Why Americans Will Believe Almost Anything

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Wed, 18 Jan 2006 18:01:13 EST

Why Americans Will Believe Almost Anything

 

 

 

http://www.mercola.com/2001/aug/15/perception.htm

 

The Doors Of Perception: Why Americans Will Believe Almost Anything

 

[ Page 1, Page 2 ]

 

by Dr. Tim O'Shea

 

We are the most conditioned, programmed beings the world has ever

known. Not only are our thoughts and attitudes continually being

shaped and molded; our very awareness of the whole design seems like

it is being subtly and inexorably erased.

 

The doors of our perception are carefully and precisely regulated. Who

cares, right?

 

It is an exhausting and endless task to keep explaining to people how

most issues of conventional wisdom are scientifically implanted in the

public consciousness by a thousand media clips per day. In an effort

to save time, I would like to provide just a little background on the

handling of information in this country.

 

Once the basic principles are illustrated about how our current system

of media control arose historically, the reader might be more apt to

question any given story in today's news.

 

If everybody believes something, it's probably wrong. We call that

Conventional Wisdom.

 

In America, conventional wisdom that has mass acceptance is usually

contrived: somebody paid for it. Examples:

 

* Pharmaceuticals restore health

* Vaccination brings immunity

* The cure for cancer is just around the corner

* When a child is sick, he needs immediate antibiotics

* When a child has a fever he needs Tylenol

* Hospitals are safe and clean.

* America has the best health care in the world.

* And many many more

 

This is a list of illusions, that have cost billions and billions to

conjure up. Did you ever wonder why you never see the President

speaking publicly unless he is reading? Or why most people in this

country think generally the same about most of the above issues?

 

How This Set-Up Got Started

 

In Trust Us We're Experts, Stauber and Rampton pull together some

compelling data describing the science of creating public opinion in

America.

 

They trace modern public influence back to the early part of the last

century, highlighting the work of guys like Edward L. Bernays, the

Father of Spin. From his own amazing chronicle Propaganda, we learn

how Edward L. Bernays took the ideas of his famous uncle Sigmund Freud

himself, and applied them to the emerging science of mass persuasion.

 

The only difference was that instead of using these principles to

uncover hidden themes in the human unconscious, the way Freudian

psychology does, Bernays used these same ideas to mask agendas and to

create illusions that deceive and misrepresent, for marketing purposes.

 

The Father Of Spin

 

Bernays dominated the PR industry until the 1940s, and was a

significant force for another 40 years after that. (Tye) During all

that time, Bernays took on hundreds of diverse assignments to create a

public perception about some idea or product. A few examples:

 

As a neophyte with the Committee on Public Information, one of

Bernays' first assignments was to help sell the First World War to the

American public with the idea to " Make the World Safe for Democracy. "

(Ewen)

 

A few years later, Bernays set up a stunt to popularize the notion of

women smoking cigarettes. In organizing the 1929 Easter Parade in New

York City, Bernays showed himself as a force to be reckoned with.

 

He organized the Torches of Liberty Brigade in which suffragettes

marched in the parade smoking cigarettes as a mark of women's

liberation. Such publicity followed from that one event that from then

on women have felt secure about destroying their own lungs in public,

the same way that men have always done.

 

Bernays popularized the idea of bacon for breakfast.

 

Not one to turn down a challenge, he set up the advertising format

along with the AMA that lasted for nearly 50 years proving that

cigarettes are beneficial to health. Just look at ads in issues of

Life or Time from the 40s and 50s.

 

Smoke And Mirrors

 

Bernay's job was to reframe an issue; to create a desired image that

would put a particular product or concept in a desirable light.

Bernays described the public as a 'herd that needed to be led.' And

this herdlike thinking makes people " susceptible to leadership. "

 

Bernays never deviated from his fundamental axiom to " control the

masses without their knowing it. " The best PR happens with the people

unaware that they are being manipulated.

 

Stauber describes Bernays' rationale like this:

 

" the scientific manipulation of public opinion was necessary to

overcome chaos and conflict in a democratic society. " Trust Us p 42

 

These early mass persuaders postured themselves as performing a moral

service for humanity in general - democracy was too good for people;

they needed to be told what to think, because they were incapable of

rational thought by themselves. Here's a paragraph from Bernays'

Propaganda:

 

" Those who manipulate the unseen mechanism of society constitute an

invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We

are governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested

largely by men we have never heard of.

 

This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is

organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner

if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society.

