THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION: ..//.. this is long but I thought worth the read,Marty

[Guest guest]

THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION:

WHY AMERICANS WILL BELIEVE ALMOST ANYTHING

- Tim O'Shea

Aldous Huxley's inspired 1954 essay detailed the

vivid, mind-

expanding,

multisensory insights of his mescaline adventures. By

altering his

brain

chemistry with natural psychotropics, Huxley tapped

into a rich and

fluid

world of shimmering, indescribable beauty and power.

With his

neurosensory

input thus triggered, Huxley was able to enter that

parallel universe

described by every mystic and space captain in

recorded history.

Whether by

hallucination or epiphany, Huxley sought to remove all

controls, all

filters

all cultural conditioning from his perceptions and to

confront

Nature or

the World or Reality first-hand - in its

unpasteurized, unedited,

unretouched, infinite rawness.

Those bonds are much harder to break today, half a

century later. We

are the

most conditioned, programmed beings the world has ever

known. Not

only are

our thoughts and attitudes continually being shaped

and molded; our

very

awareness of the whole design seems like it is being

subtly and

inexorably

erased. The doors of our perception are carefully and

precisely

regulated.

Who cares, right?

It is an exhausting and endless task to keep

explaining to people

how most

issues of conventional wisdom are scientifically

implanted in the

public

consciousness by a thousand media clips per day. In an

effort to

save time,

I would like to provide just a little background on

the handling of

information in this country. Once the basic principles

are

illustrated about

how our current system of media control arose

historically, the

reader might

be more apt to question any given story in today's

news.

If everybody believes something, it's probably wrong.

We call that

Conventional Wisdom.

In America, conventional wisdom that has mass

acceptance is usually

contrived: somebody paid for it. Examples:

Pharmaceuticals restore health

Vaccination brings immunity

The cure for cancer is just around the corner

Menopause is a disease condition

When a child is sick, he needs immediate antibiotics

When a child has a fever he needs Tylenol

Hospitals are safe and clean.

America has the best health care in the world.

Americans have the best health in the world.

Milk is a good source of calcium.

You never outgrow your need for milk.

Vitamin C is ascorbic acid.

Aspirin prevents heart attacks.

Heart drugs improve the heart.

Back and neck pain are the only reasons for spinal

adjustment.

No child can get into school without being vaccinated.

The FDA thoroughly tests all drugs before they go on

the market.

Pregnancy is a serious medical condition

Chemotherapy and radiation are effective cures for

cancer

When your child is diagnosed with an ear infection,

antibiotics

should be

given immediately 'just in case'

Ear tubes are for the good of the child.

Estrogen drugs prevent osteoporosis after menopause.

Pediatricians are the most highly trained of al

medical specialists.

The purpose of the health care industry is health.

HIV is the cause of AIDS.

AZT is the cure.

Without vaccines, infectious diseases will return

Fluoride in the city water protects your teeth

Flu shots prevent the flu.

Vaccines are thoroughly tested before being placed on

the Mandated

Schedule.

Doctors are certain that the benefits of vaccines far

outweigh any

possible

risks.

There is a terrorist threat of smallpox.

The NASDAQ is a natural market controlled only by

supply and demand.

Chronic pain is a natural consequence of aging.

Soy is your healthiest source of protein.

Insulin shots cure diabetes.

After we take out your gall bladder you can eat

anything you want

Allergy medicine will cure allergies.

An airliner can be flown into a 100-storey building

and can cause

that

building to collapse on its own footprint. Twice.

This is a list of illusions, that have cost billions

to conjure up.

Did you

ever wonder why most people in this country think

generally the same

about

most of the above issues? Or why you never see the

President speaking

publicly unless he is reading?

HOW THIS SET-UP GOT STARTED

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

Rampton pull

together

some compelling data describing the science of

creating public

opinion in

America. They trace modern public influence back to

the early part

of the

last century, highlighting the work of guys like

L. Bernays,

the

Father of Spin.

From his own amazing 1928 chronicle Propaganda, we

learn how

L.

Bernays took the ideas of his famous uncle Sigmund

Freud himself, and

applied them to the emerging science of mass

persuasion. The only

difference

was that instead of using these principles to uncover

hidden themes

in the

human unconscious, the way Freudian psychology does,

Bernays studied

these

same ideas in order to learn how to mask agendas and

to create

illusions

that deceive and misrepresent, for marketing purposes.

