RE: The ICIJ's 13.4 Million File Paradise Papers, Overshadowed by Another Mass Shooting in Texas
Very much appreciate this comment.
Thanks for the kind words, i think when most people think about propaganda they think of overt nazi type stuff and that was what 70 years ago? The current forms of propaganda are highly developed and sophisticated techniques and the West has been perfecting their methods for decades.
We would be foolish to believe that our media is not designed to manipulate our minds. Sadly, most people recoil from, or laugh off, any notion that powerful forces (including the government) would be working to control their citizens.
Your friend's wife cannot even entertain the thought in her mind. I'm certain she's not a bad person at all but most of us our so heavily indoctrinated that we cannot step back and look at it objectively and critically.
She is a very good, kind, and loving person of course - and that is partially why she shrinks from discussions like this in such horror. The cognitive dissonance of thinking that there are such incredibly evil people at the very core of the institutions we are taught, all our lives, to look to with trust and respect, is just unthinkable.
And so, I completely understand her reaction to my remarks over the phone. The real struggle for me - and I've come face to face with this stuff because I've been aware and resisting for many years now - is how to gently, clearly, and effectively communicate what is really happening to the people around me. How to do that without being immediately dismissed as some nut-job paranoid "conspiracy theorist."
So, thanks again for your clear, calm, measured discussion in this article. ;)