Propaganda

[iwanttotalk]

When i left the church a large part of it was due to what i considered to be blatant mental manipulation.

Infantilizarion, weirdness, obedience without question, censorship, revision of history, submission, exploitation of cognition etc. things often talked about here.

But now that I'm out, i dont find the mind control of the Cult of the USA to be any less odious than the manipulation of LDS inc. the Amalgamation of “America” does the same thing and just as obviously.

When i first left i wanted to retain my spirituality and feel now that the “secular government” is just as demanding or probably even more demanding of my spiritual submission than mormonism ever was. In fact without question mormonism, with all its faults, was more free and honest. I attribute this to that fact that the mormons werent as good at mind control.

Am I crazy? Does anyone else feel this way?

[Reuben]

Not crazy. Maybe sensitive to it, and that's not a bad thing. Some of us should be.

Some amount of what you describe is inevitable when humans form groups. We agree on the existence and attributes of things (e.g. money has value, our country is good, Trump is president), and then create evidence for our ideas to make them real (e.g. printed bank notes, national anthem, swearing in ceremony).

Besides that initial transition, there's always some transition or other going on, so what we want to be real is always at least a little at odds with reality. Example: At my company, we have an internal slogan "MyCompany runs on trust." Does it? Not literally. And we haven't been quite trustworthy in the past. But our new CEO wants trustworthiness to be our market differentiator, so we have this internal propaganda. It's accompanied by effective changes to structure, procedure and attitudes, so we're slowly making it real and resolving the dissonance.

But what if we couldn't do that? What if there wasn't a single thing we could do to make our aspirations into reality, but we had to maintain them anyway?

Then what we want to be real and reality would forever be at odds. Imagine what we might do to try to resolve this permanent dissonance. More effective propaganda. Testimony meetings. Shaming. Overclaiming. Self-deception. Censorship. Manipulation. Businesses and countries are just as capable of doing all of this as religions are. Ever been to a political rally? An MLM testimony meeting?

I think what you're seeing is the result of 100% investment in an impossible reality.

[iwanttotalk]

Then what we want to be real and reality would forever be at odds. Imagine what we might do to try to resolve this permanent dissonance. More effective propaganda. Testimony meetings. Shaming. Overclaiming. Self-deception. Censorship. Manipulation. Businesses and countries are just as capable of doing all of this as religions are. Ever been to a political rally? An MLM testimony meeting?

I think what you're seeing is the result of 100% investment in an impossible reality.

Obviously civil society requires some kinds of lies. Or acceptance of symbology. Even cultures demand a kind of moral cohesion and ideological uniformity.

No matter how free or benign the society these necessities will prevail.

But i am talking about something far more oppressive. The kind of spiritual submission you see take place in heavy cults or in the old soviet block or the book 1984.

You know a place where you have to write your thoughts only in secret even from your own family as one child did in east germany because the censorship and mind control are so absolute even the act of thinking is illegal and your family or friends may be your enemy. Where any kind of thought or belief which is not in conformance makes one an illegal person. A place where your spouse could be an informer upon you.

Im not talking slogans or people willfully brainwashing themselves, but the oppressive forced acceptance of blatant false realities. Where the freedom to think and be and learn are quite thouroughly extinguished.

A persona non grata like a jew in germany.

The submission to the cult of America is absolute. The severity and level of propaganda are indicting. Im begining to feel like freedom is the ability to say 2+2=4 except every book i read. Every broadcast i see. Every newspaper article says 2+2=5. And if you do not accept this you are censored and censured. Only in the privacy of your own mind can you say a true thing.

Of course no one believes these obvious lies but they are presented as universally accepted truisms. These lies are presented as in such a way to give them the approximations of truth by figures of authority. They do not withstand even the most modest scrutiny but are universally accepted.

Even the documents are manipulated. Wide swaths of history and philosophy are thoroughly erased. Purged. You may see evidence of their existence only by evidence of their absence. I have read entire books even multiple books dedicated to why certain historical viewpoints were wrong but litterally the veiwpoint so many scholarly books were dedicated to refuting which had such sway over the minds of the people literally does not exist.

