Introduction
Learn about Political Subversion, Propaganda, Misinformation and Deception in context of the current ( 2020 ) events in the U.S. and around the world.
Subversion is as a term that describes modern warfare; interlocking systems of actions that aims at the overthrow of established authority in a country.
Subversion (from the Latin word subvertere, ‘overthrow‘) refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed, in an attempt to transform the established social order and its structures of power, authority, hierarchy, and social norms.
Subversion can be described as an attack on the public morale and, “the will to resist intervention are the products of combined political and social or class loyalties which are usually attached to national symbols. Following penetration, and parallel with the forced disintegration of political and social institutions of the state, these loyalties may be detached and transferred to the political or ideological cause of the aggressor”.
Subversion is used as a tool to achieve political goals because it generally carries less risk, cost, and difficulty as opposed to open belligerency.
Furthermore, it is a relatively cheap form of warfare that does not require large amounts of training.
A subversive is something or someone carrying the potential for some degree of subversion. In this context, a “subversive” is sometimes called a “traitor” with respect to (and usually by) the government in power. […]
Subversion can imply the use of insidious, dishonest, monetary, or violent methods to bring about desired changes. […]
If subversion fails in its goal of bringing about a coup it is possible that the actors and actions of the subversive group could transition to insurrection, insurgency, and/or guerilla warfare.
The word is present in all languages of Latin origin, originally applying to such events as the military defeat of a city. As early as the 14th century, it was being used in the English language with reference to laws, and in the 15th century came to be used with respect to the realm. The term has taken over from ‘sedition’ as the name for illicit rebellion, though the connotations of the two words are rather different; sedition suggesting overt attacks on institutions, subversion something much more surreptitious, such as eroding the basis of belief in the status quo or setting people against each other.
Former KGB Agent, Yuri Bezmenov, Warns America About Socialist Subversion
Former KGB agent interview in 1984 explaining his job to destabilise USA:
https://www.facebook.com/knowthyself2100/videos/189062235739965/
Illuminati: The Real Story
We Have All Been Fooled 60 years Recording:
Subversion – Definition
The problem with defining the term subversion is that there is not a single definition that is universally accepted. Charles Townshend described subversion as a term, “so elastic as to be virtually devoid of meaning, and its use does little more than convey the enlarged sense of the vulnerability of modern systems to all kinds of covert assaults”.
What follows are some of the many attempts to define the term:
- “Subversion is the undermining or detachment of the loyalties of significant political and social groups within the victimized state, and their transference, under ideal conditions, to the symbols and institutions of the aggressor.”
- “Subversion — Actions designed to undermine the military, economic, psychological, or political strength or morale of a governing authority.”
- “Subversive Activity — Anyone lending aid, comfort, and moral support to individuals, groups, or organizations that advocate the overthrow of incumbent governments by force and violence is subversive and is engaged in subversive activity. All willful acts that are intended to be detrimental to the best interests of the government and that do not fall into the categories of treason, sedition, sabotage, or espionage will be placed in the category of subversive activity.”
- “Subversive Political Action — A planned series of activities designed to accomplish political objectives by influencing, dominating, or displacing individuals or groups who are so placed as to affect the decisions and actions of another government.”
- Subversion — “A destructive, aggressive activity aimed to destroy the country, nation, or geographical area of your enemy… [by demoralizing the cultural values and changing the population’s perception of reality].
- Subversion — Roger Trinquier defined subversion as a term that could be lumped together under the name modern warfare, “as being interlocking systems of actions, political, economic, psychological and military that aims at the overthrow of established authority in a country.”
Conceptual understanding
Defining and understanding subversion means identifying entities, structures, and things that can be subverted. Furthermore, it may help to identify practices and tools that are not subversive. Institutions and morals can be subverted, but ideology on the other hand cannot. The fall of a government or the creation of a new government as a result of an external war is not subversion. Espionage does not count as subversion because it is not an action that leads directly to an overthrow of a government. Information gathered from espionage may be used to plan and carry out subversive activities.
