A comment on the brainwashing of people

[Craig234]

People generally don't recognize they're brainwashed; they're better able to see it in others brainwashed on other things.

Here's part of how I see it works, how people get locked into 'a side' to the point of being blinded.

Science has shown that people doing what we think of as 'rational politics' - rationally looking at different sides of an issue and evaluating what's right - is a brain function that CAN happen to something, but that once the brain identifies something as an issue or symbol about which it already has an opinion, the brain rational activity doesn't occur, a different part of the brain that simply 'reacts' - negatively or positively - does.

Some of this stuff has been known for a century, when Sigmund Freud's nephew came to the US and used his teachings to start to apply them to advertising, to create more demand for products. You can see it in 'brand loyalty', when people irrationally move a brand into that 'positive' area, and just want and prefer it, they 'trust' it and will pay more for it. Brands spend billions to develop that brand loyalty and it's often the greatest asset the brand has.

The public rarely sees the science behind the scenes on these things. You might get a glimpse if you are given a poll be marketing groups building brand loyalty; they often ask you to view the brand as a person and rate your feelings on many attributes of that 'person'. They understand how people's brains work, and are looking for where the brand is weaker and advertising should bolster it.

Even in the 1950's people bemoaned that 'politicians are being sold like soap', and it's only gotten far, far more sophisticated since. Some of this is embarrassingly obvious when you know to look for it, that people often behave like monkeys; when they see an advertisement with people loving a product, monkey see monkey do, they want it too. A common marketing phrase is "everyone's talking about", because it fools people into that monkey see, monkey do. If everyone is talking about it, it must be good?

There are what I'll call the 'gateway' issues used to brainwash. These are issues that appeal to people's views. It might be something like 'personal responsibility' or abortion or morals or sharing a religion or guns or 'family values' - anything people already care about and have in those 'programmed' categories of good or bad, can be used to link your party or faction or politician to them. It's a reason you see politicians desperately look for anything to share in common with the audience, to be 'one of them'.

It's easy for people to resent politicians, the rational understands they are typically serving other interests and trying to con people to support them; so note how essentially every politician has the same basic story of coming from humble beginnings you can relate to, and working hard and rising up, trying to get you not to be rational in evaluating them but to move them into that 'I like them' positive category.

 

[Craig234]

But all of the above is some of the foundation for how people work, the brainwashing level gets to when these things are applied over and over for years. As people begin to accept some of the 'positive' and 'negative' assignments for groups and candidates, they begin to think of themselves as belonging to a faction, team or tribe that shares those views, what they support and what they oppose. They don't need to keep asking hard questions about them, they've adopted them.

And at that point, they aren't questioning and challenging their 'side' and opinions, they are interested in how their side can 'win' and defeat their opponents.

As a side note, it's an interesting parallel to see how people are trained by professional sports teams - millions of people become 'fans' of one rich person's team or another, and 'support' and 'cheer' for them against the people who are fans of the opposing team. GO TEAM! Once they pick a team, then tend to be proud of their 'loyalty' as the owners make money.

And I think over time these things tend to only harden, to where people get to be 'partisan', meaning they dismiss criticism of 'their side', and are very much just against opponents. No rational activity usually happens. It's an 'automatic' response.

They can fake rationality; they usually have sort of memorize arguments of things to say why they're for this and against that; propagandists help them with that, giving them slogans, phrases, arguments to use.

It's remarkable how simplistic some of these 'marketing' things are. Eisenhower had a slogan, "I like Ike". Nixon had, "He's the one". Reagan and someone who copied him had "Make America Great Again". Obama had hope and change. It's not unlike how sports teams have things like mascots for people to get attached to and develop 'love' for.

But where it gets more powerful is in the negative marketing, once you get people to put a faction, or person, or policy position into the 'bad' category. For example, decades earlier someone might have been taught a position on abortion, or even reached one rationally - but after that, they tend to only react. If they're anti-abortion, then anyone else is a "baby killer", if they're pro-abortion rights anyone else is "trying to control women's bodies". Just a negative reaction.

And people stop asking questions about their position, and just start to see themselves as part of that group fighting for the 'good things' against people who support the 'bad things'.

And it's incredible how powerful that is. Studies show that negative advertising is by far the most effective persuader. People are more skeptical when they're told a politician is good, but it's a lot easier to trigger people's 'bad' response to an opponent, to vote against someone more than vote for someone.

