6 ms·

This is more insidious than I think even most HN readers realize. In the intelligence community, the big black sheep people don't really talk about is psycholog

This is more insidious than I think even most HN readers realize. In the intelligence community, the big black sheep people don't really talk about is psychological operations, or psyops, units. They are the same breed that used research from MK ULTRA style programs to learn how to deprogram humans (some claims on how to reprogram them), and part of that is a scientific analysis of mass social community discourse. Previously, domestic propaganda was illegal, though it was often engaged in anyway now that the law against domestic propaganda has been rescinded that means the remnants of older programs like Operation Mockingbird, where the CIA inserted people into news outlets across the board for intel gathering and disinfo pushing, have now evolved to a level where they are actively manipulating public discourse on all kinds of subjects. A very good example of this is the post JFK assassination issue. It's pretty clear to any intellectually honest person that there are some very large issues that were never addressed regarding the assassination, because the CIA purposeful put into action an operation to discredit any alternative theory's as "conspiracy theory" and anyone who talked in that manner was labeled as a crackpot "conspiracy theorist" and then a large campaign to undermine any logical discussion of "conspiracy theory", essentially by putting it, as Chomsky would say, "outside the accepted range of debate". Wonder why the fourth estate, aka journalism is in such a sad state of affairs? It's because the state has reached (quietly) so far into it that even the handful of real journalist are having a hard time. They have keep up technologically to keep sources safe, which proves almost impossible these days. They have to deal with pushback from the editors bosses of a glarily political nature, they have to deal with being cut off from sources if they happen to piss off the wrong people with a too-strong story. This is another reason the surveillance society is so insidious. I have said it before and I will say it again, surveillance, censorship, subtle covert influence of public discourse, are not about security. It's about control. A lot of people argue about 1984 vs Brave New World. What I say is that it's a Brave New World, unless you attempt to resist, then it's 1984. This is the state we live in, the real question is "Are the people going to let this happen?" I'm no longer so reliant on the "long arc of justice", and am getting pretty pessimistic.

maxerickson 12y ago
The difficult thing is figuring out how much of it is insidious and dangerous and how much of it is The Men Who Stare at Goats.
- arca_vorago 12y ago
  The problem is that we like to imagine the hippy version of the Men Who Stare at Goats, but that's not the reality of the kind of people who kill for a living. More aptly, The Men Who Stare at Goats ... and try to kill them. Doesn't make them any less dangerous or insidious, perhaps even more so! Hanlon's razor may be a strawman that should be put in the dustbin of rational conversation, but nevertheless do not doubt the malice hidden within incompetence.
drcomputer 12y ago
> This is the state we live in, the real question is "Are the people going to let this happen?" I am terrified of mental manipulation. My only inclination and direction is to train my mind to be an independent blank slate. There's also an odd web that forms, the direction of information flows, word choice, word frequency, like it ping pongs in between groups of people. The form of abstract ideas, the direction of thought. These things can be studied.
- arca_vorago 12y ago
  >The form of abstract ideas, the direction of thought. These things can be studied. Indeed you are on to something there. I have long called for a return to our Enlightenment roots for just that reason. It encourages an independent and able mindset, which is precisely why education has been deliberately manipulated in to preventing any such thing. Education of the populace is not in the interest of the international or domestic oligarchs. Remember this.
  - drcomputer 12y ago
    I don't think anyone really does it on purpose. A truly independent mind can be a terrifying thing. It can make you feel disconnected, isolated, insane, or stupid. I have observed the flow of information through people for a long time. I find myself incredibly tired of studying this. It shows nothing of an individual's depth, their character, their individual personality. It's the shadow on the cave.
    - Umn55 12y ago
      >A truly independent mind can be a terrifying thing. It can make you feel disconnected, isolated, insane, or stupid. You get used to it because you remember the science: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F17JGDZDVUs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F17JGDZDVUs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eURiWot_-ng&list=UUW1ELHQMq-RFZhtOf6dVObg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eURiWot_-ng&list=UUW1ELHQMq-...
ElComradio 12y ago
Journalism is in bad shape because, thanks to big data/metrics, companies figured out clickbait makes more money than hard news or investigative journalism.
patronagezero 12y ago
My new online-conversation digestion involves reading the posts from the bottom up these days. I've found this yields interesting results, with what I consider the most interesting posts being towards the bottom, and the 'always-agreeable' generic karma-magnet posts at the top.
Umn55 12y ago
“What is truth? For the multitude, that which it continually reads and hears.” ― Oswald Spengler, The Decline of the West, Vol. 2: Perspectives of World History “The press today is an army with carefully organized weapons, the journalists its officers, the readers its soldiers. The reader neither knows nor is supposed to know the purposes for which he is used and the role he is to play.” ― Oswald Spengler
Umn55 12y ago
"Wonder why the fourth estate, aka journalism is in such a sad state of affairs? It's because the state has reached (quietly) so far into it that even the handful of real journalist are having a hard time." I'm sorry to tell you but it's the very nature of capitalism to consume everything in it's path. Corporations are authoritarian institutions. The idea that there ever existed some balanced press or balanced capitalism is a consistent fantasy among the vast majority of people including intelligent ones like yourself. The more history you know, the more those people around you look uneducated. The "balance" in capitalist societies is a myth that needs to be broken. http://homepages.law.asu.edu/~dkarjala/OpposingCopyrightExtension/commentary/MacaulaySpeeches.html http://homepages.law.asu.edu/~dkarjala/OpposingCopyrightExte... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act#mediaviewer/File:Copyright_term.svg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act#me... Look at that chart, that means the powers that be have been crushing the public for 200+ years, every time getting there way and the "moderates" and "balancers" like yourself are totally clueless. Also the bailout: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc Overthrowing governments https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg_-NjjnvP4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg_-NjjnvP4 http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Antiwar-Americas-Decorated/dp/0922915865/ http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Antiwar-Americas-Decorated/... "I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil intersts in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested." [p. 10] "War is a racket. ...It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives." [p. 23] "The general public shoulders the bill [for war]. This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations." [p. 24] The 9 trillion dollar bank bailout https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc Libor scandal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libor_scandal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libor_scandal Rule of law is impossible under capitalism, since the kings of business (he who has the gold makes the rules) get to do whatever they want and the public gets fucked. http://williamblum.org/ http://williamblum.org/ Regulating capitalism has totally failed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcA1v2n7WW4#t=2551 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcA1v2n7WW4#t=2551