To gain an understanding of what is considered to be subversive requires understanding the intent of those taking action. This makes defining and identifying subversion a difficult process. As Laurence Beilenson points out, “to criticize a government in an effort to reform it or to change its policies is not subversion, even though such criticism may contribute to overthrow. But criticism intended to help a projected overthrow becomes subversive without regard to whether it is right or wrong.”
Types of subversion
Subversion can generally be broken down into internal and external subversion, but this distinction is not meant to imply that each follows a specific set of unique and separate tools and practices. Each subversive campaign is different because of the social, political, economic, cultural, and historical differences that each country has. Subversive activities are employed based upon an evaluation of these factors. This breakdown merely clarifies who the actors are. While the subversive actors may be different, the soon to be subverted targets are the same. As Paul Blackstock identifies, the ruling and political elites are the ultimate targets of persuasion because they control the physical instruments of state power.
- Internal subversion is actions taken by those within a country and can be used as a tool of power ( e.g. BLM ). In most cases the use or threat of force is the last step of internal subversion.
- External subversion is actions taken by another country in cooperation with those inside the subverted country ( e.g. Syria ) and can be used as a tool of statecraft. Foreign volunteers from another country are not enough to qualify for external subversion. The reason for this is that the individuals may legitimately share the cause of the internal subversive dissidents and have legitimately volunteered. Only when the government itself furnishes a nation with money, arms, supplies, or other help to dissidents can it be called external subversion.
Subversion – Tools and practices
Subversive actions can generally be grouped into three interrelated categories:
- Establishing front groups and penetrating and manipulating existing political parties
- Infiltrating the armed forces, the police, and other institutions of the state, as well as important non-government organizations
- Generating civil unrest through demonstrations, strikes, and boycotts.
Other factors, while not specifically falling into these categories, may also be useful to subversive dissidents. Additionally, many tools may overlap into other groups of tools as well. As an example, subversives may infiltrate an organization for cultural subversion more so than for control. Civil unrest may be used to provoke the government into a violent response.
Infiltration and establishing front groups
In order for a group to be successful in subverting a government, the group itself and its ideas must be seen as an acceptable alternative to the status quo.
However, groups that work toward subverting a government, in many cases, follow ideas and promote goals that on their surface would not receive the support of the population.
Therefore, “to gain public credibility, attract new supporters, generate revenue, and acquire other resources, groups need to undertake political activities that are entirely separate, or appear separate, from the overtly violent activities of those groups. Sometimes this is achieved by infiltrating political parties, labor unions, community groups, and charitable organizations”.
Infiltrating organizations is an important tool because these institutions are already seen as legitimate in the eyes of the people and provide a platform to express their ideas. When infiltrating, the dissident identifies needs of the organization and then links those needs to solutions that his ideology can provide. This was a technique that the Communist Party USA employed. Once the organization has been co-opted, the dissident can then move on to establishing ties with other groups. Furthermore, in addition to gaining possible legitimacy for its ideas the infiltration of these groups can, “bolster political allies, attack government policies, and attract international support”. If some organizations are too difficult to infiltrate, it may be necessary to create new organizations that appear to be independent but are actually under the direction of the subversive group.
The infiltration of state organizations can provide subversive groups the opportunity to do many things to achieve their goals. The infiltration of security forces can provide information about the government’s capabilities and how they plan to address the group’s activities. Infiltration also provides the opportunity to plant false information, lead the government to misallocate resources, to steal funds, weapons, equipment, and other resources, and ultimately aid in weakening and delegitimizing the government. The targets of infiltration are not limited to the groups and institutions mentioned above. Economic industries and universities have also been the target for infiltration. In the case of universities, the liberal arts departments are more prone to subversion than the hard sciences.