 

[Craig234]

Consider how powerful these opinions are once they're set - since WWII, just calling someone a 'commie' triggers people so badly that they tend to just have their brain, that has that set as a 'bad' thing, react negatively to whoever it's said about. It gave us the 'red scare', and it's been effective ever since. How many votes did Bernie lose from people implying he was a 'commie' or 'far left', rather than rationally evaluating his views? How many Democrats have been attacked the same way?

(Republicans would point out the similarity to their side being called 'racist', which can have a similar reaction).

These hardwired responses are like buttons that can be pressed over and over, reinforcing the brainwashing. When people see or hear things in their 'good' category, their brains can react with feelings of pleasure, of comfort, reinforcing the views; and when they see things in their 'bad' category, their brains can give them feelings of anger, fear, hatred.

There's a sort of maintenance to maintain these views. Brands do it with advertising; you go to a ballgame and see a Coke logo - they have logos to help the brain create a unique reaction to the brand - and 'feel good' about it. Politicians have advertising or speeches or events where they repeat the messages that get positive responses to reinforce people feeling good about them and opposed to the opposition.

From the outside, it can be hard to tell the difference, between someone who is being rational about an issue and favors one position and opposes another, from someone who is brainwashed on the same issue and just reacts the same way. But it's very different.

Unfortunately, most people can be very manipulated; and doing so costs money, and that largely comes to mean money buying public opinion. That all but ensures corruption, when corruption is defined as an interest with money using it to 'buy' support for any view they want, and anyone 'authentic' having all but no chance as someone without that money, because they just can't get the 'name recognition', defend against any negative marketing well, have much of a chance.

This is where 'free choice' becomes something very different than that - free choice about as much as buying Coca-Cola or RC Cola, with far less advertising, is a 'free choice'.

And this situation, as people adopt these views, just react to 'good' or 'bad' partisan categories without rational activity, identify with a 'team' they're on, it's why they are said to be in a 'bubble' where they are essential impervious to those adopted views being questioned.

To the puppet masters, the people they target - whether for brand loyalty, or political views, or loyalty to a sports team or whatever - are just like farm animals to maintain and use. The cash cows. Our system gives people the artificial power of a vote, and so there are powerful interests who aim to get people to give it to them, just as brands get them to give them their money.

 

[Craig234]

I won't even get into some of the related issues, such as the psychology of how a con man's most loyal defenders are the people he's conned, because people can't stand to consider they have been conned.

Rather my point is just to illustrate the difference between the theory, of a US made of 'rational citizens' who evaluate and choose leaders and policies rationally, and what we actually have of a largely brainwashed population, with massive interests of these 'puppet master' industries seducing people into adopting these views and joining their 'team' to love and hate as the interests want.

And it's quite insidious. Brands are bad enough, where they use things like seeing warm families, where emotions are played on to manipulate people's feelings about the brand, but politics is able to use anything people care about - patriotism or 'family values' or anything else to 'build loyalty' that can have nothing to do with the 'real agenda' where the money comes from to win those people over.

And people have a hard time seeing what's happening even if they're told, because they have those attachments to things. If I were to tell someone that a group who wants tax cuts for the rich has funded a campaign to recruit them by appealing to their passionate position on abortion, they're not likely to care - they do care about abortion, and that's that.

I've just scratched the surface; for example, I haven't looked at things like why urban and rural people have such different views on average.

These mechanisms how people function aren't all bad, if they operate naturally. If people arrive at that they develop partisan views on and dismiss without rational questioning naturally, that can be pretty essential. It's when those views are manipulated by constant, carefully crafted propaganda to get people to be brainwashed how the puppet masters want, that it becomes a lot more dangerous.

It's one thing for a person to develop trust in a neighbor's business they know rationally; it's quite another for them to be manipulated to develop that trust in a brand because of advertising.

A key point about all this, is that 'finding a villain' doesn't fix it - that people essentially LIKE it. Aldous Huxley pointed out that if the tyranny he discussed using propaganda were done, the people who were 'enslaved' by it would likely love it. If you explain to someone that Coca cola has seduced them with advertising, and a generic cola is just as good (for the sake of argument) and saved them money, they might well reject the problem because they LIKE how they feel using Coca Cola, which generic doesn't give them.

 

[Craig234]

This is the basic problem. That people are manipulated for their brain functions of rationality, their pleasure and negative reactions to be manipulated, by monied interests for their own purposes, and the people generally just don't care; they don't understand it's done, and they don't care if they're told. They might object in principle to the idea, but not to any specific views they have as a result. They like the situation.