THE FATHER OF SPIN

L. Bernays dominated the PR industry until the

1940s, and was

a

significant force for another 40 years after that.

(Tye) During that

time,

Bernays took on hundreds of diverse assignments to

create a public

perception about some idea or product. A few examples:

As a neophyte with the Committee on Public

Information, one of

Bernays'

first assignments was to help sell the First World War

to the

American

public with the idea to " Make the World Safe for

Democracy. " (Ewen)

We've

seen this phrase in every war and US military

involvement since that

time.

A few years later, Bernays set up a stunt to

popularize the notion

of women

smoking cigarettes. In organizing the 1929 Easter

Parade in New York

City,

Bernays showed himself as a force to be reckoned with.

He organized

the

Torches of Liberty Brigade in which suffragettes

marched in the

parade

smoking cigarettes as a mark of women's liberation.

After that one

event,

women would be able to feel secure about destroying

their own lungs

in

public, the same way that men have always done.

Bernays popularized the idea of bacon for breakfast.

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

liaison between the

tobacco

industry and the American Medical Association that

lasted for nearly

50

years. They proved to all and sundry that cigarettes

were beneficial

to

health. Just look at ads in old issues of Life, Look,

Time or

Journal of the

American Medical Association from the 40s and 50s in

which doctors

are

recommending this or that brand of cigarettes as

promoting healthful

digestion, or whatever.

During the next several decades Bernays and his

colleagues evolved

the

principles by which masses of people could be

generally swayed

through

messages repeated over and over, hundreds of times per

week.

Once the economic power of media became apparent,

other countries of

the

world rushed to follow our lead. But Bernays remained

the gold

standard. He

was the source to whom the new PR leaders across the

world would

always

defer. Even f Goebbels, Hitler's minister of

propaganda, closely

studied

the principles of Bernays when Goebbels was

developing the

popular

rationale he would use to convince the Germans that in

order to

purify their

race they had to kill 6 million of the impure.

(Stauber)

SMOKE AND MIRRORS

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

create a

desired

image that would put a particular product or concept

in a desirable

light.

He never saw himself as a master hoodwinker, but

rather as a

beneficent

servant of humanity, providing a valuable service.

Bernays described

the

public as a 'herd that needed to be led.' And this

herdlike thinking

makes

people " susceptible to leadership. " Bernays never

deviated from his

fundamental axiom to " control the masses without their

knowing it. "

The best

PR happens with the people unaware that they are being

manipulated.

Stauber describes Bernays' rationale like this:

" the scientific manipulation of public opinion was

necessary to

overcome

chaos and conflict in a democratic society. "

-- Trust Us, p 42

These early mass persuaders postured themselves as

performing a moral

service for humanity in general. Democracy was too

good for people;

they

needed to be told what to think, because they were

incapable of

rational

thought by themselves. Here's a paragraph from

Bernays' Propaganda:

" Those who manipulate the unseen mechanism of society

constitute an

invisible government which is the true ruling power of

our country.

We are

governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed, our

ideas suggested

largely

by men we have never heard of. This is a logical

result of the way

in which

our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of

human beings

must

cooperate in this manner if they are to live together

as a smoothly

functioning society. In almost every act of our lives

whether in the

sphere

of politics or business in our social conduct or our

ethical

thinking, we

are dominated by the relatively small number of

persons who

understand the

mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It

is they who

pull the

wires that control the public mind. "

A tad different from Jefferson's view on the

subject:

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

the society

but the

people themselves; and if we think them not

enlightened enough to

exercise

that control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy

is not take it

from

them, but to inform their discretion. "

Inform their discretion. Bernays believed that only a

few possessed

the

necessary insight into the Big Picture to be entrusted

with this

sacred task

And luckily, he saw himself as one of that elect.

HERE COMES THE MONEY

Once the possibilities of applying Freudian psychology

to mass media

were

glimpsed, Bernays soon had more corporate clients than

he could

handle.

Global corporations fell all over themselves courting

the new Image

Makers.