Russian and French methods
Dominique Poirier, former employee and specialist in communication warfare in the French intelligence service, DGSE, describes extensively subversion in a book on the practices and methods of this agency, published in 2019, yet he rarely uses the noun “subversion,” remarkably. While presenting and describing extensively the Russian and French methods of subversion and counter-subversion, he explains that the French intelligence community in particular uses the term guerre de l’information, or “information warfare”.
Then information warfare subsumes a number of other nouns, sometimes of Russian origin, each denoting a specific action that may actually describe an action of subversion or counter-subversion. Coming to add to the latter difference in perception of the action of subversion, he further says that information warfare in the French intelligence community is ruled itself by active measures that the DGSE, acting as leading intelligence agency in France, adopted as an “all-encompassing” doctrine. Indeed, active measures in France would regulate not only all intelligence and counterintelligence activities, but also foreign affairs and diplomacy, domestic politics, and even the activities of the major industrial and business companies and groups in this country, since a period he locates between 1980 and 1982. For all the latter would be logically called to partake in a common and coherent effort in intelligence, counterintelligence, influence, and counterinfluence on the French soil as abroad.
Actually, the French intelligence community, and the DGSE in particular, always use the nouns “interference” (ingérence, in French) and “counterinterference” (contre-ingérence) to name “subversion” and “counter-subversion” respectively. The DGSE and one other intelligence agency of this country at least are particularly active in subversive activities abroad, often in a joint effort with the Russian foreign intelligence service, SVR RF, with a focus on the United States, Dominique Poirier specifies from firsthand knowledge and experience spanning the years 1980 to circa 2001. In the latter context, the main methods of subversion he presents as “actions of influence” and their expected results are the followings.
Most French and Russian actions of subversion, and of domestic influence alike, actually are governed by the notion of minority influence as initially defined by social psychologist Serge Moscovici. However, the DGSE in particular designs all such actions in accordance with fundamentals of a scientific approach akin to behaviorism, called “behavioral biology” (biologie comportementale, in French) initially established in the early 1980s by French military scientist Henri Laborit. Additionally, the narrative, or “formal aims” of the action of subversion — when there is one, as behavioral biology focuses on acting on the unconscious, or id, locating in the reptilian brain as defined by Paul D. MacLean — is defined in accordance with fundamentals in epistemology, another Russian import in French information warfare and active measures.
In the latter context, minority influence unfolds in five stages that Dominique Poirier describes as follow.
1. The stage revelation … aims to influence the majority in favor of / against something (social / political / economic / cultural issue). It is initiated by a small minority that spreads the message of the cause. The majority is caught by surprise, but it listens to it because it wants to know what the fuss is about, exactly.
2. In the stage question …, the majority listened to the message, and it reacts negatively to it because the arguments are absurd, excessive, and clash with the dominant scale of values, conservative therefore. Consequently, the majority takes some distances with the minority it now holds in contempt. Yet the minority is unabashed and continues trying to rally more people to what it holds as “the cause” (be it rational and justified or not, regardless, in the present explanation).
3. In the stage incubation …, the minority rallied to its cause a few people only, yet endowed with authority, in addition to others who are respected for their sole fame and notoriety, such as film actors, columnists, recipients of prestigious prizes, etc. All those people are opinion leaders, therefore.
The motives of those opinion leaders range from sincere, selfish, to opportunistic, because a need for greater notoriety and other stakes motivate them.
The latter detail is unimportant to the minority in the absolute, since what matters to it is that “the cause” be heard. In sum, the voice of the minority now has a potent echo chamber that validates its cause. At this stage, a psychological phenomenon settles.
The cause takes a new form that dismisses any further need to prove the validity of its substance. Many in the majority think that they can no longer ignore the minority, although its cause is now reducing to a few crafted slogans that repeat (example: BLM, Antifa).