And this is how we get to where it's essentially a 'numbers game'. Which puppet masters can get bigger numbers, a country of competing monied interests, except that unlike in sports, it's not at all an equal fight. Some sides of issues have huge money supporting them, while the other sides have almost none, and that's how we get very 'undemocratic' results.

There's big money supporting tax cuts for the rich, and not much against them, despite public opinion being against them. It's not that the money directly buys people supporting the tax cuts for the rich, though it can do that a little; it's that it gets politicians elected who do, because those politicians appeal to voters on whatever their hot button issues are. If their politician shares their passionate view on abortion, they don't care much that they vote for a tax cut for the rich.

And besides, the opponent who is against the tax cut for the rich is a commie, I heard.

This is how we become a nation of people in 'partisan groups', brainwashed, in bubbles, impervious to 'outside information', not approaching things rationally, influenced by money, groups who just talk past each other and don't really have much to say to each other except how it's too bad the other side is so partisan, with monied interests largely pulling the strings through this and many other means, such as the lobbying industry.

How do you fix it? Short of putting people in a re-education camp for 6 months to help them understand and development some immunity, I'm not sure how you 'fix' the people, but you can reduce the problem with systemic changes, to limiting how money can be used - which is exactly what the Republicans fight against.

And sad to say, the appeal of the propaganda for many outweighs pretty much any other political view, it's more important than 'country' or 'democracy' or other principles, it replaces them.

In short, our country was created in a very simple age regarding issues like rational people and information, and now we're in a far different situation with very powerful propaganda operations and many people are almost defenseless.

Democracy has always been about trying to overcome minority rule by giving the people artificial power, and how those minority interests try to defeat democracy, and they are doing quite well at defeating it, better all the time. It's still a war - they don't always win each battle - but it's like watching one side win battles with bows and arrows and big losses, while the other has tanks.

I'll again quote Louis Brandeis, that you can have great concentration of wealth, or you can have democracy, but you cannot have both.

With modern brainwashing, the minority interests are finding ways you can have both, if you don't look too closely at the type of 'democracy' they create of brainwashed people.

 

[Chillfolks]

I that how you were brainwashed?

 

[less right]

And besides, the opponent who is against the tax cut for the rich is a commie, I heard.

You heard that from someone trying to brainwash you. Apparently successfully.

 

[swing_voter]

"Manchurian Candidate"

Great film. I think it wasn't released because of the Kennedy assassination?

Everything you wanted to know about brainwashing and then some.


.

 

[Cope]

People generally don't recognize they're brainwashed; they're better able to see it in others brainwashed on other things.

Here's part of how I see it works, how people get locked into 'a side' to the point of being blinded.

Science has shown that people doing what we think of as 'rational politics' - rationally looking at different sides of an issue and evaluating what's right - is a brain function that CAN happen to something, but that once the brain identifies something as an issue or symbol about which it already has an opinion, the brain rational activity doesn't occur, a different part of the brain that simply 'reacts' - negatively or positively - does.

Some of this stuff has been known for a century, when Sigmund Freud's nephew came to the US and used his teachings to start to apply them to advertising, to create more demand for products. You can see it in 'brand loyalty', when people irrationally move a brand into that 'positive' area, and just want and prefer it, they 'trust' it and will pay more for it. Brands spend billions to develop that brand loyalty and it's often the greatest asset the brand has.

The public rarely sees the science behind the scenes on these things. You might get a glimpse if you are given a poll be marketing groups building brand loyalty; they often ask you to view the brand as a person and rate your feelings on many attributes of that 'person'. They understand how people's brains work, and are looking for where the brand is weaker and advertising should bolster it.

Even in the 1950's people bemoaned that 'politicians are being sold like soap', and it's only gotten far, far more sophisticated since. Some of this is embarrassingly obvious when you know to look for it, that people often behave like monkeys; when they see an advertisement with people loving a product, monkey see monkey do, they want it too. A common marketing phrase is "everyone's talking about", because it fools people into that monkey see, monkey do. If everyone is talking about it, it must be good?

There are what I'll call the 'gateway' issues used to brainwash. These are issues that appeal to people's views. It might be something like 'personal responsibility' or abortion or morals or sharing a religion or guns or 'family values' - anything people already care about and have in those 'programmed' categories of good or bad, can be used to link your party or faction or politician to them. It's a reason you see politicians desperately look for anything to share in common with the audience, to be 'one of them'.

It's easy for people to resent politicians, the rational understands they are typically serving other interests and trying to con people to support them; so note how essentially every politician has the same basic story of coming from humble beginnings you can relate to, and working hard and rising up, trying to get you not to be rational in evaluating them but to move them into that 'I like them' positive category.

