This past Thor's day, I watched a North Korean propaganda video (see here.) Similar to other videos leaked from behind the bamboo curtain, this one was crudely cut together from pirated media; it featured a man explaining the ills of capitalism (his face was blurred out) and the methods by which our Western society keeps us numbed and tuned out to the world around us. I consider myself to be a forward-thinking individual who works hard to counter the incessant lure of materialism, who educates himself through non-US news sources (such as RT.com and AlAribiya.com), who does more than most other people he knows to eat well and avoid processed foods, and who does his part to combat terrorism and protect our natural environment by not driving a car but rather moving himself around on a bicycle. The video referenced above, however – even though it was a low-budget hodgepodge originating in a place the government of the United States says we must fear and mistrust, it made a lot of sense to me; upon watching it, I knew that in my efforts I was falling short, that I was just as much a puppet of this country's capitalistic overlords as my fellow Americans who engage in constant and shameless consumerism. This knowledge waned until I started trolling on tumblr, mesmerized by image upon image of tanned and buxom beauties, whereupon it returned full-force. I sat there in shame, looked upon the shamefulness of my ways, vowed to do better, performed a Death Meditation, and started the healing process anew. Aho.
mentiri factorem fecit – 場黑麥
Showing posts with label propaganda. Show all posts
Showing posts with label propaganda. Show all posts
19 July 2013
22 February 2013
on discussing religion
In the 1950s, America was gearing up for a war that never turned hot. One potent weapon lurking in the federal arsenal was propaganda, a tool with which the Nazis before them had enslave an entire people to murderous ends. That it had been employed to ill effect in Europe was of little concern to the policy-makers in Washington, D.C. – they required every measure at their disposal to hoodwink the American people into allowing them to spend tens of trillions of dollars on a 40 year-long struggle of the wills. The Red Scare is over, and the Iron Curtain is down, but one aspect of the Cold War continues to harm millions of Americans, even unto this day: the frequent invocation of the Christian god Yahweh.
From the pledge of allegiance to the words spoken by new presidents, one phrase has contaminated the speech of officialdom such as few others before it: “under God”. This foul credo even stains our currency, every dollar we print saying IN GOD WE TRUST. Why did the fear mongers and panic sellers of sixty years ago tether our once fine and secular nation to the tenets of one religion in particular? Did they tarnish the sacrifice made by our Founding Persons and the bygone Sons of Liberty merely to justify their hatred for godless, heathen communists? Did they shit on this republic's chest out of a wan sense of patriotism or were they simply oblivious to the lessons of history? For whatever reason, our money now promotes one religion to the exclusion of all others, and our children are now tricked into worshiping bloodthirsty, genocidal Yahweh before class, each day. When millions of Americans believe that a bearded old White man sits in the sky judging their every action and that a red-skinned pervert with hoofed feet is filling their brains with evil thoughts, we see just how badly those Cold War policy makers fucked up; when candidates running for public office have to curry the favor of wild-eyed, bible-thumping, chest-pounding fanatics or risk losing the election, we see just how dangerous it is to link religion to government.
It is important to discuss the topic of racism with other people, regardless of their skin tone, mindset, belief system, needs, wants, or fears. Americans of color lament that too few of their Caucasian countrymen speak about racism regularly, openly, and without compunction. As people who have been marginalized and despised for centuries, minorities recognize that ignorance leads to fear, fear leads to hatred, and hatred leads to death; they have learned firsthand the dangers that silence brings. Similar to racism, religion must be discussed regularly, openly, and without compunction in order to keep the individual from backsliding into a mindset calcified by relentless exposure to his shaman's fire-branded, unchallenged vituperation. In the words of our first president, George Washington, and his successor, John Adams (from the Treaty of Tripoli): “America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.” It is as vital to the survival of our basic Constitutional rights to discuss the risks of our own state-sanctioned religious fanaticism as it is to combat the foreign-born fanatics who seek to do us harm. So, next time you manage to tear yourself from in front of the television, strike up a conversation with someone about religion. Please don't forget, though, that the faithful rarely enjoy talking about their beliefs unless they are being praised for them. Sic semper tyrannis.
mentiri factorem fecit – 場黑麥
From the pledge of allegiance to the words spoken by new presidents, one phrase has contaminated the speech of officialdom such as few others before it: “under God”. This foul credo even stains our currency, every dollar we print saying IN GOD WE TRUST. Why did the fear mongers and panic sellers of sixty years ago tether our once fine and secular nation to the tenets of one religion in particular? Did they tarnish the sacrifice made by our Founding Persons and the bygone Sons of Liberty merely to justify their hatred for godless, heathen communists? Did they shit on this republic's chest out of a wan sense of patriotism or were they simply oblivious to the lessons of history? For whatever reason, our money now promotes one religion to the exclusion of all others, and our children are now tricked into worshiping bloodthirsty, genocidal Yahweh before class, each day. When millions of Americans believe that a bearded old White man sits in the sky judging their every action and that a red-skinned pervert with hoofed feet is filling their brains with evil thoughts, we see just how badly those Cold War policy makers fucked up; when candidates running for public office have to curry the favor of wild-eyed, bible-thumping, chest-pounding fanatics or risk losing the election, we see just how dangerous it is to link religion to government.