4. The stage conversion marks the moment at which many in the majority begin to acknowledge the rightfulness of the cause of the minority, even if not sincerely since the arguments supporting its message did not change, or evolved and now are different, or even are no longer mentioned. In reality, the volte-face is largely motivated by a misperception that is a belief in an already ongoing adjustment of values in the majority, or “peer pressure per proxy” initiated by the few celebrities and the media. At this point, the action of influence really transforms into a manipulation.
5. The last stage innovation is reached when the cause of the minority has been widely acknowledged, to a point of being seen now as “a norm universally accepted in the country,” even though this is untrue in the facts.
The hardheaded people who stick to the old values together are the new minority. Those who are embracing the cause believe sincerely that they are not straying nor are influenced. Quite on the contrary, because they ever stick to the scale of values of their country, “which obviously changes along the natural and normal evolution of the society,” they think. Besides, they assume that they are not granted any authority great enough to oppose the voices of the many who together are the public opinion, nor have the nerve to question a cause that famous and respected persons endorse.
Moreover, the people of the former majority now see the remaining dissenters as “excessively conservatives, hardheaded, or even reactionaries,” thus turning the issue and its pro and con arguments upside down.
The change does not lay on an understanding of the cause and of the validity of its arguments, since that is not what brought the change of values to happen, but truly and unconsciously on an innate and therefore hardly repressible need for belonging / belongingness that originally was a herd instinct caused by a need for safety.
Formally speaking, the narrative that is the message of the cause actually is an action of influence, whose substance is strictly regulated, as explained below.
Establishing an action of influence claims the three following elements, plus a fourth when the circumstances are favorable.
1. The context, which is the political / social / economic / cultural situation(s) of the target country.
2. The expectation, which is the need / claim or object of the discontent of the minority or majority.
3. The message of influence, which are the myth and its narrative that the specialists of the intelligence agency design according to what 2. specifies, and to the actions chosen for spreading / voicing them.
4. The echo chamber, which of course consists in making other media relaying the action defined in 3.
Then the action of influence must include the following four steps.
A. Victimization of the minority or majority, which must be presented in terms chosen to arouse passionate feelings in the masses.
B. “Culpabilization” of the ruling elite or assimilated to it, which is the first goal of the action to be reached.
C. Call for redemption, addressed to the ruling elite or assimilated, which is the second goal of the action to be reached.
D. Mending / reparation, which must be elicited from the ruling elite or assimilated, final goal of the action.
It is understood that the action in four steps above actually is a manipulation of the masses rather than an action influence.
Its objective is to force the ruling elite or assimilated to comply to the demand of the minority, since the former collectively is the only one that is not fooled. As the action is all about passion and at no point about reason, reaching successively and successfully each of its four steps consists in winning the minds of the masses along three successive objectives called “battles,” […]
BLM is classic example of the four steps described above
Economics
Economics can be both a tool of the internal and external subversive. For the external subversive simply cutting off credit can cause severe economic problems for a country. Activities of these kinds create human, economic, and political problems that, if not addressed, can challenge the competency of the government.
An example of this is the United States’ relations with Chile in the early 1970s.
Chileans marching in support of Allende.
A crowd of people marching to support the election of Salvador Allende for president in Santiago, Chile.
In an attempt to get Salvador Allende removed from office, the United States tried to weaken the Chilean economy. Chile received little foreign investments and the loss of credit prevented Chile from purchasing vital imports. An economic pressure of this kind prevents an economy from functioning and reduces a country’s standard of living. If the reduction is too great, the people may become willing to support a change in the government’s leadership. The main objective of economic pressures is to make it difficult for the country to fulfill its basic obligations to the citizenry either by cutting off trade or by depriving it of resources.
The internal subversive can also use economics to put pressure on the government through use of the strike. An example of this is the Chilean Truckers’ Strike* during the 1970s. The strike prevented the transport of food staples and forced nearly 50% of the national economy to cease production.
Activities of these kinds create human, economic, and political problems that, if not addressed, can challenge the competency of the government.