 

In almost every act of our lives whether in the sphere of politics or

business in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are

dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the

mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who

pull the wires that control the public mind. "

 

Here Comes The Money

 

Once the possibilities of applying Freudian psychology to mass media

were glimpsed, Bernays soon had more corporate clients than he could

handle. Global corporations fell all over themselves courting the new

Image Makers. There were dozens of goods and services and ideas to be

sold to a susceptible public. Over the years, these players have had

the money to make their images happen. A few examples:

 

Philip Morris Pfizer Union Carbide

Allstate Monsanto Eli Lilly

tobacco industry Ciba Geigy lead industry

Coors DuPont Chlorox

Shell Oil Standard Oil Procter & Gamble

Boeing General Motors Dow Chemical

General Mills Goodyear

 

The Players

 

Though world-famous within the PR industry, the companies have names

we don't know, and for good reason.

 

The best PR goes unnoticed.

 

For decades they have created the opinions that most of us were raised

with, on virtually any issue which has the remotest commercial value,

including:

pharmaceutical drugs vaccines

medicine as a profession alternative medicine

fluoridation of city water chlorine

household cleaning products tobacco

dioxin global warming

leaded gasoline cancer research and treatment

pollution of the oceans forests and lumber

images of celebrities, including damage control

crisis and disaster management

genetically modified foods aspartame

food additives; processed foods dental amalgams

 

Lesson #1

 

Bernays learned early on that the most effective way to create

credibility for a product or an image was by " independent third-party "

endorsement.

 

For example, if General Motors were to come out and say that global

warming is a hoax thought up by some liberal tree-huggers, people

would suspect GM's motives, since GM's fortune is made by selling

automobiles.

 

If however some independent research institute with a very credible

sounding name like the Global Climate Coalition comes out with a

scientific report that says global warming is really a fiction, people

begin to get confused and to have doubts about the original issue.

 

So that's exactly what Bernays did. With a policy inspired by genius,

he set up " more institutes and foundations than Rockefeller and

Carnegie combined. " (Stauber p 45)

 

Quietly financed by the industries whose products were being

evaluated, these " independent " research agencies would churn out

" scientific " studies and press materials that could create any image

their handlers wanted. Such front groups are given high-sounding names

like:

Temperature Research Foundation Manhattan Institute

International Food Information Council Center for Produce Quality

Consumer Alert Tobacco Institute Research Council

The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition Cato Institute

Air Hygiene Foundation

American Council on Science and Health

Industrial Health Federation Global Climate Coalition

International Food Information Council Alliance for Better Foods

 

Sound pretty legit don't they?

 

Canned News Releases

 

As Stauber explains, these organizations and hundreds of others like

them are front groups whose sole mission is to advance the image of

the global corporations who fund them, like those listed on page 2 above.

 

This is accomplished in part by an endless stream of 'press releases'

announcing " breakthrough " research to every radio station and

newspaper in the country. (Robbins) Many of these canned reports read

like straight news, and indeed are purposely molded in the news format.

 

This saves journalists the trouble of researching the subjects on

their own, especially on topics about which they know very little.

Entire sections of the release or in the case of video news releases,

the whole thing can be just lifted intact, with no editing, given the

byline of the reporter or newspaper or TV station - and voilá! Instant

news - copy and paste. Written by corporate PR firms.

 

Does this really happen? Every single day, since the 1920s when the

idea of the News Release was first invented by Ivy Lee. (Stauber, p

22) Sometimes as many as half the stories appearing in an issue of the

Wall St. Journal are based solely on such PR press releases.. (22)

 

These types of stories are mixed right in with legitimately researched

stories. Unless you have done the research yourself, you won't be able

to tell the difference.

 

The Language Of Spin

 

As 1920s spin pioneers like Ivy Lee and Edward Bernays gained more

experience, they began to formulate rules and guidelines for creating

public opinion. They learned quickly that mob psychology must focus on

emotion, not facts. Since the mob is incapable of rational thought,

motivation must be based not on logic but on presentation. Here are

some of the axioms of the new science of PR:

 

*

 

technology is a religion unto itself

*

 

if people are incapable of rational thought, real democracy is

dangerous

*

 

important decisions should be left to experts

*

 

when reframing issues, stay away from substance; create images

*

 

never state a clearly demonstrable lie

 

Words are very carefully chosen for their emotional impact. Here's an

example. A front group called the International Food Information

Council handles the public's natural aversion to genetically modified

foods.

