Home » Posts tagged 'narrative control' (Page 5)

Tag Archives: narrative control

❖

The Associated Press has published yet another article based on unevidenced assertions by anonymous government officials about the scary horrifying frightening Russian menace, this time to accuse another media outlet of promoting propaganda. Without a trace of irony.

“U.S. intelligence officials on Tuesday accused a conservative financial news website with a significant American readership of amplifying Kremlin propaganda and alleged five media outlets targeting Ukrainians have taken direction from Russian spies,” AP reports. “The officials said Zero Hedge, which has 1.2 million Twitter followers, published articles created by Moscow-controlled media that were then shared by outlets and people unaware of their nexus to Russian intelligence. The officials did not say whether they thought Zero Hedge knew of any links to spy agencies and did not allege direct links between the website and Russia.”

“The officials briefed The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence sources,” AP adds, repeating the refrain we’re all familiar with now which is always used to justify a complete absence of evidence or accountability for incendiary claims about governments the United States doesn’t like.

You have to scroll down to the eleventh paragraph for some examples of the “Kremlin propaganda” that Zero Hedge is accused of “amplifying”. These turn out to be entirely innocuous objections to western imperial narratives that were “written by people affiliated with the Strategic Culture Foundation,” an outlet the Biden administration sanctioned last year “for allegedly taking part in Russia’s interference in the 2020 U.S. election.”

“Recent articles listed as authored by the foundation and published by Zero Hedge include those with the headlines: ‘NATO Sliding Towards War Against Russia In Ukraine,’ ‘Americans Need A Conspiracy Theory They Can All Agree On’ and ‘Theater Of Absurd… Pentagon Demands Russia Explain Troops On Russian Soil,’” writes AP’s Nomaan Merchant.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

European Energy Prices Soar As Western Media Hypes Imminent Russian Invasion Of Ukraine

February 14, 2022

European Energy Prices Soar As Western Media Hypes Imminent Russian Invasion Of Ukraine

European natural gas and electricity prices jumped as Western corporate media continued to drum up headlines of an imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine that could spark World War 3.

Benchmark European gas prices rose more than 10% to 84 euros a megawatt-hour, the highest in weeks. German power prices also moved higher.

Europe’s energy crunch is set to worsen if tensions in the region deteriorate. Russian gas supply is already low as storage facilities are well below average for this time of year (this means gas supplies will remain tight through spring). The risk of rolling blackouts across the continent increase if Russia cuts off gas to Europe.

“The immediate focus is on the potential for a disruption in Russian energy supplies to Europe, which would be very difficult to deal with, and could create a true energy shortage even beyond the challenge that we’re already seeing,” said Jason Bordoff, director of the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University. “But before that, Europe was already in an energy crisis.”

According to monthly auction results on Monday, Russian supplier Gazprom PJSC didn’t book additional pipeline capacity for March to send gas to Germany via the Yamal-Europe pipe. Gas flows through Ukraine into Europe are also far below contractual volumes.

On Monday, Fatih Birol, the head of the International Energy Agency, told attendees at a conference in Cairo that politicizing gas in Europe is not a good idea because it translates to higher prices for consumers. Already, the UK has capped energy prices for households to mitigate further soaring costs.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

They Don’t Just Lie To Us About Wars. They Lie To Us About Everything.

February 12, 2022

They Don’t Just Lie To Us About Wars. They Lie To Us About Everything.

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

Propaganda isn’t just about manufacturing consent for wars and ridiculous governmental measures we’d never normally accept. That’s what most people think of when they hear that word, but there’s so very, very much more to it than that.

The lion’s share of propaganda goes not toward convincing us to accept new agendas of the powerful, but toward keeping us entranced in the status quo dream world which enables the powerful to have power in the first place. Toward normalizing status quo systems and training us to shape ourselves to fit into them like neat little cogs in a well-oiled machine.

And it’s not even a grand, monolithic conspiracy in most cases. The giant corporations who indoctrinate us with their advertisements, their Hollywood movies and shows, their apps, their websites and their news media are all naturally incentivized to point us further and further into delusion by the fact that they benefit from the status quo systems which have elevated them to wealth.

So day in and day out we are presented with media which train us what to value, where to place our interest and attention, what success looks like, and how a normal human behaves on this planet. And it always aligns perfectly with the interests of the rich and powerful.