It is important to discuss the topic of racism with other people, regardless of their skin tone, mindset, belief system, needs, wants, or fears. Americans of color lament that too few of their Caucasian countrymen speak about racism regularly, openly, and without compunction. As people who have been marginalized and despised for centuries, minorities recognize that ignorance leads to fear, fear leads to hatred, and hatred leads to death; they have learned firsthand the dangers that silence brings. Similar to racism, religion must be discussed regularly, openly, and without compunction in order to keep the individual from backsliding into a mindset calcified by relentless exposure to his shaman's fire-branded, unchallenged vituperation. In the words of our first president, George Washington, and his successor, John Adams (from the Treaty of Tripoli): “America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.” It is as vital to the survival of our basic Constitutional rights to discuss the risks of our own state-sanctioned religious fanaticism as it is to combat the foreign-born fanatics who seek to do us harm. So, next time you manage to tear yourself from in front of the television, strike up a conversation with someone about religion. Please don't forget, though, that the faithful rarely enjoy talking about their beliefs unless they are being praised for them. Sic semper tyrannis.
mentiri factorem fecit – 場黑麥
19 September 2012
dangerous self-seclusion
During the period when America's news outlets still reported on this country's ongoing occupation of the sovereign Republic of Afghanistan, they often spoke about the dangerous seclusion of much of the Afghani population. Living in rugged valleys so inaccessible that neighboring villages are sometimes wholly ignorant of one another, even though they live but a few miles apart, the television's talking-heads spoke long ago of the risks to Liberty, justice, and the rights of women that arise when people live in such seclusion, arguing that it granted their religious and societal leaders absolute power over their minds and bodies.
As things stand in America today, however, religious extremism similar to that practiced by close-minded, militant, and misogynistic Islamic leaders in al-Qaida and Hezbollah has infected the minds of even highly-placed officials in the Republican party, rotting the souls of America's Christian extremists, persons who call themselves dominionists. Just as the threat of religious terrorism that we once thought came from without now comes from within, the American people are secluding ourselves into walled-off little worlds whose borders are defined by the edges of our flat-screen television sets, the rims of our hand-held tablet computers, and the invisibly-reaching tendrils of our Wi-Fi transceivers. This home-grown technological self-seclusion is as great a threat to democracy and freedom as the threat posed by Afghani mullahs instilling hatred-of-all-things-unknown in the minds of children living in distant and dusty valleys. Whereas in Afghanistan many villagers only hear and see and are exposed to a limited and selective view of the world – one they receive from often poorly-educated and ill-informed religious leaders – we in America who choose to spend our lives riveted to self-illuminated talking boxes expose ourselves to a limited and selective view of the world, one we receive from often ill-informed religious and societal leaders who exploit fear-of-the-unknown and the power of oft-repeated lies (as per Goebbels) to corrupt the minds of erstwhile free-thinking and self-respecting citizens.