You cant find it in any reference book, it is absent from dictionaries on the subject, the librarians have never heard of it, and computer queries end up with no results. Internet results are non existant Even the god damn auto correct wants to change the word. Ex nihlo. I can read 8 volumes refuting something that does not exist.

And its not just one thing. Upon review of any subject one becomes expert in, one can find entire branches of the matter thouroughly purged.

The only thing i can relate it to would be mormon correlation where hinckley in the 1950’s went through the compendium of mormon history and sanatized it. And you would follow references of one book quoting another in a circle back to the orignal book you had started from but could never dig your way to the source material.

Except this manipulation is on a level incomprehensible even with mormon revisionism as a reference. It is absolute and obedience to it and belief in it are mandated by either manufactured ignorance or forced submission.

[Palerider]

The submission to the cult of America is absolute. The severity and level of propaganda are indicting. Im begining to feel like freedom is the ability to say 2+2=4 except every book i read. Every broadcast i see. Every newspaper article says 2+2=5. And if you do not accept this you are censored and censured. Only in the privacy of your own mind can you say a true thing.

Of course no one believes these obvious lies but they are presented as universally accepted truisms. These lies are presented as in such a way to give them the approximations of truth by figures of authority. They do not withstand even the most modest scrutiny but are universally accepted.

Even the documents are manipulated. Wide swaths of history and philosophy are thoroughly erased. Purged. You may see evidence of their existence only by evidence of their absence. I have read entire books even multiple books dedicated to why certain historical viewpoints were wrong but litterally the veiwpoint so many scholarly books were dedicated to refuting which had such sway over the minds of the people literally does not exist.

You cant find it in any reference book, it is absent from dictionaries on the subject, the librarians have never heard of it, and computer queries end up with no results. Internet results are non existant Even the god damn auto correct wants to change the word. Ex nihlo. I can read 8 volumes refuting something that does not exist.

And its not just one thing. Upon review of any subject one becomes expert in, one can find entire branches of the matter thouroughly purged.

The only thing i can relate it to would be mormon correlation where hinckley in the 1950’s went through the compendium of mormon history and sanatized it. And you would follow references of one book quoting another in a circle back to the orignal book you had started from but could never dig your way to the source material.

I don't know if I would call it the "cult of America". But I would call it the "Cult of the ruling elite".

I've told my kids that in the near future (actually even now) the most expensive commodity will be "truth".

Everyone has ulterior motives for spinning the facts in order to benefit themselves. There used to be a time when men were more willing to admit their wrongdoings and accept the consequences. Not anymore.

Just keep spinning until no one knows the truth and take whatever you can get.

[iwanttotalk]

I've told my kids that in the near future (actually even now) the most expensive commodity will be "truth".

You mean cost the most to attain and have the dearest price to have posession of? Having truth is a criminal offence. You will go to jail or be killed for having it.

Already in most places having the truth will get you censored. It can get you fired from your job. It can make you an enemy of the state.

It will offer you nothing of value in economic terms. Its price will be a lifetime of depravations and privation like God’s Outlaws who died to defy the truth of the catholic church and published books agaisnt divine right monarchy and in favor of religious freedom. Truth is not valuable, it is deadly.

Whose truth? Their truth is power. All other truth stems from that one lone virtue. It is their god from which all else flows. If they can tell you that 2+2 = 5 and make you believe it or at least aquisce to the lie then it is true! Because it is power.

You and i may be able to spin to get providence, but our children or our childrens children will not.

[Corsair]

You and i may be able to spin to get providence, but our children or our childrens children will not.

Being concerned for our posterity and subsequent generations is a perfectly natural concern. We have to acknowledge that our believing LDS ancestors would be horrified simply by our appearance on this forum. And their ancestors back in Europe and South America would have been horrified by a segment of their descendants that ended up in this wacky American Restorationist religion.

It simply remains that we will need to teach our own children how to think critically and how to know how something is true. Understanding rhetoric is as old as Aristotle. We have his thread of critical thinking that has persisted for 2400 years and spawned numerous instances where it worked. It's our turn to pass it on.

[Palerider]

Whose truth? Their truth is power. All other truth stems from that one lone virtue. It is their god from which all else flows........Because it is power.