 

Trigger words are repeated all through the text. Now in the case of GM

foods, the public is instinctively afraid of these experimental new

creations which have suddenly popped up on our grocery shelves which

are said to have DNA alterations. The IFIC wants to reassure the

public of the safety of GM foods, so it avoids words like:

Frankenfoods Hitler biotech

chemical DNA experiments

manipulate money safety

scientists radiation roulette

gene-splicing gene gun random

 

Instead, good PR for GM foods contains words like:

hybrids natural order beauty

choice bounty cross-breeding

diversity earth farmer

organic wholesome

 

It's basic Freudian/Tony Robbins word association. The fact that GM

foods are not hybrids that have been subjected to the slow and careful

scientific methods of real crossbreeding doesn't really matter. This

is pseudoscience, not science. Form is everything and substance just a

passing myth. (Trevanian)

 

Who do you think funds the International Food Information Council?

Take a wild guess. Right - Monsanto, DuPont, Frito-Lay, Coca Cola,

Nutrasweet - those in a position to make fortunes from GM foods.

(Stauber p 20)

 

Characteristics Of Good Propaganda

 

As the science of mass control evolved, PR firms developed further

guidelines for effective copy. Here are some of the gems:

 

*

 

dehumanize the attacked party by labeling and name calling

*

 

speak in glittering generalities using emotionally positive words

*

 

when covering something up, don't use plain English; stall for

time; distract

*

 

get endorsements from celebrities, churches, sports figures,

street people - anyone who has no expertise in the subject at hand

*

 

the 'plain folks' ruse: us billionaires are just like you

*

 

when minimizing outrage, don't say anything memorable, point out

the benefits of what just happened, and avoid moral issues

 

Keep this list. Start watching for these techniques. Not hard to find

- look at today's paper or tonight's TV news. See what they're doing;

these guys are good!

 

References

 

Science For Hire

 

PR firms have become very sophisticated in the preparation of news

releases. They have learned how to attach the names of famous

scientists to research that those scientists have not even looked at.

(Stauber, p 201)

 

This is a common occurrence. In this way the editors of newspapers and

TV news shows are often not even aware that an individual release is a

total PR fabrication. Or at least they have " deniability, " right?

 

Stauber tells the amazing story of how leaded gas came into the

picture. In 1922, General Motors discovered that adding lead to

gasoline gave cars more horsepower.

 

When there was some concern about safety, GM paid the Bureau of Mines

to do some fake " testing " and publish spurious research that 'proved'

that inhalation of lead was harmless. Enter Charles Kettering.

 

Founder of the world famous Sloan-Kettering Memorial Institute for

medical research, Charles Kettering also happened to be an executive

with General Motors.

 

By some strange coincidence, we soon have the Sloan Kettering

institute issuing reports stating that lead occurs naturally in the

body and that the body has a way of eliminating low level exposure.

 

Through its association with The Industrial Hygiene Foundation and PR

giant Hill & Knowlton, Sloane Kettering opposed all anti-lead research

for years. (Stauber p 92). Without organized scientific opposition,

for the next 60 years more and more gasoline became leaded, until by

the 1970s, 90% of our gasoline was leaded.

 

Finally it became too obvious to hide that lead was a major

carcinogen, and leaded gas was phased out in the late 1980s. But

during those 60 years, it is estimated that some 30 million tons of

lead were released in vapor form onto American streets and highways.

30 million tons.

 

That is PR, my friends.

 

Junk Science

 

In 1993 a guy named Peter Huber wrote a new book and coined a new

term. The book was Galileo's Revenge and the term was junk science.

Huber's shallow thesis was that real science supports technology,

industry, and progress.

 

Anything else was suddenly junk science. Not surprisingly, Stauber

explains how Huber's book was supported by the industry-backed

Manhattan Institute.

 

Huber's book was generally dismissed not only because it was so poorly

written, but because it failed to realize one fact: true scientific

research begins with no conclusions. Real scientists are seeking the

truth because they do not yet know what the truth is.

 

True scientific method goes like this:

 

1. Form a hypothesis

2. Make predictions for that hypothesis

3. Test the predictions

4. Reject or revise the hypothesis based on the research findings

 

Boston University scientist Dr. David Ozonoff explains that ideas in

science are themselves like " living organisms, that must be nourished,

supported, and cultivated with resources for making them grow and

flourish. " (Stauber p 205)

 

Great ideas that don't get this financial support because the

commercial angles are not immediately obvious - these ideas wither and

die.

 

Another way you can often distinguish real science from phony is that

real science points out flaws in its own research. Phony science

pretends there were no flaws.

 

The Real Junk Science

 

Contrast this with modern PR and its constant pretensions to sound

science. Corporate sponsored research, whether it's in the area of

drugs, GM foods, or chemistry begins with predetermined conclusions.