Many other authors and I have rung the warning-bell previously, altering others to the brainwashing and heart-hardening upon which America's mass-media preys, which it perpetuates at all cost, and which it does with such pervasive effectiveness that its methods were copied by the Nazis themselves – all no no avail; it seems that a majority of us Americans do not care that we have become docile sheep, that our minds are owned by vulture-capitalist billionaires, that our hearts are weighted down by pettiness and greed, or that we allow our views to be shaped by small-minded idiots who squawk at cameras with make-up-caked faces. It is not hard, however, to free our minds from enslavement to television or to allow our opinions to grow out of hubris and humility; the healing begins when we turn off our TVs, toss aside our tablets, switch off our radios, and leave our houses to have a nice walk, driving Fear from our minds with gradual surety and loving effort. President Franklin D. Roosevelt got it right when, in 1933, he said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Fear festers in the minds of people who shut their ears to differing opinions, who close their hearts to the shades of truth found in dissenting voices, who allow themselves to be caught up in religious fervor and nationalistic self-righteousness. Please, friend, remember to doubt everything that you hear, to question all that you are told, and to fight the urge to live in the manner of a secluded villager who believes everything his mullah tells him. Mahalo.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
As things stand in America today, however, religious extremism similar to that practiced by close-minded, militant, and misogynistic Islamic leaders in al-Qaida and Hezbollah has infected the minds of even highly-placed officials in the Republican party, rotting the souls of America's Christian extremists, persons who call themselves dominionists. Just as the threat of religious terrorism that we once thought came from without now comes from within, the American people are secluding ourselves into walled-off little worlds whose borders are defined by the edges of our flat-screen television sets, the rims of our hand-held tablet computers, and the invisibly-reaching tendrils of our Wi-Fi transceivers. This home-grown technological self-seclusion is as great a threat to democracy and freedom as the threat posed by Afghani mullahs instilling hatred-of-all-things-unknown in the minds of children living in distant and dusty valleys. Whereas in Afghanistan many villagers only hear and see and are exposed to a limited and selective view of the world – one they receive from often poorly-educated and ill-informed religious leaders – we in America who choose to spend our lives riveted to self-illuminated talking boxes expose ourselves to a limited and selective view of the world, one we receive from often ill-informed religious and societal leaders who exploit fear-of-the-unknown and the power of oft-repeated lies (as per Goebbels) to corrupt the minds of erstwhile free-thinking and self-respecting citizens.
Many other authors and I have rung the warning-bell previously, altering others to the brainwashing and heart-hardening upon which America's mass-media preys, which it perpetuates at all cost, and which it does with such pervasive effectiveness that its methods were copied by the Nazis themselves – all no no avail; it seems that a majority of us Americans do not care that we have become docile sheep, that our minds are owned by vulture-capitalist billionaires, that our hearts are weighted down by pettiness and greed, or that we allow our views to be shaped by small-minded idiots who squawk at cameras with make-up-caked faces. It is not hard, however, to free our minds from enslavement to television or to allow our opinions to grow out of hubris and humility; the healing begins when we turn off our TVs, toss aside our tablets, switch off our radios, and leave our houses to have a nice walk, driving Fear from our minds with gradual surety and loving effort. President Franklin D. Roosevelt got it right when, in 1933, he said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Fear festers in the minds of people who shut their ears to differing opinions, who close their hearts to the shades of truth found in dissenting voices, who allow themselves to be caught up in religious fervor and nationalistic self-righteousness. Please, friend, remember to doubt everything that you hear, to question all that you are told, and to fight the urge to live in the manner of a secluded villager who believes everything his mullah tells him. Mahalo.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
17 August 2012
perspective - it matters
Time, age, tiredness, joy, sadness, loss, gain – these hard-to-define concepts are aspects of the human condition, not iron-clad rules of law but rather matters of perspective that change with one's outlook on life. What is to one person a grave insult is to another as a joyous and welcome gift. A few days ago, a family friend was telling me about growing up Jewish in a Christian town, and how the other kids would throw pennies at her and call her a penny-pinching kike, and other bad names, and how she would pick up those pennies and use them to buy herself cartons of milk and boxes of cookies, which cost about five cents a-piece. And then there is my longtime partner-in-crime, Mr. P, a friend from my childhood in Germany, who makes over a hundred-and-fifty-thousand dollars a year, who lives in the new W residences near the World Trade Center site in New York City, and who is so upset with his former boss in Thailand for that man firing him and forcing him to leave that country that his heart has become swamped with hatred, keeping him from seeing his life as blessed, the kind of life that people kill for.
I spoke with Mr. P a fortnight ago, trying to help him see things from a different perspective so that he might come to enjoy his time Stateside and not be so miserable and mopey all the time, but changes in perspective are achieved only by each person individually and are not easily forced, or coerced. So subtle is perspective, and at once so powerful, that entire industries exist to shape and to mold the views of persons who consume media (which accounts for any person who has ever watched TV or listened to the radio). Even as far back as the 1930s, American advertising was so effective and so quick to control and to shape the perspectives of millions of far-flung and unrelated citizens that the National Socialists in Germany, the Nazis, adopted Yankee-pioneered advertising and propaganda techniques and used them to brainwash tens of millions of good, honest Teutons into acquiescing to the invasion of sovereign foreign nations and the eradication of train-loads of men, women, and children. The power of the American advertising machine persists – so great is it that an imbecile such as the political puppet Sarah Palin can be packaged and sold in such cunning fashion that otherwise intelligent individuals come to see her as a desirable candidate for the second-highest office in the land.
