By Caitlin Johnstone
\nInformation Clearing House<\/p>\n
Since the dawn of civilization, powerful individuals have controlled the stories people tell themselves about who they are, who\u2019s in charge, how a good citizen behaves, what groups should be loved, what groups should be hated, and what\u2019s really going on in the world. When you study what we call history, you\u2019re mostly just reading the ancient proto-propaganda of whatever kingdom happened to win the last war during that period of time. When you study what we call religion, you\u2019re mostly reading stories that were advanced by ancient governments explaining why the people should be meek, forgiving taxpayers instead of rising up and killing their wealthy exploiters.<\/p>\n
This continues to this day. We fill our children\u2019s heads with lies about how the world works, how the government works, how the media works, and, on a deeper level,\u00a0how their own consciousness works<\/a>, and the entire process is shaped to funnel power toward the people who control our stories. The modern schooling system was\u00a0largely formed by John D Rockefeller<\/a>, widely considered\u00a0the wealthiest person in modern history<\/a>, in order to create generations of docile gear-turners for the industrial plutocratic machine. Modern schooling is essentially mainstream media in a building; it promotes authorized narratives day in and day out to ensure that children will have a reaction of cognitive dissonance and rejection when confronted with information which contradicts those narratives.<\/p>\n This funnels the populace seamlessly into the narrative control matrix of adulthood, where childhood indoctrination into mainstream narratives lubricates the way for continual programming of credulous minds with mass media propaganda. All the print, TV and online media they are presented with supports the status quo-supporting agendas of the same plutocratic class that John D Rockefeller dominated all those years ago. This ensures that no matter how bad things get, no matter how severely our spirits are crushed by end-stage metastatic neoliberalism, no matter how many stupid, pointless wars we\u2019re duped into, no matter how much further we are drawn along\u00a0the path toward extinction<\/a>\u00a0via climate chaos or nuclear war, we will never revolt to overthrow our rulers.<\/p>\n That\u2019s three paragraphs. Our predicament is simple to describe and easy to understand. But that doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s easy to solve.<\/p>\n \u201cJust leave him!\u201d we say in exasperation. \u201cThe door\u2019s right there! It\u2019s not locked!\u201d But it\u2019s never that simple. It\u2019s never that simple because, although the abusee is indeed physically capable of walking out the door, the thoughts that are in their head keep them from choosing that option.<\/p>\n This is because no abuser is simply violent or cruel: they are also necessarily manipulative. If they weren\u2019t manipulative, there wouldn\u2019t be any \u201cabusive relationship\u201d; there\u2019d just be someone doing something horrible one time, followed by a hasty exit out the door. There can\u2019t be an ongoing relationship that is abusive unless there\u2019s some glue holding the abusee in place, and that glue always consists primarily of believed narrative.<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t mean it. I love you. I just get frustrated sometimes because of your stupidity.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cYou can\u2019t leave; you\u2019ll never make it out there on your own. You need me.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m the only one who\u2019ll ever be there for you. Nobody else will ever love you because you\u2019re so disgusting.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cYour children need their father. You have to stay.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cI need you! I\u2019ll die without you!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not doing that. You\u2019re paranoid and crazy.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cYour inability to forgive me means something is wrong with you.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n They seldom say it so overtly, because if they did its malignancy would be easy to spot, but those are the ideas which get subtly implanted into the abusee\u2019s head day after day after day by way of skillful manipulation.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s her own fault for staying,\u201d someone will inevitably say.<\/p>\n No it isn\u2019t. Not really. The abuser is at fault for the overt abuse, and the abuser is also at fault for the psychological manipulations which keep the abusee in place in spite of terrible cruelty. It\u2019s all one thing, and it\u2019s entirely the abuser\u2019s fault.