There were dozens of goods and services and ideas to

be sold to a

susceptible public. Over the years, these players have

had the money

to make

their images happen. A few examples:

Philip

Pfizer

Union Carbide

Allstate

Monsanto

Eli Lilly

tobacco industry

Ciba Geigy

lead industry

Coors

DuPont

Shell Oil

Chlorox

Standard Oil

Procter & Gamble

Boeing

Dow Chemical

General Motors

Goodyear

General Mills

THE PLAYERS

Dozens of PR firms have emerged to answer the demand

for spin

control. Among

them:

Burson-Marsteller

Edelman

Hill & Knowlton

Kamer-Singer

Ketchum

Mongovin, Biscoe, and Duchin

BSMG

Ruder-Finn

Though world-famous within the PR industry, these are

names we don't

know,

and for good reason. The best PR goes unnoticed. For

decades they

have

created the opinions that most of us were raised with,

on virtually

any

issue which has the remotest commercial value,

including:

pharmaceutical drugs

vaccines

medicine as a profession

alternative medicine

fluoridation of city water

chlorine

household cleaning products

tobacco

dioxin

global warming

leaded gasoline

cancer research and treatment

pollution of the oceans

forests and lumber

images of celebrities, including damage control

crisis and disaster management

genetically modified foods

aspartame

food additives; processed foods

dental amalgams

autism

LESSON #1

Bernays learned early on that the most effective way

to create

credibility

for a product or an image was by " independent

third-party "

endorsement. For

example, if General Motors were to come out and say

that global

warming is a

hoax thought up by some liberal tree-huggers, people

would suspect

GM's

motives, since GM's fortune is made by selling

automobiles. If

however some

independent research institute with a very credible

sounding name

like the

Global Climate Coalition comes out with a scientific

report that

says global

warming is really a fiction, people begin to get

confused and to

have doubts

about the original issue.

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

inspired by

genius, he set

up " more institutes and foundations than Rockefeller

and Carnegie

combined. "

(Stauber p 45) Quietly financed by the industries

whose products

were being

evaluated, these " independent " research agencies would

churn

out " scientific

studies and press materials that could create any

image their

handlers

wanted. Such front groups are given high-sounding

names like:

Temperature Research Foundation

International Food Information Council

Consumer Alert

The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition

Air Hygiene Foundation

Industrial Health Federation

International Food Information Council

Manhattan Institute

Center for Produce Quality

Tobacco Institute Research Council

Cato Institute

American Council on Science and Health

Global Climate Coalition

Alliance for Better Foods

Sound pretty legit don't they?

CANNED NEWS RELEASES

As Stauber explains, these organizations and hundreds

of others like

them

are front groups whose sole mission is to advance the

image of the

global

corporations who fund them, like those listed on page

2 above. This

is

accomplished in part by an endless stream of 'press

releases'

announcing

breakthrough " research to every radio station and

newspaper in the

country.

(Robbins) Many of these canned reports read like

straight news, and

indeed

are purposely molded in the news format. This saves

journalists the

trouble

of researching the subjects on their own, especially

on topics about

which

they know very little. Entire sections of the release

or in the case

of

video news releases, the whole thing can be just

lifted intact, with

no

editing, given the byline of the reporter or newspaper

or TV

station - and

voilá! Instant news - copy and paste. Written by

corporate PR firms.

Does this really happen? Every single day, since the

1920s when the

idea of

the News Release was first invented by Ivy Lee.

(Stauber, p 22)

Sometimes as

many as half the stories appearing in an issue of the

Wall St.

Journal are

based solely on such PR press releases.. (22) These

types of stories

are

mixed right in with legitimately researched stories.

Unless you have

done

the research yourself, you won't be able to tell the

difference. So

when we

see new " research " being cited, we should always first

suspect that

the

source is another industry-backed front group. A

common tip-off is

the word

breakthrough. "

THE LANGUAGE OF SPIN

As 1920s spin pioneers like Ivy Lee and Bernays

gained more

experience, they began to formulate rules and

guidelines for

creating public

opinion. They learned quickly that mob psychology must

focus on

emotion, not

facts. Since the mob is incapable of rational thought,

motivation

must be

based not on logic but on presentation. Here are some

of the axioms

of the

new science of PR:

technology is a religion unto itself

if people are incapable of rational thought, real

democracy is

dangerous

important decisions should be left to experts

when reframing issues, stay away from substance;

create images

never state a clearly demonstrable lie

Words are very carefully chosen for their emotional

impact. Here's an

example. A front group called the International Food

Information

Council

handles the public's natural aversion to genetically

modified foods.

