"Television. The Drug of the Nation… A more subtle & sophisticated
propaganda mind-control machine than any sci-fi writer has been able to
imagine. Not the medium so much, but how it is used, the precision with
which its potential for enslavement is being exploited."
Dear anon,
Whenever I approach the keyboard, words seem inadequate. It's one thing to talk about an earthquake before or after,
but _during words can seem superfluous. A good part of what I've been
trying to say through the years is that we
have been hurtling headlong toward a global fascist state. Now that fact has become mainstream truth, though phrased in
different terminology.
We might perhaps learn something from history by comparing Bush & his
Homeland Security with Adolph and his Gestapo, "Enemy Combatant" with
"Enemy of the Reich", Desert Storm with Blitzkrieg... and we might recognize that Bush's legislation
enables - is indeed designed to enable - domestic concentration camps.
We might recall that the German people did not see themselves as aggressors,
they were not ogres --Goebbels convinced them at each
stage that they were on the noble defensive.
Goebbels was considered a propaganda genius in his time,
but by current standards he was but a primitive pioneer. Consider the twisted mind state that has
been somehow sold and become the
Rather than a fixed dogma or a charismatic
leader, the "public cult" is guided dynamically by hypnotic
television. The posture and the look of concern
on the news reader's faces are choreographed with as much precision as are the phony "news" stories themselves. And then there's
Oprah & Springer and the whole nine yards of fantasy television
worlds. Virtual Reality is here and it doesn't even require special
gloves or goggles. Why visit real people, and deal with traffic, when you
can sit back with a G&T and indulge in vicarious socialization with people
much more interesting than yourself and your friends?... "We are
interrupting this broadcast to announce incoming nuclear missiles... press the
blue button if you prefer to watch the rest of ER until they hit."
Addiction. Television.
The Drug of the Nation. The
Cult Siren. The All Explaining Oracle.
The Collective Consciousness. The Single Source
of all important information. Centrally generated Theater which pretends to take the place of a non-existent
"public discussion". A more subtle & sophisticated propaganda mind-control machine than
any sci-fi writer has been able to imagine. Not the medium so much, but
how it is used, the precision with which its potential for enslavement is being
exploited.
Walter Cronkite perhaps said it best, when asked what characterizes a first-rate
newscaster. His answer: "The ability to lie convincingly."
The same of course is true for Presidents. Ronald Reagan, contrary to
liberal opinion, was excellently qualified for the job of President. As
an actor and long-time advertising image, he was perfect for the job of telling
interminable lies day after day and getting majorities to swallow it.
Bush has that same quality. The Big Lie Gene.
The modern President is a personality,
not a person of power. He plays no role whatever in policy
making. He is briefed after plans have been adopted by what are
euphemistically called his "senior advisors". Mr. Prez's
concern is more to learn the script, to be in character for his part, to
convincingly present bizarre mythology. Somehow the aggressor must be
seen as the defender, the thief as the helper, the exploiter as the
humanitarian, the mass murderer as the saviour. With
all due credit to the script writers, one must respect the performer who
actually expresses the words that convince the multitudes that the Emperor is
Clothed.
There is one Great Conspiracy, and that
is the promulgation of Media Reality. A world of Lies is being
sold. There are people in positions of power who know full well it is all
lies, and there are people who plot out how events are going to be spun on
TV. And there are people who plan out actual strategies, with real goals,
and those plans are carried out successfully with real missiles and F-16's. All with no one noticing who really did what to whom, who stole
what from whom, nor what economic empires have been established behind the scenes.
I don't care who those people are who do these things,
but they obviously exist. The point is to understand how the system
works.
I believe you need to grok this Great Conspiracy before you can begin to see the
Real World. "Grok" in the sense of
realizing there CANNOT BE a Santa Claus. In the same sense as Believing Your Own Eyes - FINALLY - about the Naked Emperor. If you can see that Media Reality
is a form of Theater, that it is a Fable, a Myth, a
Distraction, a Matrix, a Virtual Reality, the White Gloves of a magician, a
Smoke Screen -- if you can grok this then you can
begin to ask the question: "What is the Real World like?" Paying
attention to Media Theater is like sitting in the
woods with your car radio on loud. Not until you turn the radio off do
you hear what's around you - birds singing and leaves rustling.
Seeing the World As It Is - that's an active process.
It's a matter of putting 2 & 2 together. All the facts are visible,
just as the nakedness of The Emperor was visible. The problem is to believe your own eyes, to interpret the facts for
yourself. This is something TV never asks you to do. It might
be a bit painful at first, just as when Neo asked why his eyes hurt after being
released from the Matrix: "You've never used them before." Trusting your Own Eyes is a leap into a
scary unknown -- something we've been warned against and trained to avoid ever
since we began going to school. "You don't know anything; only experts
know things."
Once you start looking, you've got a mystery to solve, just like on Murder She
Wrote. In the murder mystery everyone has an alibi,
just as in the Media Theater everything has an explanation.
The detective seeks out the facts and puts the pieces of the puzzle together
until a picture emerges. We Who Would See need to do the same thing.
What particular pieces you identify depends a bit on your own personal history.
The same world looks different from different perspectives... consider how
different the worlds of Einstein and Van Gogh must have appeared. My own detective work finds a puzzle with
only a few big pieces, and the Main Picture doesn't take long to describe...
Piece #1: The Great Mafia -- we are
all familiar with Mafia Culture in the context of the Godfather cinema genre.
It is characterized by family-like loyalties, strict secrecy on
"business" matters, hierarchical control structures, the ruthless use
of force to accomplish objectives, and a complete disregard for the law,.
Such is the culture of the wealthy elite who ultimately run the affairs of the
world's only super power, and increasingly the affairs of the rest of the world
as well. In the case of Crime Mafias, we all understand the function of
secrecy, and acknowledging that does not make one a "conspiracy
theorist". It is important to
understand that those who run the
Piece #2: The Great Casino -- the
game set up by the Great Mafia in which we must all play, the Casino in which
the house always wins, the Casino known
as Capitalism. You can't play without chips, and the price of chips is high
- you must spend eight hours a day helping the Casino rake in the Big Chips for
itself, an occupation also known as Working For A Corporation. And this Great
Casino is owned by Investors, which means it must always Grow Bigger Each
Quarter. And this growth is Destroying The
World.
Piece #3: The Great Addiciton
-- the addiction the Great Mafia has developed for the Great Casino. They are
as addicted to that particular scam as any crack head is to his crystals. They
have lost the ability to conceive of any other kind of world. In their
mind, the choice can only be between The Casino and Chaos. And they fear that
imagined Chaos as much as any addict fears losing his drug supply.
Piece #4: The Great Consolidation --
after centuries of rivalries among Great Powers the
Piece #5: The Great Holocaust -- the
kill-off of the Useless Feeders. When
Piece #6: the Great Hoax -- Media Theater + Myth of Progress + Illusion of Prosperity + Sham
of Democracy + Fable of Freedom = Denial of The
Real = The Matrix.
You may or may not agree that these pieces exist, or that the emerging picture
is close. I hope you comment either way, as those kinds of dialogs are
frequently of interest to our subscribers.
And let me suggest an exercise. IF this picture I've painted is more or
less accurate, then What is Worth Doing?
Is participating in a sham political system of value? Is appealing to the
humanitarian feelings of Mafia Bosses likely to help? Are protests and
demonstrations going to cure the Great Mafia of its Great Addiction? Is
Reform going to turn the Great Casino into a Good Thing?
You tell me.
all the best to you in the new year,
rkm