Tinfoil hat theory of mine about RW popularity

[OnionPatch]

Remember a decade or so ago there were stories about how advertisers were using subliminal messaging in advertisements? One example I'm thinking of is how they used to flash just one frame of a coke or hot dog in with the feature movie just before intermission at the theaters to urge people to go to the concession stand. This one frame is too quick for the mind to recognize consciously but it seems that there was some proof that it could have a real effect sub-consciously. Sometimes when I look around at America and listen to right-wingers speak their minds, I wonder seriously if someone has drugged them or put something in the water. I mean it just doesn't seem possible that this many Americans should suddenly just go Koo-koo-bananas and be so totally immune to reason.

So am I going off the deep end for believing that they are possibly using subliminal messages or some other sort of hypnosis or mind control imbedded in FOX News? And secondly, if you are laughing right now, ask yourself, "Would they be above doing something like this?" And didn't they use similar strategies when they made the Dukakis Willie Horton commercials?

That's my tinfoil hat theory of the week. What do you think? Possible? :shrug:

[SpiralHawk]

1. "Experts agree: everything is just fine." - BushCo Ministry of Propaganda

eom

[OnionPatch]

3. The blatant techniques

are plain to see. At least to most of us, but I'm wondering what sort of subliminal techniques they're using because I think they must be using them.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. no that is not a crazy theory

but bear in mind the nazis rose without that, propapanda all on its own, when done well is that powerful

[OnionPatch]

5. Well, that's true

but then weren't people a little more sheep-like in Germany at that time? I would think modern-day Americans would not be as easy to bend using such blatant methods. How sad if I'm wrong.

[nadinbrzezinski]

20. Sorry but Americans are stupid

ignorant and so easuly benadable, to jingo messages... that is the truth

[tanyev]

4. I think you are underestimating the average American's

intellectual laziness. Apparently, many people are relieved to be told what they should think. Makes their lives much easier. No subliminals are necessary.

[OnionPatch]

9. I suppose you could be right

:(

Still, when I think of the think-tanks and the strategy they've built over the last half a century it's mind-boggling. I can't feel certain subliminal techniques were/are not among their arsenal.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

6. I don't think they need any "subliminal". It's all blatant, all the time.

When you have 95 percent of talk radio all right wing loudmouths, and most of cable and network news "going along" with the party line, you don't need subliminal when people are bombarded with the overt all the time. THAT works, too.

[OnionPatch]

13. You sure have a point there

I'm totally with you about the radio and media. I've watched so many people here in rural America form their political opinions around the Rush Limbaugh Show and all those others. They spend a lot of time in their cars and trucks here commuting and doing mechanical and farm work, etc. and get bored so they listen.....

I pray for the success of Air America every night. ;)

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

17. I agree they certainly would do it, if they thought they could get away

with it. There's nothing they won't do as they've shown. So if this was revealed tomorrow (sublimininal messages) it wouldn't surprise me at all.

It would only surprise me in that I think it's unnecessary with the degree of overt media control they've had the last several years.

[Richard Steele]

7. Entirely possible.

And they certainly aren't above doing it.

And it might explain their supporters'
bizarre propensity to become belligerent
when confronted with FACTS.....

I've read that people who have been HYPNOTIZED and told
to believe an impossible thing, often become very
angry when confronted with the fact that it is impossible.

[OnionPatch]

12. Yes, this is what I'm thinking!

It really does seem this way when they are confronted with the truth. They get so defensive. They refuse to even look at the facts. Some get downright violent. It's just as if they are hypnotized. Hold a statistical chart or something up to them and they react like vampires to a cross!

I guess it could just be the effects of so much overt propaganda, but it still seems like some people are actually under hypnosis or something.

[bostonbabs]

8. Subliminal was replaced with overt control

...the media....what we hear and more importantly what we don't hear has been filtered to us and therefore CONTROLS us.....and the constant "sex in your face" advertising for the circus crowd keeps them numb...albeit "happy".

[meegbear]

10. In a way you're right ...

During the shows, they're running banners at the bottom of the screen. They could have something that says, for example "Democrats: Love Terrorists?" and the person speaking is saying something anti-Dem.

The words and the image may merge in the mind. You never know ....

[OnionPatch]

14. This is what I'm saying

Do any of you doubt for one moment that Karl Rove and his minions would not use this kind of thing to the height of its possibilities?

[Atman]

11. I you're watching Fox News, there's nothing subliminable about it

You're already a dupe, willing or not. I find it hard to believe reasonable people can see the disparate reporting between Fox and everyone else, and not stop and wonder just a little bit, why they have such a different perspective. My guess is, it's that republican thing, where they're always saying "Why are democrats so pessimistic? Why can't they report on the GOOD news happening?" That's what Fox is for. If you watch it, you'll rarely hear anything negative, unless it is about democrats. So it's self-fulfilling. Mind control for the willing dupes.

[jjmalonejr]

15. To see see the disparate reporting between Fox and everyone else...

...you'd have to actually WATCH something else.

[OnionPatch]

16. I never watch it

so I guess I might now see just how bad it really is.

I get nauseated even seeing the icon on the menu grid.

[Marleyb]

18. They got caught during the 2000 election

Doesn't anyone remember how they got caught in spelling out democrats, they flashed 'rats'(or something like that) in one of their campaign commercials. Bush came out later and said something about how they weren't doing anything 'subliminable'. I think they just got better at it after that.

[I Have A Dream]

19. I have wondered about that myself for a while also.

Otherwise, it just doesn't make sense to me. I've actually cautioned my mother about watching Fox News. (I didn't tell her that it was because I was concerned about subliminal messages but rather because of their being unfair and unbalanced, but I was also concerned about the possibility of subliminal messages.)