Trigger

words are repeated all through the text. Now in the

case of GM

foods, the

public is instinctively afraid of these experimental

new creations

which

have suddenly popped up on our grocery shelves and

which are said to

have

DNA alterations. The IFIC wants to reassure the public

of the safety

of GM

foods. So it avoids words like:

enfoods

Hitler

biotech

chemical

DNA

experiments

manipulate

money

safety

scientists

radiation

roulette

gene-splicing

gene gun

random

Instead, good PR for GM foods contains words like:

hybrids

natural order

beauty

choice

bounty

cross-breeding

diversity

earth

farmer

organic

wholesome

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

fact that GM

foods

are not hybrids that have been subjected to the slow

and careful

scientific

methods of real cross-breeding doesn't really matter.

This is

pseudoscience,

not science. Form is everything and substance just a

passing myth.

(Trevanian)

Who do you think funds the International Food

Information Council?

Take a

wild guess. Right - Monsanto, DuPont, Frito-Lay, Coca

Cola,

Nutrasweet -

those in a position to make fortunes from GM foods.

(Stauber p 20)

CHARACTERISTICS OF GOOD PROPAGANDA

As the science of mass control evolved, PR firms

developed further

guidelines for effective copy. Here are some of the

gems:

dehumanize the attacked party by labeling and name

calling

speak in glittering generalities using emotionally

positive words

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

stall for time;

distract

get endorsements from celebrities, churches, sports

figures, street

people -

anyone who has no expertise in the subject at hand

the 'plain folks' ruse: us billionaires are just like

you

when minimizing outrage, don't say anything memorable

when minimizing outrage, point out the benefits of

what just happened

when minimizing outrage, avoid moral issues

Keep this list. Start watching for these techniques.

Not hard to

find - look

at today's paper or tonight's TV news. See what

they're doing; these

guys

are good!

SCIENCE FOR HIRE

PR firms have become very sophisticated in the

preparation of news

releases.

They have learned how to attach the names of famous

scientists to

research

that those scientists have not even looked at.

(Stauber, p 201) It's

a

common practice. In this way, the editors of

newspapers and TV news

shows

are themselves often unaware that an individual

release is a total PR

fabrication. Or at least they have " deniability, "

right?

Stauber tells the amazing story of how leaded gas came

into the

picture. In

1922, General Motors discovered that adding lead to

gasoline gave

cars more

horsepower. When there was some concern about safety,

GM paid the

Bureau of

Mines to do some fake " testing " and publish spurious

research

that 'proved'

that inhalation of lead was harmless. Enter

Kettering.

Founder of the world famous Sloan-Kettering Memorial

Institute for

medical

research, Kettering also happened to be an

executive with

General

Motors. By some strange coincidence, we soon have

Sloan-Kettering

issuing

reports stating that lead occurs naturally in the body

and that the

body has

a way of eliminating low level exposure. Through its

association

with The

Industrial Hygiene Foundation and PR giant Hill &

Knowlton, Sloane-

Kettering

opposed all anti-lead research for years. (Stauber p

92). Without

organized

scientific opposition, for the next 60 years more and

more gasoline

became

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

leaded.

Finally it became too obvious to hide that lead was a

major

carcinogen,

which they knew all along, and leaded gas was phased

out in the late

1980s.

But during those 60 years, it is estimated that some

30 million tons

of lead

were released in vapor form onto American streets and

highways. 30

million

tons. (Stauber)

That is PR, my friends.

JUNK SCIENCE

In 1993 a guy named Huber wrote a new book and

coined a new

term. The

book was Galileo's Revenge and the term was junk

science . Huber's

shallow

thesis was that real science supports technology,

industry, and

progress.

Anything else was suddenly junk science. Not

surprisingly, Stauber

explains

how Huber's book was supported by the industry-backed

Manhattan

Institute.

Huber's book was generally dismissed not only because

it was so

poorly

written, but because it failed to realize one fact:

true scientific

research

begins with no conclusions. Real scientists are

seeking the truth

because

they do not yet know what the truth is.