You may be asking yourself right about now, “Well then, oh-so-clever LyeSmythe, how can I avoid being brainwashed, and how can I craft for myself a pure and honest view of the world?” Persons who change their perspectives begin by turning off and throwing out their television sets, they refuse to watch junk-TV (think reality- and talk-shows), they get news from sources located in different countries around the world, and they read news in languages other than English. In this manner, self-respecting people avoid the snare of America's propaganda juggernaut, giving their minds enough unique views of news-worthy events that their opinions are not shaped or dominated by just one brand of crazy.
Beyond the political sphere, however, one's perspective of something on the order to time itself – time-keeping via clock or watch, being on or off schedule, on time or off it, early or late – is shaped by society and by the consensual, Western hallucination that time is a rigid temporal plane extending in a straight line from the past into the future. Which is all well and good until one runs into the article entitled the Rebirth of a Sioux Nation in the August 2012 edition of National Geographic in which the author talks about the way the people of the Oglala Sioux view time – as a cyclical maelstrom in which past and present, life and death, and the spirit and waking worlds are shadows of one another, not strictly separate realms. Seeing the world from a point of view so foreign to the cookie-cutter, pre-packaged perception drilled endlessly into the heads of average Americans is a nice way to blow one's mind on a rainy Tuesday afternoon; such adventures into the curious minds of wise and ancient peoples are good ways to keep one's perspectives loose, and flexible. Therefore, on the next occasion that someone complains that you were not on time, you, dear reader, can claim to be changing your views on the nature of the universe, and that the clocks were wrong, not you. Give the gift of cognitive insecurity – change your mind frequently, adopt new points of view as often as you are able, and keep that dome-piece of a swivel. Mahalo.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
I spoke with Mr. P a fortnight ago, trying to help him see things from a different perspective so that he might come to enjoy his time Stateside and not be so miserable and mopey all the time, but changes in perspective are achieved only by each person individually and are not easily forced, or coerced. So subtle is perspective, and at once so powerful, that entire industries exist to shape and to mold the views of persons who consume media (which accounts for any person who has ever watched TV or listened to the radio). Even as far back as the 1930s, American advertising was so effective and so quick to control and to shape the perspectives of millions of far-flung and unrelated citizens that the National Socialists in Germany, the Nazis, adopted Yankee-pioneered advertising and propaganda techniques and used them to brainwash tens of millions of good, honest Teutons into acquiescing to the invasion of sovereign foreign nations and the eradication of train-loads of men, women, and children. The power of the American advertising machine persists – so great is it that an imbecile such as the political puppet Sarah Palin can be packaged and sold in such cunning fashion that otherwise intelligent individuals come to see her as a desirable candidate for the second-highest office in the land.
You may be asking yourself right about now, “Well then, oh-so-clever LyeSmythe, how can I avoid being brainwashed, and how can I craft for myself a pure and honest view of the world?” Persons who change their perspectives begin by turning off and throwing out their television sets, they refuse to watch junk-TV (think reality- and talk-shows), they get news from sources located in different countries around the world, and they read news in languages other than English. In this manner, self-respecting people avoid the snare of America's propaganda juggernaut, giving their minds enough unique views of news-worthy events that their opinions are not shaped or dominated by just one brand of crazy.
Beyond the political sphere, however, one's perspective of something on the order to time itself – time-keeping via clock or watch, being on or off schedule, on time or off it, early or late – is shaped by society and by the consensual, Western hallucination that time is a rigid temporal plane extending in a straight line from the past into the future. Which is all well and good until one runs into the article entitled the Rebirth of a Sioux Nation in the August 2012 edition of National Geographic in which the author talks about the way the people of the Oglala Sioux view time – as a cyclical maelstrom in which past and present, life and death, and the spirit and waking worlds are shadows of one another, not strictly separate realms. Seeing the world from a point of view so foreign to the cookie-cutter, pre-packaged perception drilled endlessly into the heads of average Americans is a nice way to blow one's mind on a rainy Tuesday afternoon; such adventures into the curious minds of wise and ancient peoples are good ways to keep one's perspectives loose, and flexible. Therefore, on the next occasion that someone complains that you were not on time, you, dear reader, can claim to be changing your views on the nature of the universe, and that the clocks were wrong, not you. Give the gift of cognitive insecurity – change your mind frequently, adopt new points of view as often as you are able, and keep that dome-piece of a swivel. Mahalo.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
02 September 2011
on acting like a bitch
The mentality of the average American voter bears certain resemblance to that of a skittish dog rescued from the pound. No matter her physical size or how well she is treated by her adoptive family, the canine will likely never shake the Fear put into her by her abusive former master(s). If when out walking she is spooked, she at times will shake off her leash and bound away at high speed, her face seeming to express an exuberant anxiety. Gracefully eluding all attempts at capture, one of the few options for bringing her back under control is to trick her into entering a vehicle (an action that normally means a trip to the park or some such thing). Once inside the vehicle, she forgets the potential for freedom unbound that lies but a quick tug of the head away, and allows the leash to be bound around her neck once again.