Maybe they are doing it, and maybe they're not. However, I wouldn't put it past them.

[leftofthedial]

21. people in general are so goddamned stupid

that not much mind control is needed

just feed the yay-hoos a diet of lefitimized hatred and greed . . .

what you suggest does happen though, relentlessly.

[hfojvt]

22. didn't they already do this?

Wasn't there an ad that was subliminally flashing "Rats"?

To me, the blatant stuff has been too blatant. Bush gets up there and dances around with naked lies and it is almost never reported. The MSM devotes five minutes to a clip of Bush lying, and then maybe ten seconds to a clip of a partisan 'claiming' that he is lying.

For example, Bush visited KC in 2003, I think it was September, to give a little speech about the May tax cuts and how they were creating jobs. The speech was a load of crap to begin with since those permanent tax cuts for rich people were never about job creation. However, that basic fact was never reported outside of the columns of Herbert and Krugman (write that off as the liberal NY Times) and occasional LTTE by people like me and left wing blogs, etc.
I drove down to KC to protest, and the turn out sucked. There were more people lined up to see the liar than were there to protest his lies. The local news report on TV that night gave a few minutes of quoting parts of Bush's speech and then quoted about eight people off the street in fifteen second clips. Six people were shown saying "oh wow, it's the President, hurrah" and two were shown saying "he's a liar". Objective reporting on his lies - none. Taking the Emperor's new outfit as a given - quite a bit.

[meow2u3]

23. You can test you theory: here's how

Just record some Faux News and play it back in super slo-mo, or even better yet, examine the footage frame by frame.

Faux News does use some flashy gimmicks and cool special effects to attract viewers and make their venomous message seem palatable: sound effects, screaming, angry anchors, emotionally appealing crawlers, etc. We just have to hunt for any possible visual effects that would mesmerize viewers.

[Occulus]

24. It's nothing so mysterious as all that

If you tell someone something over and over, and that's all they get to hear, they'll eventually come to believe its "truth", regardless of whether there's anything at all true about what they've heard.

This is as true for groups as it is for individuals. Suppose you have a child in school, and that child is constantly being teased, mocked, belittled- you know what I mean. Then the kid comes home, and his family tells him since he "insists" on being "different" (note: no definition of "different" is ever provided) from everyone else, he should expect to be treated badly.

So basically, you have a kid who is verbally flayed on a daily basis by his peers and then comes home to be told by the only people he trusts that it's all his fault. Further, he's also told that there isn't anything he can do about it, violence isn't the answer, turn the other cheek, let 'em have their fun, etc. In truth, the child is actually talented, creative, and smart, but those things end up not counting one whit to him because he is constantly being told none of those things are really true- or worse, being told they're true, but then realizing he isn't being treated as if they were true.

What happens years down the road?

It is more than likely that such a child, regardless of how "good" or even-tempered he is, will eventually come to believe he's the lowest of the low, and will probably end up doing things that will isolate him from other people later in life. This isn't to say he'll become a criminal, or to say that he'll end up being cold-hearted and indifferent, either. However, it does mean that that child will likely grow up to be the kind of person that doesn't willingly associate with other people, and then only with people who already know him somewhat.

The same is true for adults; the only difference is the amount of time it takes to push an adult to that point. Consider a group of factory workers. They are busting their asses day in and day out, getting product out on the trucks or whatnot. They're really doing very, very well as a group, and actually need a minimal amount of supervision to do their jobs.

However, their supervisor is under pressure to increase production without additional hiring. The bosses job depends on this happening. What might an unscrupulous or uncaring supervisor do?

That person may tell his workers they are in fact in danger of losing their jobs because their production is too low. It doesn't matter that this is an out-and-out lie, because the workers don't know any better; they don't have access to a talk with the people higher up the chain.

What happens to the workers, in such a situation? Morale goes down. Workplace injuries rise, as does absenteeism due to simple employee burnout. Tempers rise. People start looking for other employment. Turnover goes up.

I really don't like the fact that I'm able to draw upon personal experiences for this post. I don't like it one bit.

[interestedparty]

25. I don't know about subliminals...

I think they appealed to a certain demographic by exploiting
their fears (loss of majority status in this country), appealed
to racial biases through use of stock code words and phrases, and
used a "brute force" technique of just simply having many people repeat the same rhetoric over and over again.

But then again, my TV has become my DVD projection screen and
little else, so what do I know?

[omega minimo]

26. Right-- it's called TeeVee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

:sheesh: :banghead:

[interestedparty]

27. Eh..?

I don't watch much TV but I do watch movies. I can't name the
specific movie titles right off the top of my head at the moment,
but I do remember thinking on more than one occassion that certain
lines of dialogue could have been taken straight from the RNC
playbook. How's that for tin-foil? There are times when
*tin-foil* is just really good powers of observation.

[omega minimo]

28. Uh huh

There are times when
*tin-foil* is just really good powers of observation.

[salvorhardin]

29. It wasn't a decade ago. It was 1957 and it was a fraud.

James Vicary performed this "experiment" in a movie theater in 1957 and later admitted that he lied about the results. Subliminal injection of messages into media has been repeatedly shown to be bunk yet that doesn't stop this little meme from cropping up every few years or Congress from passing bills banning it.
You can read about it here:
http://skepdic.com/subliminal.html
http://www.snopes.com/business/hidden/popcorn.asp

Americans haven't suddenly gone "Koo-koo-bananas". There has been a concerted effort by the right wing to own the media since the 1960s. Read Lewis Lapham's Tentacles of Rage and then read Jack Shafer's critique.
http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2004/Republican-Propaganda1sep04.htm
http://slate.msn.com/id/2106548

As far as Americans being immune to reason, that's been true for a large part of the population for a long time. After all, look how often the subliminal advertising meme keeps reappearing.