*Note: In October 1972, Chile saw the first of what were to be a wave of confrontational strikes led by some of the historically well-off sectors of Chilean society; these received the open support of United States President Richard Nixon. A strike by trucking company owners, which the CIA supported by funding them with US$2 million within the frame of the “September Plan”, began on 9 October 1972.
The 1973 Chilean coup d’état was the overthrow of the socialist President of Chile Salvador Allende by the army and national police.[5][6] It followed an extended period of social unrest and political tension between the opposition-controlled Congress of Chile and the socialist President Salvador Allende, as well as economic warfare ordered by US President Richard Nixon
Coup of September 11, 1973. Bombing of La Moneda (presidential palace)
Agitation and civil unrest
As defined by Laurence Beilenson, agitation is “subversive propaganda by action such as mass demonstrations or the political strike, that is, a strike not intended to benefit the union or workers in the ordinary sense, but intended instead against the government”.
Furthermore, propaganda and agitation, even when they are legal forms of freedom of speech, press, and assembly can still be classified as subversive activity. These tools further demonstrate the need to determine intent of those taking action to identify subversive activities.
Civil unrest creates many of the problems that an insurgency campaign does.
First of all it is an affront to government authority, and if the government is unable to quell the unrest it leads to an erosion of state power.
This loss of power stems from the people’s lack of trust in the government to maintain law and order.
In turn, the people begin to question whether or not new leadership is needed.
Discrediting, disarming, and demoralizing the government is the goal of these activities and the cause of the government’s loss of power.
Civil unrest depletes resources as the government is forced to spend more money on additional police.
Additionally, civil unrest may be used to provoke a response from the government.
In the 1940s communists in France during strikes against the Marshall Plan would, “deliberately provoke the police and gendarmerie into acts of repressive violence in order to exploit the resulting ‘martyrs to the cause’ for propaganda purposes”.
These martyrs and subsequent propaganda can be useful in turning political and social groups against each other. The less violent forms of unrest, “such as worker absenteeism, passive resistance, boycotts, and deliberate attempts to cripple government agencies by ‘overloading the system’ with false reports, can have powerfully disruptive effects, both economically and politically”.
Offensive terror
Offensive terror can be defined as the killing of people, destruction of property, kidnapping, etc.
It is usually a minor part of subversion and, “is used not to exert force in the transfer of state power, but is meant to cower the people or ruler”. Force used in this manner is meant to reinforce other forms of persuasion in addition to cowering the people or leaders. Additionally, much like civil unrest and agitation, it raises the question of whether or not the state can provide security for the population. Terror also provides a practical motivation of physically removing political opponents.
The assassination of an organization’s leader may open the door to a successor that is more friendly to the subversives position or possibly someone that has successfully infiltrated the organization and is in fact one of the subversives.
Bribery
Bribery is one of the most common tools of subversion. Most societies see bribery as a form of corruption and it used as a subversive tool because it, “implies the undermining of existing rules of political or moral conduct”. It can also be one of the less reliable tools as well. Bribed officials are only useful if they take action. However actions taken over a period of time draw suspicion from the public. The official must be able to carefully conceal their actions or perform only key functions and action. For these reasons bribed officials are most effective when they are asked to take immediate action. In the case of external subversion, bribery is usually used for influence rather than for actions.
PS JFK 1961 Speech
THE PRESIDENT AND THE PRESS: ADDRESS BEFORE THE AMERICAN NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS ASSOCIATION, APRIL 27, 1961
Fragment of the President John F. Kennedy Speech
Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, New York City,
April 27, 1961
The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it. Even today, there is little value in opposing the threat of a closed society by imitating its arbitrary restrictions. Even today, there is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. That I do not intend to permit to the extent that it is in my control. And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know.
But I do ask every publisher, every editor, and every newsman in the nation to reexamine his own standards, and to recognize the nature of our country’s peril. In time of war, the government and the press have customarily joined in an effort based largely on self-discipline, to prevent unauthorized disclosures to the enemy. In time of “clear and present danger,” the courts have held that even the privileged rights of the First Amendment must yield to the public’s need for national security.