True scientific method goes like this:

1. form a hypothesis

2. make predictions for that hypothesis

3. test the predictions

4. reject or revise the hypothesis based on the

research findings

Boston University scientist Dr. Ozonoff explains

that ideas in

science

are themselves like " living organisms, that must be

nourished,

supported,

and cultivated with resources for making them grow and

flourish. "

(Stauber p

205) Great ideas that don't get this financial support

because the

commercial angles are not immediately obvious - these

ideas wither

and die.

Another way you can often distinguish real science

from phony is

that real

science points out flaws in its own research. Phony

science pretends

there

were no flaws.

THE REAL JUNK SCIENCE

Contrast this with modern PR and its constant

pretensions to sound

science.

Corporate sponsored research, whether it's in the area

of drugs, GM

foods,

or chemistry begins with predetermined conclusions. It

is the job of

the

scientists then to prove that these conclusions are

true, because of

the

economic upside that proof will bring to the

industries paying for

that

research. This invidious approach to science has

shifted the entire

focus of

research in America during the past 50 years, as any

true scientist

is

likely to admit. If a drug company is spending 10

million dollars on

a

research project to prove the viability of some new

durg, and the

preliminary results start coming back about the

dangers of that dug,

what

happens? Right. No more funding. The well dries up.

What is being

promoted

under such a system? Science? Or rather Entrenched

Medical Error? "

Stauber documents the increasing amount of corporate

sponsorship of

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

the pursuit of

knowledge. Scientists lament that research has become

just another

commodity

something bought and sold. (Crossen)

THE TWO MAIN TARGETS OF " SOUND SCIENCE "

It is shocking when Stauber shows how the vast

majority of corporate

PR

today opposes any research that seeks to protect

public health

the environment

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

the phrase " junk

science, " it is in a context of defending something

that threatens

either

the environment or our health. This makes sense when

one realizes

that money

changes hands only by selling the illusion of health

and the

illusion of

environmental protection or the illusion of health.

True public

health and

real preservation of the earth's environment have very

low market

value.

Stauber thinks it ironic that industry's

self-proclaimed debunkers

of junk

science are usually non-scientists themselves. (255)

Here again they

can do

this because the issue is not science, but the

creation of images.

THE LANGUAGE OF ATTACK

When PR firms attack legitimate environmental groups

and alternative

medicine people, they again use special words which

will carry an

emotional

punch:

outraged

sound science

junk science

sensible

scaremongering

responsible

phobia

hoax

alarmist

hysteria

The next time you are reading a newspaper article

about an

environmental or

health issue, note how the author shows bias by using

the above

terms. This

is the result of very specialized training.

Another standard PR tactic is to use the rhetoric of

the

environmentalists

themselves to defend a dangerous and untested product

that poses an

actual

threat to the environment. This we see constantly in

the PR

smokescreen that

surrounds genetically modified foods. They talk about

how GM foods

are

necessary to grow more food and to end world hunger,

when the

reality is

that GM foods actually have lower yields per acre than

natural crops.

(Stauber p 173) The grand design sort of comes into

focus once you

realize

that almost all GM foods have been created by the

sellers of

herbicides and

pesticides so that those plants can withstand greater

amounts of

herbicides

and pesticides. (see The Magic Bean)

THE MIRAGE OF PEER REVIEW

Publish or perish is the classic dilemma of every

research

scientist. That

means whoever expects funding for the next research

project had

better get

the current research paper published in the best

scientific

journals. And we

all know that the best scientific journals, like JAMA,

New England

Journal,

British Medical Journal, etc. are peer-reviewed. Peer

review means

that any

articles which actually get published, between all

those full color

drug ads

and pharmaceutical centerfolds, have been reviewed and

accepted by

some

really smart guys with a lot of credentials. The

assumption is, if

the

article made it past peer review, the data and the

conclusions of the

research study have been thoroughly checked out and

bear some

resemblance to

physical reality.

But there are a few problems with this hot little set

up. First off,

money

..

Even though prestigious venerable medical journals

pretend to be so

objective and scientific and incorruptible, the

reality is that they

face

the same type of being called to account that all

glossy magazines

must

confront: don't antagonize your advertisers. Those

full-page drug

ads in the

best journals cost millions, Jack. How long will a

pharmaceutical

company

pay for ad space in a magazine that prints some very

sound scientific

research paper that attacks the safety of the drug in

the

centerfold? Think

about it. The editors may lack moral fibre, but they

aren't stupid.

Another problem is the conflict of interest thing.

