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>And ISIS wins. Honest question: what exactly is ISIS "winning" by depicting their group as crucifying members that they couldn't accomplish by, say, actually

>And ISIS wins. Honest question: what exactly is ISIS "winning" by depicting their group as crucifying members that they couldn't accomplish by, say, actually crucifying members? Don't get me wrong, I agree with essentially everything in your post; the planted stories, how virality works, the lack of any diligence in fact-checking, the state of modern media in general. I just don't understand your reasoning for ISIS wanting to plant the story, rather than some stupid teenager in Wisconsin.

austenallred 12y ago
It's not about ISIS crucifying or not crucifying its members; it's about ISIS constantly deciding exactly what we're talking about. Most of ISIS's PR strategy would rightly seem insane to most of us, but ISIS wants to amplify how extremist they are. They want to be perceived as a group willing to do anything for their cause. With every story they're saying, "We are creating a perfect Islamic state, and nothing in our way will stop us. You should both fear and respect us." There's an interesting PR term called "agenda setting." You can't dictate whether or not people agree with you, but you can decide which angle they're looking at you from. The beheading of US journalists was completely intentional. They wanted us to be afraid of how ruthless they are. Now we're getting stories of "Teenage boy from country X left his family to join ISIS." That's just them recruiting. The sad part of all this isn't that ISIS has a PR machine, but that we're so awful at detecting it, and that we let them get away with it even when it's made up out of whole cloth.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
typicalbender 12y ago
My guess is ISIS has a public reputation they want to uphold which is an amplification of what they're actually doing. By planting the story they benefit from the extremist world view without having to actually commit the act that the story is about. Its also faster to make up a story and leak it than going out and actually finding corruption and do the act for real.
kordless 12y ago
Control the conversation.
carsongross 12y ago
4th Generation warfare is mainly about legitimacy, particularly of non-state actors. ISIS is fighting to be seen as the legitimate representative of Iraq and a broader caliphate, and self-policing corruption furthers that goal. I highly recommend reading Bill Lind's stuff on 4G warfare, which helps make sense of lots of things in modern warfare: why massive armies don't win wars, why the pentagon is infatuated with expensive technologies, why 4G combatants act the way they do, etc.
- pavel_lishin 12y ago
  Can you recommend a good starting point?
  - carsongross 12y ago
    If you can stomach some old-right cultural conservatism, "On War" is a collection of his essays during the first phase of the Iraq war: http://www.amazon.com/War-Collected-Columns-William-2003-2009-ebook/dp/B00OY2QFAY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418747951&sr=8-1&keywords=on+war+lind&pebp=1418747954029 http://www.amazon.com/War-Collected-Columns-William-2003-200... You may be able to find them online in archive form too: http://www.dnipogo.org/lind/lind_archive.htm http://www.dnipogo.org/lind/lind_archive.htm
    - jerf 12y ago
      "If you can stomach some old-right cultural conservatism," Though just to make sure that doesn't overly turn off people it really shouldn't, bear in mind that this is the sort of 'old-right cultural conservatism' that, at least so far into my reading of the book, was unremittingly hostile about every aspect of the Iraq war, from its goals, how it was run, who was running it, and so on. It makes left-wing criticism of the war look anemic and bereft of detail by comparison. I mean, I strongly recommend that a serious intellectual ought to with some frequency seriously entertain viewpoints that don't match their own anyhow, but I do feel it's worth pointing out that an anti-war left wing partisan will probably have less trouble with the book than that summary would indicate.

austenallred 12y ago

It's not about ISIS crucifying or not crucifying its members; it's about ISIS constantly deciding exactly what we're talking about. Most of ISIS's PR strategy would rightly seem insane to most of us, but ISIS wants to amplify how extremist they are. They want to be perceived as a group willing to do anything for their cause. With every story they're saying, "We are creating a perfect Islamic state, and nothing in our way will stop us. You should both fear and respect us." There's an interesting PR term called "agenda setting." You can't dictate whether or not people agree with you, but you can decide which angle they're looking at you from. The beheading of US journalists was completely intentional. They wanted us to be afraid of how ruthless they are. Now we're getting stories of "Teenage boy from country X left his family to join ISIS." That's just them recruiting. The sad part of all this isn't that ISIS has a PR machine, but that we're so awful at detecting it, and that we let them get away with it even when it's made up out of whole cloth.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

typicalbender 12y ago

My guess is ISIS has a public reputation they want to uphold which is an amplification of what they're actually doing. By planting the story they benefit from the extremist world view without having to actually commit the act that the story is about. Its also faster to make up a story and leak it than going out and actually finding corruption and do the act for real.

kordless 12y ago

Control the conversation.

carsongross 12y ago

4th Generation warfare is mainly about legitimacy, particularly of non-state actors. ISIS is fighting to be seen as the legitimate representative of Iraq and a broader caliphate, and self-policing corruption furthers that goal. I highly recommend reading Bill Lind's stuff on 4G warfare, which helps make sense of lots of things in modern warfare: why massive armies don't win wars, why the pentagon is infatuated with expensive technologies, why 4G combatants act the way they do, etc.

pavel_lishin 12y ago
Can you recommend a good starting point?
- carsongross 12y ago
  If you can stomach some old-right cultural conservatism, "On War" is a collection of his essays during the first phase of the Iraq war: http://www.amazon.com/War-Collected-Columns-William-2003-2009-ebook/dp/B00OY2QFAY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418747951&sr=8-1&keywords=on+war+lind&pebp=1418747954029 http://www.amazon.com/War-Collected-Columns-William-2003-200... You may be able to find them online in archive form too: http://www.dnipogo.org/lind/lind_archive.htm http://www.dnipogo.org/lind/lind_archive.htm
  - jerf 12y ago
    "If you can stomach some old-right cultural conservatism," Though just to make sure that doesn't overly turn off people it really shouldn't, bear in mind that this is the sort of 'old-right cultural conservatism' that, at least so far into my reading of the book, was unremittingly hostile about every aspect of the Iraq war, from its goals, how it was run, who was running it, and so on. It makes left-wing criticism of the war look anemic and bereft of detail by comparison. I mean, I strongly recommend that a serious intellectual ought to with some frequency seriously entertain viewpoints that don't match their own anyhow, but I do feel it's worth pointing out that an anti-war left wing partisan will probably have less trouble with the book than that summary would indicate.