<\/p>\n Humanity\u2019s predicament is the same. I often hear revolutionary-minded thinkers voicing frustration at the mainstream public for choosing to stay within this transparently abusive dynamic instead of rising up and forcing change, and yes, it is self-evident that the citizenry could easily use its vastly superior numbers to do that if it collectively chose to. The door is right there. It\u2019s not even locked.<\/p>\n But the people aren\u2019t failing to choose the door because they love being abused, they\u2019re failing to choose the door because they\u2019ve been manipulated into not choosing it. From cradle to grave they\u2019re pummeled with stories telling them that this is the only way things can be, in exactly the same way a battered wife or a cult member are pummeled with stories about how leaving is impossible.<\/p>\n The difficulty of our times is not that we are locked up; we aren\u2019t. The difficulty is that far too many of us are manipulated into choosing a prison cell over freedom.<\/span><\/p>\n The fact of the matter is that a populace will never rise up against its oppressors as long as it is being successfully propagandized not to. It will never, ever happen. The majority will choose the prison cell every time.<\/p>\n You\u2019d expect that more dissident thinking would be pouring into solving this dilemma, but not much is. People talk about elections and political strategies, they talk about who has the most correct ideology, they talk about rising up and seizing the means of production due to unacceptable material conditions, they wax philosophical about the tyranny of the state and the immorality of coercion, but they rarely address the elephant in the room that you can\u2019t get a populace to oust the status quo when they do not want to.<\/p>\n Nothing will ever be done about our predicament as long as powerful people are controlling the stories that the majority of the public believe. This is as true today as it was in John D Rockefeller\u2019s time, which was as true as when Rome chose to spread the \u201crender unto Caesar what is Caesar\u2019s\u201d submissiveness of Christianity throughout the Empire. The only difference is that now the powerful have\u00a0a century of post-Bernays propaganda science<\/a>\u00a0under their belt, and a\u00a0whole lot of research and development<\/a>\u00a0can happen in a hundred years.<\/p>\n So what\u2019s the solution? How do you awaken a populace that is not just manipulated into choosing its prison cell every time, but is also manipulated into believing that any suggestion that they\u2019re in a prison cell is a crazy conspiracy theory?<\/p>\n Well, what do you do when a loved one is in an abusive relationship? It never works to shake them and scream \u201cYou\u2019re being abused!\u201d; that just causes them to tighten up and dig in deeper with their abuser\u2019s narratives about how this is the only way things can be and anyone who says otherwise is crazy. What works is to lovingly help that sovereign spark within them gather evidence that the narratives they\u2019re being fed by their abuser are lies. Point out every time where reality contradicts the stories they\u2019ve been told. Weaken their trust in the old stories while strengthening their confidence in their own perception and their sense of entitlement and worthiness. Help them to see that they\u2019re being lied to, and that they deserve better.<\/p>\n This breaking of trust needs to happen within the respective partisan echo chambers of those who are being propagandized. It\u2019s useless to increase the distrust of CNN and MSNBC among Trump\u2019s base, for example, but it\u2019s very useful to increase their distrust in right-wing narratives. It\u2019s useless to increase Democrats\u2019 distrust in Trump and Fox News, but it\u2019s very useful to get them skeptical of the narrative control machine they\u2019ve been plugged into. Each head of the two-headed one-party system needs to be attacked in a way that makes sense inside each of its respective echo chambers.<\/p>\n Mostly, though, what we need is we need is for more thinkers to be more focused on the real problem. I know some influential minds read this blog; if they can help seed the idea out among the movers and shakers of dissident thought that propaganda is our first and foremost problem, we just might get somewhere. We need a major shift of focus onto the narrative control matrix and the obstacle that it poses to revolution, and everyone can help shift us there in their own way.<\/p>\n The propaganda machine won\u2019t be adequately disrupted without intensive effort, and until it is we\u2019re going to keep selecting the prison cell every time.<\/p>\n
\nEveryone has at some point known someone in some kind of an abusive relationship, whether it be with a partner, a family member, or a job, and we all know that helpless feeling of being unable to help someone who refuses to walk away from the source of their abuse.<\/p>\n