 

It is the job of the scientists then to prove that these conclusions

are true, because of the economic upside that proof will bring to the

industries paying for that research. This invidious approach to

science has shifted the entire focus of research in America during the

past 50 years, as any true scientist is likely to admit.

 

Stauber documents the increasing amount of corporate sponsorship of

university research. (206) This has nothing to do with the pursuit of

knowledge. Scientists lament that research has become just another

commodity, something bought and sold. (Crossen)

 

The Two Main Targets Of " Sound Science "

 

It is shocking when Stauber shows how the vast majority of corporate

PR today opposes any research that seeks to protect

 

* public health

* the environment

 

It's a funny thing that most of the time when we see the phrase " junk

science, " it is in a context of defending something that may threaten

either the environment or our health.

 

This makes sense when one realizes that money changes hands only by

selling the illusion of health and the illusion of environmental

protection. True public health and real preservation of the earth's

environment have very low market value.

 

Stauber thinks it ironic that industry's self-proclaimed debunkers of

junk science are usually non-scientists themselves. (255) Here again

they can do this because the issue is not science, but the creation of

images.

 

The Language Of Attack

 

When PR firms attack legitimate environmental groups and alternative

medicine people, they again use special words which will carry an

emotional punch:

outraged sound science junk science sensible scaremongering responsible

phobia hoax alarmist hysteria

 

The next time you are reading a newspaper article about an

environmental or health issue, note how the author shows bias by using

the above terms. This is the result of very specialized training.

 

Another standard PR tactic is to use the rhetoric of the

environmentalists themselves to defend a dangerous and untested

product that poses an actual threat to the environment. This we see

constantly in the PR smokescreen that surrounds genetically modified

foods.

 

They talk about how GM foods are necessary to grow more food and to

end world hunger, when the reality is that GM foods actually have

lower yields per acre than natural crops. (Stauber p 173)

 

The grand design sort of comes into focus once you realize that almost

all GM foods have been created by the sellers of herbicides and

pesticides so that those plants can withstand greater amounts of

herbicides and pesticides. (The Magic Bean)

 

Kill Your TV?

 

Hope this chapter has given you a hint to start reading newspaper and

magazine articles a little differently, and perhaps start watching TV

news shows with a slightly different attitude than you had before.

 

Always ask, what are they selling here, and who's selling it? And if

you actually follow up on Stauber & Rampton's book and check out some

of the other resources below, you might even glimpse the possibility

of advancing your life one quantum simply by ceasing to subject your

brain to mass media.

 

That's right - no more newspapers, no more TV news, no more Time

magazine or Newsweek. You could actually do that. Just think what you

could do with the extra time alone.

 

Really feel like you need to " relax " or find out " what's going on in

the world " for a few hours every day? Think about the news of the past

couple of years for a minute.

 

Do you really suppose the major stories that have dominated headlines

and TV news have been " what is going on in the world? " Do you actually

think there's been nothing going on besides the contrived tech slump,

the contrived power shortages, the re-filtered accounts of foreign

violence and disaster, and all the other non-stories that the

puppeteers dangle before us every day?

 

What about when they get a big one, like with OJ or Monica Lewinsky or

the Oklahoma city bombing? Do we really need to know all that detail,

day after day? Do we have any way of verifying all that detail, even

if we wanted to? What is the purpose of news?

 

To inform the public? Hardly. The sole purpose of news is to keep the

public in a state of fear and uncertainty so that they'll watch again

tomorrow and be subjected to the same advertising.

 

Oversimplification? Of course. That's the mark of mass media mastery -

simplicity. The invisible hand. Like Edward Bernays said, the people

must be controlled without them knowing it.

 

Consider this: what was really going on in the world all that time

they were distracting us with all that stupid vexatious daily

smokescreen? Fear and uncertainty -- that's what keeps people coming

back for more.

 

If this seems like a radical outlook, let's take it one step further:

 

What would you lose from your life if you stopped watching TV and

stopped reading newspapers altogether?

 

Would your life really suffer any financial, moral, intellectual or

academic loss from such a decision?

 

Do you really need to have your family continually absorbing the

illiterate, amoral, phony, uncultivated, desperately brainless values

of the people featured in the average nightly TV program? Are these

fake, programmed robots " normal " ?

 

Do you need to have your life values constantly spoon-fed to you?

 

Are those shows really amusing, or just a necessary distraction to

keep you from looking at reality, or trying to figure things out

yourself by doing a little independent reading?

 

Name one example of how your life is improved by watching TV news and

reading the evening paper.

