scientific

journals, like JAMA, New England Journal, British Medical Journal,

etc. are peer-reviewed.

 

Peer review means that any articles which

actually get published, between all those full color drug ads and

pharmaceutical centerfolds, have been reviewed and accepted by some

really smart guys with a lot of credentials. The assumption is, if

the article made it past peer review, the data and the conclusions of

the research study have been thoroughly checked out and bear some

resemblance to physical reality.

 

But there are a few problems with this hot little set up. First

off, money

..

 

Even though prestigious venerable medical journals pretend to

be so objective and scientific and incorruptible, the reality is that

they face the same type of being called to account that all glossy

magazines must confront: don't antagonize your advertisers.

 

Those

full-page drug ads in the best journals cost millions, Jack. How long

will a pharmaceutical company pay for ad space in a magazine that

prints some very sound scientific research paper that attacks the

safety of the drug in the centerfold?

 

Think about it. The editors may

lack moral fibre, but they aren't stupid.

 

Another problem is the conflict of interest thing. There's a

formal requirement for all medical journals that any financial ties

between an author and a product manufacturer be disclosed in the

article. In practice, it never happens. A study done in 1997 of 142

medical journals did not find even one such disclosure. (Wall St.

Journal, 2 Feb 99)

 

A 1998 study from the New England Journal of Medicine found

that 96% of peer reviewed articles had financial ties to the drug

they were studying. (Stelfox, 1998) Big shock, huh? Any disclosures?

Yeah, right. This study should be pointed out whenever somebody

starts getting too pompous about the objectivity of peer review, like

they often do.

 

Then there's the outright purchase of space. A drug company may

simply pay $100,000 to a journal to have a favorable article printed.

(Stauber, p 204)

 

Fraud in peer review journals is nothing new. In 1987, the New

England Journal ran an article that followed the research of R.

Slutsky MD over a seven year period. During that time, Dr. Slutsky

had published 137 articles in a number of peer-reviewed journals.

NEJM found that in at least 60 of these 137, there was evidence of

major scientific fraud and misrepresentation, including:

 

a.. reporting data for experiments that were never done

b.. reporting measurements that were never made

c.. reporting statistical analyses that were never done

d.. o Engler

 

Dean Black PhD, describes what he the calls the Babel Effect

that results when this very common and frequently undetected

scientific fraud in peer-reviewed journals is quoted by other

researchers, who are in turn re-quoted by still others, and so on.

 

Want to see something that sort of re-frames this whole

discussion? Check out the McDonald's ads which routinely appear in

the Journal of the American Medical Association. Then keep in mind

that this is the same publication that for almost 50 years ran

cigarette ads proclaiming the health benefits of tobacco. (Robbins)

 

Very scientific, oh yes.

 

KILL YOUR TV?

 

Hope this chapter has given you a hint to start reading

newspaper and magazine articles a little differently, and perhaps

start watching TV news shows with a slightly different attitude than

you had before.

 

Always ask, what are they selling here, and who's

selling it?

 

And if you actually follow up on Stauber & Rampton's book

and check out some of the other resources below, you might even

glimpse the possibility of advancing your life one quantum simply by

ceasing to subject your brain to mass media.

 

That's right - no more

newspapers, no more TV news, no more Time magazine or People magazine

Newsweek. You could actually do that. Just think what you could do

with the extra time alone.

 

Really feel like you need to " relax " or find out " what's going

on in the world " for a few hours every day? Think about the news of

the past couple of years for a minute. Do you really suppose the

major stories that have dominated headlines and TV news have been

" what is going on in the world? "

 

Do you actually think there's been nothing going on besides the

contrived tech slump, the contrived

power shortages, the re-filtered accounts of foreign violence and

disaster, even the new accounts of US retribution in the Middle East,

making Afghanistan safe for democracy, bending Saddam to our will,

etc., and all the other non-stories that the puppeteers dangle before

us every day?

 

What about when they get a big one, like with OJ or

Monica Lewinsky or the Oklahoma city bombing? Or now with the

Neo-Nazi aftermath of 9/11. Do

we really need to know all that detail, day after day?

 

Do we have any

way of verifying all that detail, even if we wanted to?

 

What is the purpose of news? To inform the public? Hardly.

 

The sole purpose of news is to keep the public in a state of

fear and uncertainty so that they'll watch again tomorrow to see how

much worse

things got and to be subjected to the same advertising.

 

Oversimplification? Of course. That's the mark of mass media

mastery - simplicity. The invisible hand. Like Edward Bernays said,

the people must be controlled without them knowing it.

 

Consider this: what was really going on in the world all that

time they were distracting us with all that stupid vexatious daily

smokescreen?

 

We have no way of knowing. And most of it doesn't even

concern us even if we could know it. Fear and uncertainty -- that's

what keeps people coming back for more.

 

If this seems like a radical outlook, let's take it one step

further:

 

What would you lose from your life if you stopped watching TV

and stopped reading newspapers and glossy magazines altogether?

 

Whoa!

 

Would your life really suffer any financial, moral,

intellectual, spiritual, or academic loss from such a decision?