Power is not a virtue. Only the manner of it's use can be virtuous......or not.

The lust for power eventually consumes itself and everyone nearby. Look at the tyrants through history who killed even their own children because they didn't know who to trust. The problem with spinning the truth is that eventually the spinner can no longer know who or what information to trust. Paranoia follows.....

Meanwhile, those who know the truth are at a minimum able to avoid the flailings of the ruling elite as best as they can.

Knowing the truth is always better.

[Palerider]

You and i may be able to spin to get providence, but our children or our childrens children will not.

Being concerned for our posterity and subsequent generations is a perfectly natural concern. We have to acknowledge that our believing LDS ancestors would be horrified simply by our appearance on this forum. And their ancestors back in Europe and South America would have been horrified by a segment of their descendants that ended up in this wacky American Restorationist religion.

It simply remains that we will need to teach our own children how to think critically and how to know how something is true. Understanding rhetoric is as old as Aristotle. We have his thread of critical thinking that has persisted for 2400 years and spawned numerous instances where it worked. It's our turn to pass it on.

[iwanttotalk]

Whose truth? Their truth is power. All other truth stems from that one lone virtue. It is their god from which all else flows........Because it is power.

Power is not a virtue. Only the manner of it's use can be virtuous......or not.

The lust for power eventually consumes itself and everyone nearby. Look at the tyrants through history who killed even their own children because they didn't know who to trust. The problem with spinning the truth is that eventually the spinner can no longer know who or what information to trust. Paranoia follows.....

Meanwhile, those who know the truth are at a minimum able to avoid the flailings of the ruling elite as best as they can.

Knowing the truth is always better.

Thats a media trope. That power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Thats what they have taught you to believe. There are of course examples of power destroying. They say that power is evil and therefore to be powerless is virtious. Not because it is so, but because it is easier to have power over people who are afraid, divided, and think virtue lies in impoverishment.

Power is also good. And is necessary to create, maintian, and perform good.

Yet christians believe in an all powerful god. That must then mean god is absolutley corrupted and evil?

You seemingly espouse some kind of neiztching slave morality as goodness. They claim the master morality of power and consiquence.

The point is their only virtue is power. They dont care about what you think is virtious. To them your virtue is evil the same way god is evil. To them virtue is a means to control the ignorant masses.

Ever seen the film “prophets prey” about warren jeffs and the FLDS? They use ‘virtue’ to imprisson the followers.

[Palerider]

Whose truth? Their truth is power. All other truth stems from that one lone virtue. It is their god from which all else flows........Because it is power.

Power is not a virtue. Only the manner of it's use can be virtuous......or not.

The lust for power eventually consumes itself and everyone nearby. Look at the tyrants through history who killed even their own children because they didn't know who to trust. The problem with spinning the truth is that eventually the spinner can no longer know who or what information to trust. Paranoia follows.....

Meanwhile, those who know the truth are at a minimum able to avoid the flailings of the ruling elite as best as they can.

Knowing the truth is always better.

Thats a media trope. That power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Nope, never said that. You have read that into my statement. Thats what they have taught you to believe. There are of course examples of power destroying. They say that power is evil and therefore to be powerless is virtious. Not because it is so, but because it is easier to have power over people who are afraid, divided, and think virtue lies in impoverishment.

Power is also good. And is necessary to create, maintian, and perform good. To repeat what I said, power is neither virtuous or evil, only how it is USED is either good or evil or somewhere in the middle.

Yet christians believe in an all powerful god. That must then mean god is absolutley corrupted and evil?

You seemingly espouse some kind of neiztching slave morality as goodness. They claim the master morality of power and consiquence.

The point is their only virtue is power. They dont care about what you think is virtious. To them your virtue is evil the same way god is evil. To them virtue is a means to control the ignorant masses.

Ever seen the film “prophets prey” about warren jeffs and the FLDS? They use ‘virtue’ to imprisson the followers.

I can see why you want to talk. But it would be better if you slowed down a little and worked on reading for comprehension first. You have missed my point entirely and are arguing against a concept that I never suggested.

You don't have to answer by any means but I'm curious how old you are?