Today no war has been declared–and however fierce the struggle may be, it may never be declared in the traditional fashion. Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe. The survival of our friends is in danger. And yet no war has been declared, no borders have been crossed by marching troops, no missiles have been fired.
If the press is awaiting a declaration of war before it imposes the self-discipline of combat conditions, then I can only say that no war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent.
It requires a change in outlook, a change in tactics, a change in missions–by the government, by the people, by every businessman or labor leader, and by every newspaper. For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence–on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations.
Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed. It conducts the Cold War, in short, with a war-time discipline no democracy would ever hope or wish to match.
Nevertheless, every democracy recognizes the necessary restraints of national security–and the question remains whether those restraints need to be more strictly observed if we are to oppose this kind of attack as well as outright invasion.
Illuminati: The Real Story
https://www.facebook.com/IIKAAOPILI/videos/969775983443010/
Subject Related
- https://blog.world-mysteries.com/modern-world/america-freedom-to-fascism-new-world-order/
- https://blog.world-mysteries.com/modern-world/the-usa-presidents-and-their-wars/
- https://blog.world-mysteries.com/modern-world/who-benefits-from-wars/
- https://blog.world-mysteries.com/ancient-writings/who-wrote-that-script/
Subversive Propaganda – Examples
Note: During just one generation, the entertainment industry went from producing relatively modest TV and movies content, to making content that is extremely violent, disturbing and vulgar.
Shadows of Liberty (2012) – Examines the new media monopoly by corporations in America versus the public battle for truth and democracy.
90% of the media in the USA are controlled by five big for-profit-conglomerats, creating a media monopoly that manipulates our political, economical, and social world. Shadows of Liberty reveals the extraordinary truth behind the news media: censorship, cover-ups and corporate control. Filmmaker Jean-Philippe Tremblay takes an intrepid journey through the darker corridors of the American media landscape, where global conglomerates call the shots. For decades, their overwhelming influence has distorted news journalism and compromised its values. In highly revealing stories, renowned journalists, activists and academics give insider accounts of a broken media system. Controversial news reports are suppressed, people are censored for speaking out, and lives are shattered as the arena for public expression is turned into a private profit zone. Tracing the story of media manipulation through the years, Shadows of Liberty poses a crucial question: why have we let a handful of powerful corporations write the news? We’re left in no doubt – media reform is urgent and freedom of the press is fundamental. With Danny Glover, Julian Assange, Dan Rather, Roberta Baskin, and many others. ILoveDocs.com is your YouTube destination for full-length feature documentaries.
Don’t miss an upload: https://youtube.com/c/ILoveDocs
Who’s funding the migrant caravans? (2019)
Ever since I started reporting on the migrant crisis at the U.S. southern border, there’s a question I’ve been asking: Is somebody funding this mass migration? Is someone paying for these migrants’ travel, food, and shelter—and if so, who? What’s the agenda?
[…]
One customs officer asked me: “Why do you think these people are coming?”
I replied, “I don’t know. They tell me they’re fleeing violence and poverty, and someone told them there was a way to get asylum here in the U.S.”
“Ah!” the officer exclaimed. “I’m glad you said someone told them—because this is all happening all of a sudden, and someone is behind this.” Another officer in the next stall who overheard our conversation muttered that it was probably a far-left activist group. It reminded me of conspiracy theories I’ve heard about Marxist groups trying to derail our national structures.
I’ve spoken to a leader of one activist group that has faced the brunt of such accusations. Pueblo Sin Fronteras is a leftist group that helped organize at least three U.S.-bound migrant caravans in 2017 and early 2018. I met one leader, Alex Mensing, at the shelter he operates in a rural, hilly part of Tijuana.
