4 ms·

Most of your litany of questions can be answered by saying that nobody became a cultist by only reading words on a screen of what the cult believes. Take Scien

Most of your litany of questions can be answered by saying that nobody became a cultist by only reading words on a screen of what the cult believes. Take Scientology for instance. I have access to the whole of their printed words online, yet I am not a Scientologist. You wouldn't be either. You can sub out "Scientology" for any other cult or any other odious group (including race nationalists, terrorists, etc.) and the statement remains true. The reason being that nothing is being engaged here other than reading, writing, and thinking. No money is changing hands, no leader is demanding my obedience at literal or metaphorical gunpoint. In the case of a web forum the absolute worst thing that could happen to me is that I'll get rude comments or be unable to participate further. The only difference between discourse and propaganda is the aim of the people doing the talking. This is a subjective value judgment on what you think of the speech, and when it comes to analyzing it, this amounts to noise. Are you trying to propagandize at me? :)

tmuir 9y ago
The flaw in your argument is that the obedience must be demanded at gunpoint. In actuality, the obedience can be gained through a combination of continuously putting people under stress, and framing yourself as the only viable solution to the stress. Its how you train dogs, and how you train Marines. Narcissists and con artists don't need to threaten violence to achieve their means. The threat of violence is simply one of the most effective methods of placing someone under emotional stress. It is once these people are under emotional stress that their defenses are down, and they are vulnerable to brainwashing.
- Karunamon 9y ago
  Fair, but how do you continuously put people under stress using only words on a screen? The comment you originally replied to asserted that "There's no words that can make robots out of people", and so far you've provided counterexamples that use many more things; none of which are restricted to internet comments. Keeping the original topic in mind, we're talking about online comments. Not cults, not marines, not anything other than words on screens.
  - spiralx 9y ago
    > Fair, but how do you continuously put people under stress using only words on a screen? Once someone has become afraid of something, it doesn't just vanish after the event that caused it is over.
- tmuir 9y ago
  @Karunamon: I'm not sure why, but I have no reply link under your latest post, so I'm posting as close to it as I can. I don't think its controversial at all to say that both Facebook and Reddit are brainwashing people. Not to say that the companies themselves are doing the brainwashing, just that they are effective platforms for anyone to do it on. Do you really not know anyone who literally lives on one of the two sites? They are both highly addictive echo chamber services that people willingly return to, hoping that the next page load will contain their unicorn story that confirms everything they want to be true. Its the dopamine cycle of what makes social media interesting in the first place. These are two of the four most visited sites in America. I can't control for peoples previous experiences, or say that Reddit or Facebook are the exclusive causal factors, but I think that just the fact that they are excellent at getting users to self select for interesting content, at the expense of content that may challenge their opinions, is enough to count these services as brainwashing platforms. People are figuratively screaming to the void "I want to be entertained!!!" Trump answered the call. The repeated dopamine cycle of discovering outrageous content, and then eventually petering out to boredom, is the stress. Once you are sufficiently stressed out, you are far more susceptible to believing that the media is lying, and the FBI is biased, the intelligence community and government at large is filled with evil actors with their own agenda. I mean, how interesting would that all be, right? Another point to consider is that I don't necessarily think any one organization has caused all of this to happen. Internet addiction has obviously existed nearly as long as the internet. My theory is that Facebook and Reddit effectively teed up millions of people for someone else to come along, and capture their minds. As I've said throughout this thread, I'm not suggesting a minority report situation, or that circumstantial evidence should depose a president, or that censorship is the answer to any of this. What I'm more lamenting is that the charlatans are winning, and their methods are nearly impervious to defense in a modern democracy. As best I can tell, all I can do is try to convince people of what I think is at play, and hope that it resonates.
  - Karunamon 9y ago
    Re commenting: That happens after two or three replies - you have to click on the timestamp to get the permalink to the comment to be able to reply to it. Re everything else: This is a reply that doesn't do justice to the effort you put into it, but I think with your definition of "brainwashing", we've made that term functionally useless, and I think bringing partisan politics into it apropos of nothing has made any further honest conversation on this matter impossible.

tmuir 9y ago

The flaw in your argument is that the obedience must be demanded at gunpoint. In actuality, the obedience can be gained through a combination of continuously putting people under stress, and framing yourself as the only viable solution to the stress. Its how you train dogs, and how you train Marines. Narcissists and con artists don't need to threaten violence to achieve their means. The threat of violence is simply one of the most effective methods of placing someone under emotional stress. It is once these people are under emotional stress that their defenses are down, and they are vulnerable to brainwashing.

Karunamon 9y ago
Fair, but how do you continuously put people under stress using only words on a screen? The comment you originally replied to asserted that "There's no words that can make robots out of people", and so far you've provided counterexamples that use many more things; none of which are restricted to internet comments. Keeping the original topic in mind, we're talking about online comments. Not cults, not marines, not anything other than words on screens.
- spiralx 9y ago
  > Fair, but how do you continuously put people under stress using only words on a screen? Once someone has become afraid of something, it doesn't just vanish after the event that caused it is over.
tmuir 9y ago
@Karunamon: I'm not sure why, but I have no reply link under your latest post, so I'm posting as close to it as I can. I don't think its controversial at all to say that both Facebook and Reddit are brainwashing people. Not to say that the companies themselves are doing the brainwashing, just that they are effective platforms for anyone to do it on. Do you really not know anyone who literally lives on one of the two sites? They are both highly addictive echo chamber services that people willingly return to, hoping that the next page load will contain their unicorn story that confirms everything they want to be true. Its the dopamine cycle of what makes social media interesting in the first place. These are two of the four most visited sites in America. I can't control for peoples previous experiences, or say that Reddit or Facebook are the exclusive causal factors, but I think that just the fact that they are excellent at getting users to self select for interesting content, at the expense of content that may challenge their opinions, is enough to count these services as brainwashing platforms. People are figuratively screaming to the void "I want to be entertained!!!" Trump answered the call. The repeated dopamine cycle of discovering outrageous content, and then eventually petering out to boredom, is the stress. Once you are sufficiently stressed out, you are far more susceptible to believing that the media is lying, and the FBI is biased, the intelligence community and government at large is filled with evil actors with their own agenda. I mean, how interesting would that all be, right? Another point to consider is that I don't necessarily think any one organization has caused all of this to happen. Internet addiction has obviously existed nearly as long as the internet. My theory is that Facebook and Reddit effectively teed up millions of people for someone else to come along, and capture their minds. As I've said throughout this thread, I'm not suggesting a minority report situation, or that circumstantial evidence should depose a president, or that censorship is the answer to any of this. What I'm more lamenting is that the charlatans are winning, and their methods are nearly impervious to defense in a modern democracy. As best I can tell, all I can do is try to convince people of what I think is at play, and hope that it resonates.
- Karunamon 9y ago
  Re commenting: That happens after two or three replies - you have to click on the timestamp to get the permalink to the comment to be able to reply to it. Re everything else: This is a reply that doesn't do justice to the effort you put into it, but I think with your definition of "brainwashing", we've made that term functionally useless, and I think bringing partisan politics into it apropos of nothing has made any further honest conversation on this matter impossible.