They don’t just teach us what to believe. They teach us who we are. They give us the frameworks upon which we cast our ambitions and evaluate our success, and we build psychological identities out of those constructs. I am a businessman. I am unemployed. My life is about making money…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

What Has Been Asserted Without Evidence May Be Dismissed Without Evidence

February 2, 2022

What Has Been Asserted Without Evidence May Be Dismissed Without Evidence

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

We’re being bashed in the face with western propaganda about the Ukraine situation with increasing forcefulness. Every day now we’re seeing things like “analysts” claiming Putin definitely wants a large-scale war, very familiar-looking puff pieces about Ukrainian guerrilla freedom fighters based on claims by anonymous intelligence sources, think pieces on why Americans should all care about Ukrainian freedom from Kremlin tyranny, and, of course, a lot of entirely unsubstantiated assertions about what Russia is doing.

Despite the British government’s evidence-free claim that Russia was planning to install a puppet regime in Ukraine being debunked within hours and then shown to be a US intelligence claim dishonestly packaged as a British one days later, mass media outlets still to this day repeat the allegation like it’s a real thing. Despite the entirely unevidenced US government claim that Russia was plotting to stage a false flag attack in eastern Ukraine failing to prove true in subsequent weeks, US Senator Bob Menendez went on CNN over the weekend and declared that this false flag which never actually, physically happened was grounds to sanction Russia effective immediately.

The US political/media class is just saying whatever it wants about what Russia is doing and planning to do with no regard for facts or evidence. Nothing is too cartoonishly hysterical; in fact the more clickbaity and attention-grabbing the better. They feel free to scattergun these outlandish claims willy nilly all over our information ecosystem because five years of Russia hysteria have taught them that they will suffer exactly zero professional consequences when they are proven wrong, and that they will in fact see their stars rise as a reward for advancing the interests of the US empire.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

CNN In Meltdown Mode Over Biden-Ukraine Phone Call Fiasco

January 27, 2022

CNN In Meltdown Mode Over Biden-Ukraine Phone Call Fiasco

Update (2023ET): CNN journos doing damage control after the network’s Natasha Bertrand panicked and deleted tweets containing harsh comments reportedly made by President Biden to Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky – namely that a Russian invasion was “imminent,” that the Capital city of Kyiv could be “sacked,” and to “prepare for impact.”

Now – none of that apparently happened according to CNN‘s Jim Sciutto, the White House, and apparently Ukraine itself. Of note, CNN claims their source was a “senior Ukrainian official.”

Human Events‘ Jack Posobiec lays it out:

Bertrand apparently didn’t get the message to CNN‘s Jake Tapper and Senior International Correspondent Matthew Chance, who repeated the now-disputed report.

And the White House disputes:

Now, Posobiec reports that Zelensky’s office is also denying CNN’s report.

CNN‘s Alexander Marquardt gives a master class in walking back misinformation:

* * *

In their Thursday afternoon phone call which the White House called “a check-in”, it seems President Joe Biden took the opportunity to continue with an alarmist posture as he told his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy that a Russian invasion is “now highly certain” – according to CNN.

Further, “President Biden reaffirmed the readiness of the United States along with its allies and partners to respond decisively if Russia further invades Ukraine,” according to the White House call readout. But it remains that two conflicting narratives have emerged, given just prior to the call it was being reported that Zelensky was expected to request that the US be more cautious in its messaging surrounding a potential Russian attack, per source–particularly the word “imminent,” as it risks causing panic and negative economic consequences for Ukraine. That was also according to CNN.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Secret of Propaganda: Teaching Obedience

January 26, 2022

The Secret of Propaganda: Teaching Obedience

A classic example of modern propaganda. It dates from the 1940s and it shamelessly exploits the principle of authority. Note that there is no proof or evidence that a majority of doctors smoked Camels more than any other cigarettes. And there is no proof or evidence that, even if the claim were true, the doctors would be right. But the principle of authority works independently from data and truth and the campaign was a huge success. It is the great power of obedience.

Just a few days ago, I was a guest on a TV discussion on the usual subject* (practically, the only one being discussed nowadays). At some moment, the discussion veered on propaganda, and the host** said something like, “but isn’t it strange that Germany fell so easily for the Nazi propaganda despite the fact that it was the most cultured society in Europe at that time?” And it dawned on me:

It was not despite. It was because.

Exactly that. Propaganda and education go hand in hand: they are one the consequence of the other. In an instant, my whole career as a teacher flashed in my mind. What are we teaching to our students? Plenty of things, of course, but mostly it is about trusting the authority. Obedience, in one word.

I experimented at times with the opposite approach, pushing my chemistry students to criticize their textbooks. Many of my students are smart fellows, some of them appreciated the idea, and sometimes they found errors that I hadn’t noticed myself. But most of them found the exercise an annoying interlude in their studies. They were not stupid, either…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Fact-Checkers Are Used to Confuse the Public: Sharyl Attkisson

January 26, 2022

Sharyl Attkisson, a five-time Emmy Award winning investigative journalist and host of “Full Measure,” in Leesburg, Virginia, on Jan. 14, 2022. (York Du/The Epoch Times)

Fact-Checkers Are Used to Confuse the Public: Sharyl Attkisson

Five-time Emmy award-winning journalist Sharyl Attkisson said she has seen an increased effort to manipulate the public to appreciate censorship and disapprove of journalism. One of the strategies that has been employed is the use of third-party fact-checkers, she said.

“Nearly every mode of information has been co-opted, if it can be co-opted by some group, [and] fact-checkers are no different,” Attkisson told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders.”

“Either they’ve been co-opted, in many instances, or created for the purpose of distributing narratives and propaganda,” said Attkisson. “This is all part of a very well-funded, well-organized landscape that dictates and slants the information they want us to have.”

Attkisson said she first started to notice news being controlled in the early 2000s when the media company she was working for was actively trying to suppress certain stories.

“The pushback came to be more about keeping a story from airing or keeping a study from being reported on the news, not just giving the other side, not just making sure it was accurately reported,” she said of pharmaceutical company stories she was covering at the time.

In 2016 Attkisson heard former President Barack Obama say news needed to be curated, after which mainstream media outlets started to consistently use the term fake news to describe mostly conservative news stories that they deemed untrue.

“And I remember thinking that was such a strange thing to say, because there was no big movement among the public, that people needed to have their information curated, that someone needed to step in and tell us what to think, curate what was online…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Don’t Underestimate How Badly The Powerful Need Control Of Online Speech

January 17, 2022

Don’t Underestimate How Badly The Powerful Need Control Of Online Speech

Seems like almost every day now the mass media are blaring about the need for speech on the internet to be controlled or restricted in some way. Today they’re running stories about Joe Rogan and Covid misinformation; tomorrow it will be something else.

The reasons for the need to control online speech change from day to day, but the demand for that control remains a constant. Some days it’s a need to protect the citizenry from online disinformation campaigns by foreign governments. Sometimes it’s the need to guarantee election security. Sometimes it’s the need to eliminate domestic extremism and conspiracy theories. Sometimes it’s Covid misinformation. The problems change, but the solution is always the same: increased regulation of speech by monopolistic online platforms in steadily increasing coordination with the US government.

It’s actually pretty comical at this point, once you notice it. It’s like if you had an expensive Prada bag that your friend really coveted and she was always making up excuses to try and take it home with her. “Gosh I’m carrying all these small objects and I have nothing to carry them in!” “You’re going on vacation? I’ll look after your Prada bag for you!” “Oh no you slipped and now you’re clinging to a cliff’s edge! Quick! Throw me your Prada bag!” Once you know what they’re actually after, their attempts to obtain it look clownish and silly.

Whenever I talk about how the immense power structure which the mass media serves and protects has a desperate need to control online speech, I’ll always get a few people objecting that the powerful don’t care about what ideas and information the ordinary riff raff share with each other on internet forums. They just do what they want regardless of public opinion, like Greek gods on Mount Olympus.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Google Manipulates Results as Searches ‘Mass Formation Psychosis’ Explode Due to Collapsing Covid Narrative

January 5, 2022

Google Manipulates Results as Searches ‘Mass Formation Psychosis’ Explode Due to Collapsing Covid Narrative

Those paying attention to the current situation regarding the establishment’s control on the narrative around Covid-19, have watched as anyone — including esteemed experts in the field — are censored into oblivion for attempting to put forth information that challenges the status quo. For the first time in recent American history, merely talking about alternative treatments for a disease is met with mass censorship by big tech. This is diametrically opposed to actual “science” and the opposite direction in which a free society should be moving.

One of the people who has been censored the most is Robert W Malone MD, MS who is one of the inventors of mRNA & DNA vaccines. Dr. Malone has been outspoken about the way the establishment system is handling, or rather mishandling, the covid crisis.

His Twitter account had grown to over a half million followers last week before the platform decided that his alternative views on the pandemic were a danger to the narrative. So they banned him.

Instead of standing up for the free exchange of ideas by experts — which is how science works — the left cheered for Malone’s censorship, calling him a kook while celebrating the tools of tyrants.

Before Donald Trump came into office and caused mass hysteria over Russia, the left used to stand for freedom of speech. However, the flamboyant tyrant in the White House quickly eroded their respect for rights. Then, in 2020, Covid-19 arrived and the censorship campaign switched into overdrive.

The left — armed with their militant “fact checkers” whose opinions are wielded like swords against anyone who challenges the official narrative — became the regime of authoritarian information controllers. After all, if you challenge their messiahs like Dr. Fauci, you challenge science itself — facts be damned.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

We’ll Either Rise As A Collective Or Perish As Individuals: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

January 2, 2022

We’ll Either Rise As A Collective Or Perish As Individuals: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

Everyone who’s freaking out about wokeness and identity politics can relax. Liberals are 100 percent certain to get bored with that schtick and forget all about it without having helped a single member of any minority or marginalized group. Ask the immigrants and the kids in cages.

❖

Anyone to the left of Ted Cruz is a communist. Anyone who opposes US imperialism loves and supports the governments it targets. Anyone who defends Palestinians hates Jews. Move the Overton window far enough toward your side of the debate and you can spin even the slightest hint of disagreement with you as dangerous extremism.

❖

People who spend their time freaking out about communism are hilarious. Even if you believe communism is always necessarily evil, if you live in the western empire you’re so far from experiencing communism it makes more sense to spend your time fretting about shark attacks or being struck by lightning. If you’re reading this odds are you live in an English-speaking nation. If you live in an English-speaking nation your government is so very, very, very far from espousing communism that it would make more sense for you to spend your time worrying about being eaten by lions.

Even if you believe everything the TV tells you about communism, the simple economic realities of your nation and the mountains of violent force keeping it in place mean that of all the many, many existential threats you can worry about, communism should rank near dead last.

❖

Reverse Batman: A working class ninja spends his nights beating up kleptocratic billionaires whose thievery has created the socioeconomic injustice that’s destroying his city.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

If You Haven’t Researched Arguments Disputing A Western Narrative, You Don’t Understand The Issue

December 29, 2021

If You Haven’t Researched Arguments Disputing A Western Narrative, You Don’t Understand The Issue

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

Lately when people react with shock and indignation that I would dare to dispute a claim made by the western political/media class about an empire-targeted government, I’ve taken to simply asking them what reading they’ve done on the other side of the issue. What are some articles they’ve read arguing against the official western narrative about that government?

It’s a question that can be applied to any disputed western narrative about any government the US-centralized empire doesn’t like. Russia is engaging in aggressive provocations. Assad is using chemical weapons. There’s a genocide in Xinjiang. Iran is developing nuclear weapons. Maduro is deliberately starving his people. Whatever’s the Official Imperial Line of the Day about the Official Bad Guy of the Day.

What I’ve found interesting about this exercise is that while I would’ve correctly predicted that those questioned had done zero research into the opposing viewpoints of the issue they’re commenting on, I would probably not have predicted the brazenness with which they’ll admit it. Very often they’ll come right out and express incredulity at the very idea that any such counter-arguments could even exist, skipping right past any pretense that they may have read them or even made any effort to find them.

When they do this, even before I provide them with links to counter-arguments against whatever issue we’re discussing, they have already lost the argument. They have already admitted that they’ve done no real research into whether or not the western narrative they just swallowed is actually true; they just believed what they were told because someone told them to believe it. They swallowed an imperial narrative about an empire-targeted government with zero gag reflex, just as people did in the lead-up to the Iraq war.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Today’s Contemplation: Collapse Cometh XXXVI

December 22, 2021

Today’s Contemplation: Collapse Cometh XXXVI

On Narrative Control and ‘Fact Checking’

One of the areas of interest for me as I weaved my way through my ten years of formal post-secondary education (yes, I spent the entire decade of the 1980s pursuing four degrees at several different universities; some of it part-time as I waffled between education and full-time work for relatively good pay in a grocery store) was that of epistemology (the nature and origins of ‘knowledge’). It was likely the result of some of my required readings: Stephen Jay Gould’s Ever Since Darwin, Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, and Clifford Gertz’s The Interpretation of Cultures. Regardless, I ended up exploring (outside of my regular classes) such topics as deconstructive criticism, hermeneutics, and philology; interesting topics for someone who ended up teaching elementary school students (10 years) and as a school administrator (15 years).

Upon reflection, this exploration of how humans come to ‘know’ what they know (or at least what they believe) has led me to be rather skeptical of dominant narratives, especially of ‘authority figures’. My challenging of ‘authority’, as it were, may have come somewhat ‘naturally’ given I grew up in the household of a police officer. Not that I consider my dad to have been ‘authoritarian’, not at all, but the somewhat ‘natural’ pushback children can give to parents was slightly coloured in our household by the simple fact that my dad was a sociocultural authority figure on top of his role as a father.