So it is often with voters in this nation, especially with those who were so scared by the events whose ten year anniversary we will soon mark that they sat quietly by, cowed by Fear-driven propaganda into allowing the Patriot Act to pass unopposed, believing of the lies spewing forth from the suck-holes of power-hungry politicians desperate to expand their base, cheering as we joined the short-list of nations guilty of initiating a war of aggression, re-electing a president who forever tarnished America's long and honorable traditions by valuing the paltry benefits of enhanced interrogation over the unalienable and immutable Rights of the individual.
A dog raised to fear is unlikely to shake its burden; an individual provided the opportunity to fear will settle gratefully into the welcoming cocoon that fear provides, forever ignorant of the beautiful savagery inherent to mankind, never doubting the actions or the rhetoric of persons claiming to have all the answers, forever trusting any individual who stokes the fires of that fear and who makes skin-deep promises that evaporate immediately upon re-election.
When the conditions seem right, the voter is likely to break free and to dash about wildly, demanding changes in the status quo through the implementation of untested strategies championed as the solutions to our economic and societal woes, believing with exuberant anxiety in the clever deceptions of the heads shouting on TV, scrambling madly for the first door that promises even the faintest hint of Happiness only to succumb instantly, wild-eyed and out-of-breath, to fear's soothing grip as the shackles of ignorance and repression are calmly reapplied to the cardinal points of the soul.
It is without question easier for the People to accept the oppressions to which they have become accustomed than for us to venture forth, without a backward glance or the slightest hesitation, in search of new Guards for our future Security. Unlike a tortured and skittish bitch, however, once we have broken free of the chains that have held us in check, we have the capacity to maintain that newfound freedom by consuming news from various unrelated sources, by being wary always of the power of propaganda, and by not forgetting for an instant that, as Frank Herbert said best in his book Dune, “Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration.”
Fear in itself is a sufferable Evil, but fear employed by the highest powers as a tool for controlling the hearts and minds of the People is an Evil that has ceased to be sufferable. Freed from constriction, the mind is capable of feats far-reaching and grand, while a mind hobbled by perpetual paranoia functions similar to that of a broken, groveling beast who understands only the bite of the lash.
Speak freely. Stay vigilant. Spread liberty.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
So it is often with voters in this nation, especially with those who were so scared by the events whose ten year anniversary we will soon mark that they sat quietly by, cowed by Fear-driven propaganda into allowing the Patriot Act to pass unopposed, believing of the lies spewing forth from the suck-holes of power-hungry politicians desperate to expand their base, cheering as we joined the short-list of nations guilty of initiating a war of aggression, re-electing a president who forever tarnished America's long and honorable traditions by valuing the paltry benefits of enhanced interrogation over the unalienable and immutable Rights of the individual.
A dog raised to fear is unlikely to shake its burden; an individual provided the opportunity to fear will settle gratefully into the welcoming cocoon that fear provides, forever ignorant of the beautiful savagery inherent to mankind, never doubting the actions or the rhetoric of persons claiming to have all the answers, forever trusting any individual who stokes the fires of that fear and who makes skin-deep promises that evaporate immediately upon re-election.
When the conditions seem right, the voter is likely to break free and to dash about wildly, demanding changes in the status quo through the implementation of untested strategies championed as the solutions to our economic and societal woes, believing with exuberant anxiety in the clever deceptions of the heads shouting on TV, scrambling madly for the first door that promises even the faintest hint of Happiness only to succumb instantly, wild-eyed and out-of-breath, to fear's soothing grip as the shackles of ignorance and repression are calmly reapplied to the cardinal points of the soul.
It is without question easier for the People to accept the oppressions to which they have become accustomed than for us to venture forth, without a backward glance or the slightest hesitation, in search of new Guards for our future Security. Unlike a tortured and skittish bitch, however, once we have broken free of the chains that have held us in check, we have the capacity to maintain that newfound freedom by consuming news from various unrelated sources, by being wary always of the power of propaganda, and by not forgetting for an instant that, as Frank Herbert said best in his book Dune, “Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration.”
Fear in itself is a sufferable Evil, but fear employed by the highest powers as a tool for controlling the hearts and minds of the People is an Evil that has ceased to be sufferable. Freed from constriction, the mind is capable of feats far-reaching and grand, while a mind hobbled by perpetual paranoia functions similar to that of a broken, groveling beast who understands only the bite of the lash.
Speak freely. Stay vigilant. Spread liberty.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)