 

Do you really need to have your family continually absorbing

the illiterate, amoral, phony, culturally bereft, desperately

brainless values of the people featured in the average nightly TV

program?

 

Are these fake, programmed robots " normal " ?

 

Do you need to have your life values constantly spoonfed to

you?

 

Are those shows really amusing, or just a necessary distraction

to keep you from looking at reality, or trying to figure things out

yourself by doing a little independent reading? Or perhaps from

having a life?

 

Name one example of how your life is improved by watching TV

news and reading the evening paper or the glossy magazines.

 

What measurable gain is there for you?

 

What else could we be doing with all this freed-up time that

would actually expand awareness?

 

PLANET OF THE APES?

 

There's no question that as a nation, we're getting dumber year

by year. Look at the presidents we've been choosing lately. Ever

notice the blatant grammar mistakes so ubiquitous in today's

advertising and billboards?

 

Literacy is marginal in most American

secondary schools. Three-fourths of California high school seniors

can't read well enough to pass their exit exams. ( SJ Mercury 20 Jul

01)

 

If you think other parts of the country are smarter, try this

one: hand any high school senior a book by Dumas or Jane Austen, and

ask them to open to any random page and just read one paragraph out

loud. Go ahead, do it.

 

SAT scales are arbitrarily shifted lower and

lower to disguise how dumb kids are getting year by year.

 

(ADD: A Designer Disease) At least 10% have documented " learning

disabilities, " which are reinforced and rewarded by special treatment

and special drugs.

 

Ever hear of anyone failing a grade any more?

 

Or observe the intellectual level of the average movie which

these days may only last one or two weeks in the theatres, especially

if it has insufficient explosions, chase scenes, silicone, fake

martial arts, and cretinesque dialogue.

 

Doesn't anyone else notice how badly these 30 or 40 " movie stars " we

keep seeing over and over

in the same few plots must now overact to get their point across to

an ever-dimming audience?

 

Radio? Consider the low mental qualifications of the falsely

animated corporate simians they hire as DJs --

 

seems like they're only allowed to have 50 thoughts, which they just

repeat at random.

 

 

And at what point did popular music cease to require the study of any

musical instrument or theory whatsoever, not to mention lyric?

Perhaps we just don't understand this emerging art form, right?

 

The Darwinism of MTV - apes descended from man.

 

Ever notice how most articles in any of the glossy magazines

sound like they were all written by the same guy? And this writer

just graduated from junior college?

 

And yet he has all the correct

opinions on social issues, no original ideas, and that shallow, smug,

homogenized corporate omniscience, which enables him to assure us

that everything is fine...

 

All this is great news for the PR industry - makes their job

that much easier.

 

Not only are very few paying attention to the

process of conditioning; fewer are capable of understanding it even

if somebody explained it to them.

 

TEA IN THE CAFETERIA

 

Let's say you're in a crowded cafeteria, and you buy a cup of

tea. And as you're about to sit down you see your friend way across

the room. So you put the tea down and walk across the room and talk

to your friend for a few minutes. Now, coming back to your tea, are

you just going to pick it up and drink it? Remember, this is a

crowded place and you've just left your tea unattended for several

minutes. You've given anybody in that room access to your tea.

 

Why should your mind be any different?

 

Turning on the TV, or

uncritically absorbing mass publications every day - these activities

allow access to our minds by

 

" just anyone " -

 

anyone who has an agenda, anyone with the resources to create a

public image via popular media.

 

As we've seen above, just because we read something or

see something on TV doesn't mean it's true or worth knowing. So the

idea here is, like the tea, perhaps the mind is also worth guarding,

worth limiting access to it.

 

This is the only life we get. Time is our total capital.

 

Why waste it allowing our potential, our scope of awareness, our

personality, our values to be shaped, crafted, and boxed up according

to the whims of the mass panderers?

 

There are many important issues

that are crucial to our physical,

 

mental, and spiritual well-being

which require time and study.

 

If it's an issue where money is

involved, objective data won't be so easy to obtain.

 

Remember, if everybody knows something, that image

 

has been bought and paid for.

 

Real knowledge takes a little effort, a little excavation down

at least one level below what " everybody knows. "

_________________

 

JoAnn Guest

mrsjoguest

DietaryTipsForHBP

http://www.geocities.com/mrsjoguest

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The complete " Whole Body " Health line consists of the " AIM GARDEN TRIO "

Ask About Health Professional Support Series: AIM Barleygreen

 

" Wisdom of the Past, Food of the Future "

 

http://www.geocities.com/mrsjoguest/AIM.html

 

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" JoAnn Guest " <angelprincessjo

 

WHY AMERICANS WILL BELIEVE ALMOST ANYTHING

__

Americans will believe almost anything, because they're people, not because

they're Americans. Americans, like every other nation and group in the

world (in fact, you can find every other group in the world, in the USA),

believe almost anything, if they are only permitted to hear one side of a

story. In every area where Americans, or anyone else, are found to believe

something which is, at bottom, a lie, a gross exaggeration, or some kind of

distortion of the truth, you'll find that this distortion was the only

information they received. If you give the people a balanced view of any

situation, the gullibleness disappears. But corporate America knows how to

keep whatever limits their profits, hidden from the people.

JP