This is spot on. If only more people would see this, especially people here (probably reading this going yeah THEY sure do!!)

There is never a thought of WE needing to recognize it.
If you are extremely partisan with any topic, this is for you. If you have never changed your stance regarding political items, this is for you. There is a lot of that on these very boards.

 

[Chillfolks]

"Manchurian Candidate"

Great film. I think it wasn't released because of the Kennedy assassination?

Everything you wanted to know about brainwashing and then some.


.

The remake sucked.

 

[TheParser]

Oh, yes, it's easy to brainwash people.

Right now a lot of people have been brainwashed by a certain "theory" that is being foisted on the American people, especially on the young who do not know better.

 

[swing_voter]

Rush Limbaugh is the one who created the trump supporters.

Limbaugh would figure out what his listeners wanted to hear and then he would tell them that. Often, they wanted to hear negative things about black for example, so Limbaugh would attack prominent black people, celebrities and politicians. The audience ate it up.

I'm not sure that's brain washing though.

.

 

[Craig234]

Right now a lot of people have been brainwashed by a certain "theory" that is being foisted on the American people, especially on the young who do not know better.

Or, you are brainwashed by manipulators who tell you the theory is bad a thousand times, and you are inclined to accept it and respond like this, without a rational approach.

Actually, it's a good example regarding propaganda. How do you get people to side against a 'good' issue? One way is to try to create straw men, so they aren't opposing the 'good' issue, but only something specific, such as where it 'goes too far'.

On this issue, for example, they aren't about to be 'pro slavery' or use the n word; instead, they just talk abut 'extremists' who 'go too far'. People can get behind that, and feel they aren't 'racist'.

It's done many ways. Another is to find something bad about a promoter - such as discrediting BLM not by saying 'murdering black people is good', but by pointing out Marxist views of movement founders, however irrelevant.

Another example: voters agree overwhelmingly with Bernie on the issues? Then don't talk about the issues. Launch a campaign about how he honeymooned in Russia, and leave out the reasons why. "He must be a commie!"

It's just about getting that 'negative reaction'. It can be as simple as a photo of an opponent with someone who is a 'hot button' for hostility, like a Democrat's photo shown with one of Pelosi or Hillary. Basic stuff.

At the end of my post, I said you could explain to someone how interests who want tax cuts for the rich are seducing them for their vote using abortion, and they wouldn't care.

You could say the same thing about you, that I could explain to you how right-wing interests are seducing you for their own purposes using an issue like your opposition to 'critical race theory' they hype, and you wouldn't care.

 

[Syamsu]

Very obviously, it is the socialists who do all the brainwashing. Trump's politics, is rather straightforward and common sensical. You might even say it is kind of boring, if it weren't for the success of it. There is no manipulation going on, it is what you see is what you get.

Socialists on the other hand, it is all lies and manipulation. Infrastructure, is whatever you want infrastructure to be. The for the people act, shafting the people.

Now the central question, how come socialists are no good liars? It is very simple, the socialists want to get rid of emotions. Socialists are "rational", meaning they throw out emotions, and come up with some bullshit socialistic formula of what is the best to determine policy and people's lives, instead of emotions. They have no belief in the human spirit, the American spirit, God the holy spirit, because it requires emotion.

Socialism is in place of any kind of emotion. It is coldhearted and calculating. It is reasoning like, we can build so many swimming pools for the able, if we stop the care for the disabled. And everything the socialist does, it is always calculated as being the best. So the socialist never does anything wrong, they never apologize for any catastrophy, like the catastrophy at the southern border of the usa. They always did what was best.

 

[Moderate Right]

People generally don't recognize they're brainwashed; they're better able to see it in others brainwashed on other things.

Here's part of how I see it works, how people get locked into 'a side' to the point of being blinded.

Science has shown that people doing what we think of as 'rational politics' - rationally looking at different sides of an issue and evaluating what's right - is a brain function that CAN happen to something, but that once the brain identifies something as an issue or symbol about which it already has an opinion, the brain rational activity doesn't occur, a different part of the brain that simply 'reacts' - negatively or positively - does.

Some of this stuff has been known for a century, when Sigmund Freud's nephew came to the US and used his teachings to start to apply them to advertising, to create more demand for products. You can see it in 'brand loyalty', when people irrationally move a brand into that 'positive' area, and just want and prefer it, they 'trust' it and will pay more for it. Brands spend billions to develop that brand loyalty and it's often the greatest asset the brand has.