Source: https://world.wng.org/2019/04/who_s_funding_the_migrant_caravans
https://www.facebook.com/IIKAAOPILI/videos/969775983443010/
PS What is something about human psychology that almost nobody knows?
Don’t read if you don’t want to take the red pill.
NOTE: This information explains what is going on nowadays …
Humans could never be allowed to rule in a democracy.
In the documentary called “The Century Of The Self”, you explore how today’s society came up to be and how human nature was shaped during this process.
Sigmund Freud (Austrian neurologist) believed that humans are irrational beings, dominated by fears and desires which lurked in their subconscious mind. You could never allow such irrational creatures to be in charge of a democratic system.
Edward Bernays — Freud’s nephew who lived in the USA—soon realized the potential of Freud’s insights and swiftly put them into practice assisting Woodrow Wilson in convincing the American public that by joining WW1 the US would be helping bring democracy to Europe. Given the success of this wartime propaganda Bernays then looked to its implementation during peacetime.
Having seen how effective propaganda could be during war, Bernays wondered whether it might prove equally useful during peacetime.
Yet propaganda had acquired a somewhat pejorative connotation (which would be further magnified during World War II), so Bernays promoted the term “public relations.”
Drawing on the insights of his Uncle Sigmund – a relationship Bernays was always quick to mention – he developed an approach he dubbed “the engineering of consent.”
He provided leaders the means to “control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing about it.” To do so, it was necessary to appeal not to the rational part of the mind, but the unconscious.
Bernays knew he had to build a social system in which the masses were not allowed to rule. He had to give them the illusion of a democracy.
From his seminal work of 1928, Propaganda, comes this chilling quote –
The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in a democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, and our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of…. It is they who pull the wires that control the public mind.
The Nazis implemented the same concepts as Bernays, but they abandoned altogether the illusion of a democracy. They chose instead a straightforward approach: the energy of the masses should be channeled into a united force that would maintain the nation glued together.
Bernays’ plan was to transform the masses into passive consumers.
As long as people’s hidden desires were satisfied and exponentially multiplied, the Government could keep on doing whatever it saw fit.
Through this transformation, people became obedient workers of a society that spoon-fed them the illusion of democracy and well-being.
One of the greatest stunts Edward Bernays has ever pulled off was when he got American women to smoke—an unprecedented event in USA’s history.
You see, Bernays had to go beyond the obvious.
Cigarettes were thought of as a male products. No one thought a woman would smoke. And then he realized—he didn’t have to use logic to make women smoke.
Bernays paid a group of women to go on a smoking march. He subtly spread rumors to journalists about the upcoming march.
And so it happened.
Dozens of women marched on the streets carrying “torches of freedom”.
Yes—cigarettes had become a symbol of freedom.
The news spread like a wildfire throughout the USA thanks to Bernays’ rumors.
It resonated so well with the masses because they associated cigarettes with freedom—one of the USA’s long-lasting values. By appealing to their emotional side, women started to smoke.
Bernays achieved his mission and the tobacco industry grew larger as their profit now had increased tenfold due to the gigantic success of Bernays’ campaign.
From one success to another, Bernays hired countless psychologists to analyze the behavior of people and better understand how they could satisfy their irrational desires.
Socialism failed where capitalism thrived.
The communists tried to suppress these subconscious, irrational forces hidden within the humans.
It always failed.
The Americans had to find a better tactic to prevent the masses from revolting against the government in times of peace.
During the war, all governments used this chance to channel human’s primitive forces and turn them into mindless killing machines.
But you could not do the same in times of peace.
The consumer society of today is a society built on lies and deceit.
We have practically been trained to seek more and more goods that are not a necessity in itself but rather a means to satisfy our constant wants.
I invite you to watch the documentary on Youtube for the full experience and a complete understanding of the situation.
Here is the link to the documentary: The Century Of The Self.
Further reading: The manipulation of the American mind: Edward Bernays and the birth of public relations
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