 

What measurable gain is there for you?

 

Planet of the Apes?

 

There's no question that as a nation, we're getting dumber year by

year. Look at the presidents we've been choosing lately. Ever notice

the blatant grammar mistakes so ubiquitous in today's advertising and

billboards?

 

Literacy is marginal in most American secondary schools. Three fourths

of California high school seniors can't read well enough to pass their

exit exams. (SJ Mercury 20 Jul 01)

 

If you think other parts of the country are smarter, try this one:

hand any high school senior a book by Dumas or Jane Austen, and ask

them to open to any random page and just read one paragraph out loud.

Go ahead, do it. SAT scales are arbitrarily shifted lower and lower to

disguise how dumb kids are getting year by year.

 

At least 10% have documented " learning disabilities, " which are

reinforced and rewarded by special treatment and special drugs. Ever

hear of anyone failing a grade any more?

 

Or observe the intellectual level of the average movie which these

days may only last one or two weeks in the theatres, especially if it

has insufficient explosions, chase scenes, silicone, fake martial

arts, and cretinesque dialogue.

 

Radio? Consider the low mental qualifications of the falsely animated

corporate simians they hire as DJs -- they're only allowed to have 50

thoughts, which they just repeat at random.

 

And at what point did popular music cease to require the study of any

musical instrument or theory whatsoever, not to mention lyric? Perhaps

we just don't understand this emerging art form, right? The Darwinism

of MTV - apes descended from man.

 

Ever notice how most articles in any of the glossy magazines sound

like they were all written by the same guy? And this guy just

graduated from junior college? And yet he has all the correct opinions

on social issues, no original ideas, and that shallow, smug,

homogenized corporate omniscience, which enables him to assure us that

everything is going to be fine...

 

All this is great news for the PR industry - makes their job that much

easier. Not only are very few paying attention to the process of

conditioning; fewer are capable of understanding it even if somebody

explained it to them.

 

Tea In the Cafeteria

 

Let's say you're in a crowded cafeteria, and you buy a cup of tea. And

as you're about to sit down you see your friend way across the room.

So you put the tea down and walk across the room and talk to your

friend for a few minutes.

 

Now, coming back to your tea, are you just going to pick it up and

drink it? Remember, this is a crowded place and you've just left your

tea unattended for several minutes. You've given anybody in that room

access to your tea.

 

Why should your mind be any different? Turning on the TV, or

uncritically absorbing mass publications every day - these activities

allow access to our minds by " just anyone " - anyone who has an agenda,

anyone with the resources to create a public image via popular media.

 

As we've seen above, just because we read something or see something

on TV doesn't mean it's true or worth knowing. So the idea here is,

like the tea, the mind is also worth guarding, worth limiting access

to it.

 

This is the only life we get. Time is our total capital. Why waste it

allowing our potential, our personality, our values to be shaped,

crafted, and limited according to the whims of the mass panderers?

 

There are many important issues that are crucial to our physical,

mental, and spiritual well-being. If it's an issue where money is

involved, objective data won't be so easy to obtain. Remember, if

everybody knows something, that image has been bought and paid for.

 

Real knowledge takes a little effort, a little excavation down at

least one level below what " everybody knows. "

 

References

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Dr. Mercola's Comment:

 

One of the main reasons I publish my free health e-newsletter is to

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through much of the nonsense that the media throws at you and learn

what can REALLY help you and your loved ones fight and prevent disease

and enhance the quality and length of your life.

 

So much of what you hear about " healthcare " through the media is

manipulated or controlled by the pharmaceutical and other medical

giants who have mass profit, not your personal health, as their

primary goal. My free health e-newsletter has grown to over 250,000

rs because:

 

A) my vision and passion is to change the current healthcare

system to one focused on real prevention and cure versus the current

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over, and I am committed to providing you the TRUTH about health and

medical news toward that end

 

B) I am an internationally respected physician with over two

decades of experience developing a REAL health and dietary plan that

has PROVEN to help tens of thousands of my patients overcome chronic

disease. The point is, my passion and lifelong dedication has been to

help people, including the millions of readers of Mercola.com (now one

of the world's top-five most visited health websites), improve their

health, whether they are confronting some disease, illness, or weight

issue or seeking to improve already good health, and motives have

EVERYTHING to do with who you should trust with health advice. If you

are interested learning more about my dietary and health program, read

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of my profits, as you will read, are going to a new non-profit

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current drug-domination model fueling a lot of hype that doesn't

really help you.

 

 

Related Articles:

 

How the Media Deceives You About Health Issues