See other Editorial Articles
Title: Why Propaganda Trumps Truth
Source:
Atheo News
URL Source: http://atheonews.blogspot.com/2009/ ... y-propaganda-trumps-truth.html
Published: Sep 15, 2009
Author: Paul Craig Roberts
Post Date: 2009-09-15 22:25:24 by Dakmar
Keywords: None
Views: 171
Comments: 6
September 15, 2009 "Information Clearing House" -- -An article in the journal, Sociological Inquiry, casts light on the effectiveness of propaganda. Researchers examined why big lies succeed where little lies fail. Governments can get away with mass deceptions, but politicians cannot get away with sexual affairs. The researchers explain why so many Americans still believe that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, years after it has become obvious that Iraq had nothing to do with the event. Americans developed elaborate rationalizations based on Bush administration propaganda that alleged Iraqi involvement and became deeply attached to their beliefs. Their emotional involvement became wrapped up in their personal identity and sense of morality. They looked for information that supported their beliefs and avoided information that challenged them, regardless of the facts of the matter. In Mein Kampf, Hitler explained the believability of the Big Lie as compared to the small lie: “In the simplicity of their minds, people more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have such impudence. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and continue to think that there may be some other explanation.” What the sociologists and Hitler are telling us is that by the time facts become clear, people are emotionally wedded to the beliefs planted by the propaganda and find it a wrenching experience to free themselves. It is more comfortable, instead, to denounce the truth-tellers than the liars whom the truth-tellers expose. The psychology of belief retention even when those beliefs are wrong is a pillar of social cohesion and stability. It explains why, once change is effected, even revolutionary governments become conservative. The downside of belief retention is its prevention of the recognition of facts. Belief retention in the Soviet Union made the system unable to adjust to economic reality, and the Soviet Union collapsed. Today in the United States millions find it easier to chant “USA, USA, USA” than to accept facts that indicate the need for change. The staying power of the Big Lie is the barrier through which the 9/11 Truth Movement is finding it difficult to break. The assertion that the 9/11 Truth Movement consists of conspiracy theorists and crackpots is obviously untrue. The leaders of the movement are highly qualified professionals, such as demolition experts, physicists, structural architects, engineers, pilots, and former high officials in the government. Unlike their critics parroting the government’s line, they know what they are talking about. Here is a link to a presentation by the architect, Richard Gage, to a Canadian university audience: http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13242 The video of the presentation is two hours long and seems to have been edited to shorten it down to two hours. Gage is low-key, but not a dazzling personality or a very articulate presenter. Perhaps that is because he is speaking to a university audience and takes for granted their familiarity with terms and concepts. Those who believe the official 9/11 story and dismiss skeptics as kooks can test the validity of the sociologists’ findings and Hitler’s observation by watching the video and experiencing their reaction to evidence that challenges their beliefs. Are you able to watch the presentation without scoffing at someone who knows far more about it than you do? What is your response when you find that you cannot defend your beliefs against the evidence presented? Scoff some more? Become enraged? Another problem that the 9/11 Truth Movement faces is that few people have the education to follow the technical and scientific aspects. The side that they believe tells them one thing; the side that they don’t believe tells them another. Most Americans have no basis to judge the relative merits of the arguments. For example, consider the case of the Lockerbie bomber. One piece of “evidence” that was used to convict Magrahi was a piece of circuit board from a device that allegedly contained the Semtex that exploded the airliner. None of the people, who have very firm beliefs in Magrahi’s and Libya’s guilt and in the offense of the Scottish authorities in releasing Magrahi on allegedly humanitarian grounds, know that circuit boards of those days have very low combustion temperatures and go up in flames easily. Semtex produces very high temperatures. There would be nothing whatsoever left of a device that contained Semtex. It is obvious to an expert that the piece of circuit board was planted after the event. I have asked on several occasions and have never had an answer, which does not mean that there isn’t one, how millions of pieces of unburnt, uncharred paper can be floating over lower Manhatten from the destruction of the WTC towers when the official explanation of the destruction is fires so hot and evenly distributed that they caused the massive steel structures to weaken and fail simultaneously so that the buildings fell in free fall time just as they would if they had been brought down by controlled demolition. What is the explanation of fires so hot that steel fails but paper does not combust? People don’t even notice the contradictions. Recently, an international team of scientists, who studied for 18 months dust samples produced by the twin towers’ destruction collected from three separate sources, reported their finding of nano-thermite in the dust. The US government had scientists dependent on the US government to debunk the finding on the grounds that the authenticity of custody of the samples could not be verified. In other words, someone had tampered with the samples and added the nano-thermite. This is all it took to discredit the finding, despite the obvious fact that access to thermite is strictly controlled and NO ONE except the US military and possibly Israel has access to nano-thermite. The physicist, Steven Jones, has produced overwhelming evidence that explosives were used to bring down the buildings. His evidence is not engaged, examined, tested, and refuted. It is simply ignored. Poster Comment: (continued)
Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: Dakmar, *libertarians* (#0)
pping
If one doesn't fit neatly into some government category, they're different and must be fixed.-jethro tull
Pretty good piece. I've always liked Roberts, even if he won't go all the way on race. And he won't for all the same reasons he describes here. The one thing orthodox and revisionist historians agree upon is that their subject of discussion is important.
Galut went the little green frog one day is that big mind of yours capable of opening?
It's almost as though perhaps maybe there might have been explosives planted in the buildings. Call me paranoid.
Ain't nothing wrong with that mind, IMO. 911 just isn't important. Now, if you ask me, there may have been a little more going on there than foreknowledge. I'm just not going to waste much time or energy on it.
When a whole society keeps saying "It's not about race," the person who BELIEVES that will be seen as an idiot. Even by children. Even by ILLITERATE children.
Would you believe it was important if you knew it was an inside job? There was much more than foreknowledge going on and spending time or energy to know that is no waste.
#2. To: Dakmar (#0)
Galut went the little green frog
Galut went the little green frog one day
and we all go galut galut galut
#3. To: Turtle (#0)
(Edited)
#4. To: Dakmar (#0)
What is the explanation of fires so hot that steel fails but paper does not combust?
"The trouble with people is not that they don't know but that they know so much that ain't so." ~ Josh Billings
#5. To: christine (#3)
Turtle: I wouldn't be surprised if our worst enemy, and in fact the enemy of the entire world, had some advanced knowledge of the attacks and didn't warn us.
#6. To: Prefrontal Vortex (#5)
911 just isn't important.
Now, if you ask me, there may have been a little more going on there than foreknowledge. I'm just not going to waste much time or energy on it.
"The trouble with people is not that they don't know but that they know so much that ain't so." ~ Josh Billings
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest