Reply #52: The Public-Opinion Engineers [View All]

[PhilipShore]

http://www.ninehundred.net/control/mc-ch5.html

THE RAPE OF THE MIND: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing, by Joost A. M. Meerloo, M.D., Instructor in Psychiatry, Columbia University Lecturer in Social Psychology, New School for Social Research, Former Chief, Psychological Department, Netherlands Forces, published in 1956, World Publishing Company. (Out of Print)


PART TWO: THE TECHNIQUES OF MASS SUBMISSION


The conviction is steadily growing in our country that an elaborate propaganda campaign for either a political idea or a deep-freeze can be sucessful in selling the public any idea or object one wants them to buy, any politial figure one wants them to elect. Recently, some of our election campaigns have been masterminded by the so-called public-opinion engineers, who have used all the techniques of modern mass communication and all the contemporary knowledge of the human mind to persuade Americans to vote for the candidate who is paying the public-relation men's salaries. The danger of such high-pressure advertising is that the man or the party who can pay the most can become, temporarily at least, the one who can influence the people to buy or to vote for what may not be in their real interest.


The specialists in the art of persuasion and the molding of public sentiment may try to knead man's mental dough with all the tools of communication available to them: pamphlets, speeches, posters, billboards, radio programs, and T.V. shows. They may water down the spontaneity and creativity of thoughts and ideas into sterile and streamlined cliches that direct our thoughts even although we still have the illusion of being original and individual.


What we call the will of the people, or the will of the masses, we only get to know after such collective action is put on the move, after the will of the people has been expressed either at the polls or in fury and rebellion. This indicates again how important it is who directs the tools and machines of public opinion.


In the wake of such advertising and engineering of consent, the citizen's trust in his leaders may become shaken and the populace may gradually grow more and more accustomed to official deceit. Finally, when people no longer have confidence in any program, any position, and when they are unable to form intelligent judgments any more, they can be more easily influenced by any demagogue or would-be dictator, whose strength appeals to their confusion and their growing sense of dissatisfaction. Perhaps the worst aspect of this slick mechandising of ideas is that too often even those who buy the experts, and even the opinion experts themselves, are unaware of what they are doing. They too are swayed by the current catchword "management of public opinion," and they cannot judge any more the tools they have hired.

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http://www.ninehundred.net/control/index.html
NOTE: This work has been long out of print, last known publication date 1956, the World Publishing Company. Of course, the technology has advanced and the techniques have been refined, but the principles remain the same.


THE RAPE OF THE MIND

The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing

by

Joost A. M. Meerloo, M.D

FORWARD

PART ONE -- THE TECHNIQUES OF INDIVIDUAL SUBMISSION

CHAPTER ONE -- YOU TOO WOULD CONFESS

CHAPTER TWO -- PAVLOV'S STUDENTS AS CIRCUS TAMERS

CHAPTER THREE -- MEDICATION INTO SUBMISSION

CHAPTER FOUR -- WHY DO THEY YIELD? -- THE PSYCHODYNAMICS OF FALSE CONFESSION

PART TWO -- THE TECHNIQUES OF MASS SUBMISSION

CHAPTER FIVE -- THE COLD WAR AGAINST THE MIND

CHAPTER SIX -- TOTALITARIA AND ITS DICTATORSHIP

CHAPTER SEVEN -- THE INTRUSION BY TOTALITARIAN THINKING

CHAPTER EIGHT -- TRIAL BY TRIAL


NOTE: There are additional chapters that are not available at this time.