There's a formal

requirement for all medical journals that any

financial ties between

an

author and a product manufacturer be disclosed in the

article. In

practice,

it never happens. A study done in 1997 of 142 medical

journals did

not find

even one such disclosure. (Wall St. Journal, 2 Feb 99)

A 1998 study from the New England Journal of Medicine

found that 96%

of peer

reviewed articles had financial ties to the drug they

were studying.

(Stelfox, 1998) Big shock, huh? Any disclosures? Yeah,

right. This

study

should be pointed out whenever somebody starts getting

too pompous

about the

objectivity of peer review, like they often do.

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

company may

simply pay

$100,000 to a journal to have a favorable article

printed. (Stauber,

p 204)

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

the New

England

Journal ran an article that followed the research of

R. Slutsky MD

over a

seven year period. During that time, Dr. Slutsky had

published 137

articles

in a number of peer-reviewed journals. NEJM found that

in at least

60 of

these 137, there was evidence of major scientific

fraud and

misrepresentation, including:

reporting data for experiments that were never done

reporting measurements that were never made

reporting statistical analyses that were never done

o Engler

Dean Black PhD, describes what he the calls the Babel

Effect

that results when this very common and frequently

undetected

scientific

fraud in peer-reviewed journals is quoted by other

researchers, who

are in

turn re-quoted by still others, and so on.

Want to see something that sort of re-frames this

whole discussion?

Check

out the Mc's ads which routinely appear in the

Journal of the

American

Medical Association. Then keep in mind that this is

the same

publication

that for almost 50 years ran cigarette ads proclaiming

the health

benefits

of tobacco. (Robbins)

Very scientific, oh yes.

KILL YOUR TV?

Hope this chapter has given you a hint to start

reading newspaper and

magazine articles a little differently, and perhaps

start watching

TV news

shows with a slightly different attitude than you had

before. Always

ask,

what are they selling here, and who's selling it? And

if you

actually follow

up on Stauber & Rampton's book and check out some of

the other

resources

below, you might even glimpse the possibility of

advancing your life

one

quantum simply by ceasing to subject your brain to

mass media.

That's right

- no more newspapers, no more TV news, no more Time

magazine or

People

magazine Newsweek. You could actually do that. Just

think what you

could do

with the extra time alone.

Really feel like you need to " relax " or find out

" what's going on in

the

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

of the past

couple of

years for a minute. Do you really suppose the major

stories that have

dominated headlines and TV news have been " what is

going on in the

world? "

Do you actually think there's been nothing going on

besides the

contrived

tech slump, the contrived power shortages, the

re-filtered accounts

of

foreign violence and disaster, even the new accounts

of US

retribution in

the Middle East, making Afghanistan safe for

democracy, bending

Saddam to

our will, etc., and all the other non-stories that the

puppeteers

dangle

before us every day? What about when they get a big

one, like with

OJ or

Lewinsky or the Oklahoma city bombing? Or now

with the Neo-

Nazi

aftermath of 9/11. Or the contrived war against

Saddam? Do we really

need to

know all that detail, day after day? Do we have any

way of verifying

all

that detail, even if we wanted to? What is the purpose

of news? To

inform

the public? Hardly.

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

state of fear and

uncertainty

so that they'll watch again tomorrow to see how much

worse things

got and to

be subjected to the same advertising.

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

media

mastery -

simplicity. The invisible hand. Like Bernays

said, the people

must be

controlled without them knowing it.

Consider this: what was really going on in the world

all that time

they were

distracting us with all that stupid vexatious daily

smokescreen? We

have no

way of knowing. And most of it doesn't even concern us

even if we

could know

it. Fear and uncertainty -- that's what keeps people

coming back for

more.

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

one step further:

What would you lose from your life if you stopped

watching TV and

stopped

reading newspapers and glossy magazines altogether?

Whoa!

Would your life really suffer any financial, moral,

intellectual,

spiritual,

or academic loss from such a decision?

Do you really need to have your family continually

absorbing the

illiterate,

amoral, phony, culturally bereft, desperately

brainless values of

the people

featured in the average nightly TV program? Are these

fake,

programmed

robots " normal " ?

Do you need to have your life values constantly

spoonfed to you?

Are those shows really amusing, or just a necessary

distraction to

keep you

from looking at reality, or trying to figure things

out yourself by

doing a

little independent reading? Or perhaps from having a

life?