maxerickson 12y ago

The difficult thing is figuring out how much of it is insidious and dangerous and how much of it is The Men Who Stare at Goats.

arca_vorago 12y ago
The problem is that we like to imagine the hippy version of the Men Who Stare at Goats, but that's not the reality of the kind of people who kill for a living. More aptly, The Men Who Stare at Goats ... and try to kill them. Doesn't make them any less dangerous or insidious, perhaps even more so! Hanlon's razor may be a strawman that should be put in the dustbin of rational conversation, but nevertheless do not doubt the malice hidden within incompetence.

drcomputer 12y ago

> This is the state we live in, the real question is "Are the people going to let this happen?" I am terrified of mental manipulation. My only inclination and direction is to train my mind to be an independent blank slate. There's also an odd web that forms, the direction of information flows, word choice, word frequency, like it ping pongs in between groups of people. The form of abstract ideas, the direction of thought. These things can be studied.

arca_vorago 12y ago
>The form of abstract ideas, the direction of thought. These things can be studied. Indeed you are on to something there. I have long called for a return to our Enlightenment roots for just that reason. It encourages an independent and able mindset, which is precisely why education has been deliberately manipulated in to preventing any such thing. Education of the populace is not in the interest of the international or domestic oligarchs. Remember this.
- drcomputer 12y ago
  I don't think anyone really does it on purpose. A truly independent mind can be a terrifying thing. It can make you feel disconnected, isolated, insane, or stupid. I have observed the flow of information through people for a long time. I find myself incredibly tired of studying this. It shows nothing of an individual's depth, their character, their individual personality. It's the shadow on the cave.
  - Umn55 12y ago
    >A truly independent mind can be a terrifying thing. It can make you feel disconnected, isolated, insane, or stupid. You get used to it because you remember the science: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F17JGDZDVUs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F17JGDZDVUs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eURiWot_-ng&list=UUW1ELHQMq-RFZhtOf6dVObg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eURiWot_-ng&list=UUW1ELHQMq-...

ElComradio 12y ago

Journalism is in bad shape because, thanks to big data/metrics, companies figured out clickbait makes more money than hard news or investigative journalism.

patronagezero 12y ago

My new online-conversation digestion involves reading the posts from the bottom up these days. I've found this yields interesting results, with what I consider the most interesting posts being towards the bottom, and the 'always-agreeable' generic karma-magnet posts at the top.

Umn55 12y ago

“What is truth? For the multitude, that which it continually reads and hears.” ― Oswald Spengler, The Decline of the West, Vol. 2: Perspectives of World History “The press today is an army with carefully organized weapons, the journalists its officers, the readers its soldiers. The reader neither knows nor is supposed to know the purposes for which he is used and the role he is to play.” ― Oswald Spengler

Umn55 12y ago

"Wonder why the fourth estate, aka journalism is in such a sad state of affairs? It's because the state has reached (quietly) so far into it that even the handful of real journalist are having a hard time." I'm sorry to tell you but it's the very nature of capitalism to consume everything in it's path. Corporations are authoritarian institutions. The idea that there ever existed some balanced press or balanced capitalism is a consistent fantasy among the vast majority of people including intelligent ones like yourself. The more history you know, the more those people around you look uneducated. The "balance" in capitalist societies is a myth that needs to be broken. http://homepages.law.asu.edu/~dkarjala/OpposingCopyrightExtension/commentary/MacaulaySpeeches.html http://homepages.law.asu.edu/~dkarjala/OpposingCopyrightExte... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act#mediaviewer/File:Copyright_term.svg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act#me... Look at that chart, that means the powers that be have been crushing the public for 200+ years, every time getting there way and the "moderates" and "balancers" like yourself are totally clueless. Also the bailout: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc Overthrowing governments https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg_-NjjnvP4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg_-NjjnvP4 http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Antiwar-Americas-Decorated/dp/0922915865/ http://www.amazon.com/War-Racket-Antiwar-Americas-Decorated/... "I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil intersts in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested." [p. 10] "War is a racket. ...It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives." [p. 23] "The general public shoulders the bill [for war]. This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations." [p. 24] The 9 trillion dollar bank bailout https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVjz1OyBJCc Libor scandal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libor_scandal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libor_scandal Rule of law is impossible under capitalism, since the kings of business (he who has the gold makes the rules) get to do whatever they want and the public gets fucked. http://williamblum.org/ http://williamblum.org/ Regulating capitalism has totally failed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcA1v2n7WW4#t=2551 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcA1v2n7WW4#t=2551