Following Chomsky’s ‘Manufacturing Consent’ thesis I offer a hypothesis on the process:
An objective is identified, relating to the elite’s interests and on the long-term threats on its power. A course is laid out and the institutional powers are drafted behind the need to rally the masses behind events that will cost them, so that others might benefit.
The news media falls behind the official doctrine, lending its unquestioning support by creating mass hysteria, governed by fear about as hypothetical immediate threat to national security and national well-being.
Facts are found, documents translated and information spun.
Any skepticism is ignored under the pressures of immediate reaction to an impending, and undeniable threat. Fear pushing aside and doubt and forcing action.
Skepticism here is characterized as naïve or indecisiveness.
Marketing strategies are used, with their utilization of human psychology to direct thought.
Once the course of action has been laid out and begun, the first hints at the costs or consequences become apparent. They are minimized or dismissed as short-term and worthwhile, because they cannot be totally denied.
The first voices of dissention are heard as whining whispers of doubt by liberals or anti-nationals.
Information is strictly controlled (a lesson learned from previous wars).
National pride is used using a combination of pride and fear to create the needed results.
Here the voices of skepticism, from within the institutions, are allowed access to the mass-distribution, as a precursor to what will happen.
They will look back on this as proof that the system is free, self-regulating and democratic.
This step is crucial in maintaining the illusion of freedom of the press as a regulator of power.
The original skeptics are offered mass-media access.
Once the goals are achieved and the benefits are acquired by the elite, the costs become undeniable and severe. The media then switches sides, now beginning to display skepticism for policies it never originally questioned but participated in creating support for. This moment is where the facade of ‘free-press’ and the illusion of freedom of information and democracy is nurtured.
Now, once the needed support is no longer needed, the deed being done, security services and the press turn sides, becoming mouthpieces for growing insecurity and the skepticism of hindsight. Their original role in the power game is diminished from memory as they now become critical of policies they helped manufacture.
The governing entity is brought under scrutiny, deflecting criticism of the process itself or the system itself, and he or she will become the final sacrifice to systemic control.
The last period is one of feigned introspection as scapegoats are found and responsibilities doled out.
The culprits are identified the errors analyzed and responsible are dealt with.
Here, also, self-criticism is allowed offering the illusion of free-thought and a hopeful insinuation about the next time. The institutions now become critical of each other, their original cooperation and allegiances swept under the rugs of time, the illusion of a self-correcting system maintained. The anger of the masses, that were duped, is defused by offering institutional outlets to their irritation for not being heard beforehand or for having been convinced by the rhetoric at the beginning.
I just finished watching the Sunday News- Shows.
And I was struck by how things become lost in time and events forgotten or reinterpreted.
It’s particularly interesting how a sitting president is held responsible for having sex in the oval office and lying about it and his impeachment seems plausible, whereas one that leads a nation to war, with lives lost and long-term consequences to pay is not or one using drug money to support professional armies that fight against foreign elected governments is not.
The system definitely has self-correcting mechanisms.
It would seem to be a world-wide phenomenom. Mao unleashed the red guards, damn near destroyed the infrastructure that supported him, and it was conveniently forgotten. The world wrings it’s hands over the Israeli “attack” on Lebanon, but conveniently forgets that Hezbolla started the whole flap with their stupid raid and kidnappings. Even now, The so-called Islamic terrorists kill their own people and call it a war on the West.
Orwell had it all wrong. The powers of oppression don’t need to re-write history, we do it for them. The wages of sin look pretty good, huh?
True. Rodney King may have been right to say “Can’t we all just get along?” but the sentiment and the reality doesn’t match up well. Fanaticism is easily conjured. We talk of fanatical Islamics, but the west has hitorically proven that its’ peoples are more than capable of creating “devils” with which to do battle. That we battle for control of oil is lost in our fervor to combat those evil terrorists…
Pfffft. What are you guys talking about? All current events point to the simple fact of defeating a known daily threat to our unsubstantially perceived illusion of free willed democratic process, and the liberties that usher forth from said process.
Man are you guys misinformed, I mean, didn’t you see the stockpiles of WMD that came from Iraq, and all those terrorist camps that we shut down?
Oh, and for the other commentator in the thread, “the whole rest of the world”, in the greater majority, completely deplored the U.S. governments course of action from the beginning, which is why they refused to become involved, as it was obvious this was a war about ego, profit, petrol, and lies.
Terrorism, much like “the war on drugs” and “the war on poverty”, is a politically motivated phantom, with no beginning, no ending, and no protocol known that will stop the activity.
Bush and degenerate company has captured the true essence of the phrase “red herring”.
Is it not more dangerous to wake up the sleeping and lose a counter-balance to another’s fanaticism?
Should the sheep be set free?
Then what shall the shepherd eat?
Being pragmatic noble Satyr, there is no harboring the delusion that the socio-political status quo will ever change.
Parasitism? Yes, it’s called history of the world, always has been the way, always will be the way. Socially it is how we exist generation to generation. The slumber of the sheep is unstoppable and eternal, no fear of change here.
Doesn’t necessarily equate with acceptance of the norm though, now does it?
Sounds right to me. I like how you fleshed out the key players, the motivations, the illusions created, and the ultimate realities. Nice job.
It made me think right way of the Iraq war: The media admitted not challenging the Bush admininstration enough prior to going to war (one of their supposed prime directives) after we didn’t find WMD, “yellow cake”, aluminum tubes, and Al Queda/terrorist ties.
Oops!
So now a lot of the media are against the war, but as far as our overlords are concerned, they’ve achieved exactly what they wanted: a never-ending occupation of Iraq.
A mind must take advantage of the resources that become available to him/her.
People, are no more than that, if they are not your equal.
When they are your equal, or near equal, they become adversaries or companions.
Acceptance is a personal matter.
One is always considering his/her own advantages and disadvantages in every status.
The trick is to take advantage of what benefits you and to disconnect yourself from the consequences that do not.
Membrain
Was anyone alive and old enough back in the sixties to tell us if the process then is similar to the present one?
I suspect that even then the media first played the war-drums in rhythm with the government and only later turned critical so as to mask the collusion and pretend independence.