Name one example of how your life is improved by

watching TV news and

reading the evening paper or the glossy magazines.

What measurable

gain is

there for you?

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

time that would

actually

expand awareness?

PLANET OF THE APES?

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

dumber year by

year.

Look at the presidents we've been choosing lately.

Ever notice the

blatant

grammar mistakes so ubiquitous in today's advertising

and billboards?

Literacy is marginal in most American secondary

schools. Three-

fourths of

California high school seniors can't read well enough

to pass their

exit

exams. ( SJ Mercury 20 Jul 01) If you think other

parts of the

country are

smarter, try this one: hand any high school senior a

book by Dumas

or Jane

Austen, and ask them to open to any random page and

just read one

paragraph

out loud. Go ahead, do it. SAT scales are arbitrarily

shifted lower

and

lower to disguise how dumb kids are getting year by

year. (ADD: A

Designer

Disease) At least 10% have documented " learning

disabilities, " which

are

reinforced and rewarded by special treatment and

special drugs. Ever

hear of

anyone failing a grade any more?

Or observe the intellectual level of the average movie

which these

days may

only last one or two weeks in the theatres, especially

if it has

insufficient explosions, chase scenes, silicone, fake

martial arts,

and

cretinesque dialogue. Doesn't anyone else notice how

badly these 30

or 40

movie stars " we keep seeing over and over in the same

few plots must

now

overact to get their point across to an ever-dimming

audience?

Radio? Consider the low mental qualifications of the

falsely animated

corporate simians they hire as DJs -- seems like

they're only

allowed to

have 50 thoughts, which they just repeat at random.

And at what

point did

popular music cease to require the study of any

musical instrument

or theory

whatsoever, not to mention lyric? Perhaps we just

don't understand

this

emerging art form, right? The Darwinism of MTV - apes

descended from

man.

Ever notice how most articles in any of the glossy

magazines sound

like they

were all written by the same guy? And this writer just

graduated

from junior

college? And yet he has all the correct opinions on

social issues, no

original ideas, and that shallow, smug, homogenized

corporate

omniscience,

which enables him to assure us that everything is

fine...

All this is great news for the PR industry - makes

their job that

much

easier. Not only are very few paying attention to the

process of

conditioning; fewer are capable of understanding it

even if somebody

explained it to them.

TEA IN THE CAFETERIA

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

cup of tea.

And as

you're about to sit down you see your friend way

across the room. So

you put

the tea down and walk across the room and talk to your

friend for a

few

minutes. Now, coming back to your tea, are you just

going to pick it

up and

drink it? Remember, this is a crowded place and you've

just left

your tea

unattended for several minutes. You've given anybody

in that room

access to

your tea.

Why should your mind be any different? Turning on the

TV, or

uncritically

absorbing mass publications every day - these

activities allow

access to our

minds by " just anyone " - anyone who has an agenda,

anyone with the

resources

to create a public image via popular media. As we've

seen above, just

because we read something or see something on TV

doesn't mean it's

true or

worth knowing. So the idea here is, like the tea,

perhaps the mind

is also

worth guarding, worth limiting access to it.

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

capital. Why waste it

allowing our potential, our scope of awareness, our

personality, our

values

to be shaped, crafted, and boxed up according to the

whims of the

mass

panderers? There are many important issues that are

crucial to our

physical,

mental, and spiritual well-being which require time

and study. If

it's an

issue where money is involved, objective data won't be

so easy to

obtain.

Remember, if everybody knows something, that image has

been bought

and paid

for.

Real knowledge takes a little effort, a little

excavation down at

least one

level below what " everybody knows. "

It's possible that Americans are

Single most manipulated people on

Earth.

How did we get this way?

Here's some essential history you weren't

Taught in school.

http://www.brassche cktv.com/ page/44.html

Spiritual freedom is my birthright.

I am a free thinker. I am able to rise above mental

prejudices and stereotypes of others.

I am a free thinker. Nobody and nothing can manipulate

me or deceive me.

I am a free thinker. I freely choose truth and love.

Today, I embrace a greater degree of spiritual

freedom.

________________________________________________________________________________\

____

Looking for last minute shopping deals?

Find them fast with Search.

http://tools.search./newsearch/category.php?category=shopping