The public rarely sees the science behind the scenes on these things. You might get a glimpse if you are given a poll be marketing groups building brand loyalty; they often ask you to view the brand as a person and rate your feelings on many attributes of that 'person'. They understand how people's brains work, and are looking for where the brand is weaker and advertising should bolster it.

Even in the 1950's people bemoaned that 'politicians are being sold like soap', and it's only gotten far, far more sophisticated since. Some of this is embarrassingly obvious when you know to look for it, that people often behave like monkeys; when they see an advertisement with people loving a product, monkey see monkey do, they want it too. A common marketing phrase is "everyone's talking about", because it fools people into that monkey see, monkey do. If everyone is talking about it, it must be good?

There are what I'll call the 'gateway' issues used to brainwash. These are issues that appeal to people's views. It might be something like 'personal responsibility' or abortion or morals or sharing a religion or guns or 'family values' - anything people already care about and have in those 'programmed' categories of good or bad, can be used to link your party or faction or politician to them. It's a reason you see politicians desperately look for anything to share in common with the audience, to be 'one of them'.

It's easy for people to resent politicians, the rational understands they are typically serving other interests and trying to con people to support them; so note how essentially every politician has the same basic story of coming from humble beginnings you can relate to, and working hard and rising up, trying to get you not to be rational in evaluating them but to move them into that 'I like them' positive category.

You do realize that many on the right and the left are brainwashed, don't you?

 

[Craig234]

Very obviously, it is the socialists who do all the brainwashing. Trump's politics, is rather straightforward and common sensical. You might even say it is kind of boring, if it weren't for the success of it. There is no manipulation going on, it is what you see is what you get.

Socialists on the other hand, it is all lies and manipulation. Infrastructure, is whatever you want infrastructure to be. The for the people act, shafting the people.

Now the central question, how come socialists are no good liars? It is very simple, the socialists want to get rid of emotions. Socialists are "rational", meaning they throw out emotions, and come up with some bullshit socialistic formula of what is the best to determine policy and people's lives, instead of emotions. They have no belief in the human spirit, the American spirit, God the holy spirit, because it requires emotion.

Socialism is in place of any kind of emotion. It is coldhearted and calculating. It is reasoning like, we can build so many swimming pools for the able, if we stop the care for the disabled. And everything the socialist does, it is always calculated as being the best. So the socialist never does anything wrong, they never apologize for any catastrophy, like the catastrophy at the southern border of the usa. They always did what was best.

You really offered a post to illustrate many of the points I made.

One was when I said that the brainwashed develop things to say, talking points, arguments, used to justify their positions, but which aren't actually rational. You do that here in spades.

Another was my statement about how they become blinded. The fantasies you talk about I think clearly show that's the case also.

Another was about demonizing opponents. I even mentioned the long history of calling people 'commie' and how well that has kept working since WWII, and you do just that. Part of it was about using straw men; you are talking about Democrats, but you call them "socialists", because you think that makes your argument stronger. You replace real issues like people having healthcare, with bizarre straw men like denying pools for the disabled heartlessly. Remarkably illustrating my points.

 

[Evilroddy]

Some useful background knowledge about the conditions necessary for mass manipulation/brainwashing.



Cheers and be well.
Evilroddy.

 

[Syamsu]

I fully support the opinion that socialists are demonic, total evil. Not just ordinary disagreements.

Because socialism is about throwing out all emotions. Socialism comes from the universities, where materialism is prevalent. So everything spiritual, meaning the human spirit, God the holy spirit, the American spirit, simply every emotion is rejected because of emotions not being material.

There are lots and lots, and lots of materialists at universities, they are all socialists.

Bernie Sanders, he supported the Cuban literacy program. Look that up, what the Cuban literacy program was like.

It can never end up well when you are a materialist, and throw out everything spiritual.

 

[Razoo]

And the brainwashing will begin very early if America caves to the privatizing of public education which will teach our children that Fascism and no choice for women is okay. The favorite buzz word in this movement is "CHOICE" as if there is no choice in America for educating children.

The USA has always had a wide selection of where parents can choose to educate their children........always.

Just so you know.

The right wing Fascists and the right wing fundamentalists have teamed up.

 

[Quag]

And the brainwashing will begin very early if America caves to the privatizing of public education which will teach our children that Fascism and no choice for women is okay. The favorite buzz word in this movement is "CHOICE" as if there is no choice in America for educating children.

The USA has always had a wide selection of where parents can choose to educate their children........always.

Just so you know.

The right wing Fascists and the right wing fundamentalists have teamed up.

Nah they got together and had kids now the kids have grown up and taken over