Anyways, I believe I have always questioned to a certain extent the ‘popular’ stories we are exposed to. And as I’ve read more widely over the years, I’ve come to hold that these stories tend to always play to the pursuits of the people that dominate society’s economic and power structures.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Maturity Is Realizing That Propaganda Isn’t Something That Only Happens To Other People

December 22, 2021

Maturity Is Realizing That Propaganda Isn’t Something That Only Happens To Other People

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

I’ve been doing a lot of commentary on the western propaganda campaign against China lately, so my online notifications have been full of brainwashed human livestock regurgitating all the lines they’ve been programmed to bleat about that nation by the very propaganda campaign I’m criticizing.

What I find interesting is that it’s not just coming from complete mainstream normies; a lot of the pushback I’m getting comes from people who’ve succeeded in seeing through other western propaganda narratives on fronts like Russia, Syria, or Julian Assange. They’re just as brainwashed about China as any uncritical consumer of TV news, but because they get their information from people like Tucker Carlson and other so-called “right-populists” who have disputed those other narratives, they assume they are safe from mass media indoctrination.

And a liberal who gets their information from The New York Times will look over at the Tucker Carlson viewer and tut-tut about Fox News propaganda, then go back to reading a fearmongering article about how the Kremlin is militarizing Russian society. And both the Tucker Carlson viewer and the New York Times reader will look at nations like China and North Korea and shake their heads about how propagandized the people who live there are.

Western mass media consumers are no less propagandized than North Koreans or any of the other nations we’re told to pity because their government indoctrinates them with state media, in fact they are arguably more propagandized, which is why Noam Chomsky said that any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the US media…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Assange Issue Is NOT Complicated: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

December 16, 2021

The Assange Issue Is NOT Complicated: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

The most powerful regime on the planet imprisoning a journalist for journalistic activity is as brazen and obvious an act of tyranny as you could possibly come up with, and yet you still get pseudoleft pundits acting like you’re some kind of weird freak for expecting them to oppose it.

The Assange issue is not actually complicated. The most powerful government in the world is trying to extradite a journalist and try him under the Espionage Act for exposing its war crimes. It is that simple. This isn’t some super complex subject that you defer to the experts on.

That’s one of the things that’s so frustrating about this case. It’s such a blatant abuse of government power that virtually everyone would normally be ideologically opposed to it, but because there’s been so much media spin on it for so long people don’t see it.

Don’t imprison journalists for exposing the truth. I mean, like, duh. This should really be such a mainstream issue that fringey types like myself would see no need to focus on it, and if the media environment wasn’t being so despicably manipulated it would be.

❖

China is far, far better than the US. That doesn’t mean China is awesome, it just means the US is far, far worse than anyone else in terms of tyranny and destructiveness. Working to destroy any population which disobeys you anywhere in the world makes you worse than anyone else.

The only reason nobody seems to recognize this in the west is because the US has such phenomenally excellent global narrative control. If it didn’t, the entire world would’ve laughed when the butchers of the Middle East started pretending to care about Muslims in Xinjiang.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The US Manufactures Weapons And Consent: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

December 4, 2021

The US Manufactures Weapons And Consent: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

Listen to a reading of this article:

❖

The only manufacturing jobs left in the US are military weapons and consent.

❖

Gotta keep dropping bombs because they gotta keep making bombs. Gotta keep making bombs because they made the entire economy dependent on bomb-making. This is the only type of system that could possibly work.

❖

The goal of internet censorship is to suppress and marginalize unauthorized ideas so much that the internet actually becomes a net negative for ordinary people, because the only ones who will be able to rapidly share ideas of consequence will be the propagandists and their acolytes.

❖

Because people who object to US-led imperialist aggressions against their governments are routinely purged from social media, those of us who do not live in nations that are being targeted by those aggressions have a special duty to forcefully speak out against US imperialism.

❖

“Come to our Summit for Democracy,” said the nation whose elections are completely fake and whose intelligence agencies have interfered in scores of foreign elections and which openly works to topple democratically elected governments around the world all the time.

I mean, come on:

❖

Capitalism is such a garbage system that news media will shriek all day about “crime” like it’s this mysterious alien phenomenon being inflicted upon society from the outside instead of a very obvious symptom of economic injustices with very obvious and widely known solutions.

❖

I was fully expecting Biden to be absolute shit but I will still admit to being disappointed that he just flat-out lied about ending the war in Yemen. Yes I know it serves me right for getting my hopes up. But it is still horrific that this atrocity continues.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Tag Archives: narrative control

Content

Post categories

Economic Links

Energy/Resource Links

Environmental Links

Geopolitical Links

Liberty Links

News Links

Other Links

Survival Skills

Post Archives by Category

Post navigation

Latest Posts