Why are we so gullible?

[Edwcraig]

Last edited Sun Mar 7, 2021, 08:52 AM - Edit history (3)

Was in the military. In civil affairs. Not a general just a soldier. I was exposed to PSYOPs concepts and methods. They are effective and help win wars. There are recognizable tactics used with PSYOps in winning the hearts and minds of the people. People being defined as the enemy population. That is what civil affairs is all about.

When I see things like cancel culture and Dr. Seuss. I see this is an orchestrated PSYOP tactic to shift attention. The trap here is engagement. Get any kind of engagement whether the engagement is a negative or positive reaction to the propaganda. Whether through social media or network news, there is a limited amount of impressions that people can receive daily. The point is that the messaging diverts the attention of the populous away from what you don't want them focused on i.e. not enough food or water. Eliminate impressions that carry the messaging that you do not want them to hear.

After the attempted and up until now failed Coup d'état, the PSYOPs team of the bad guys went into full PSYOP mode creating the cancel culture and related propaganda. This was orchestrated across many channels including media such as Fox News, Qanon, Republican messaging and bad guy elected officials. These people know what they are doing. Who are they really?

Their KPI for success is how many of the targeted opposition engages on the issue. How many hours of impressions on the bad issue have been reduced by the PSYOP messaging. Engagement means anything. Criticizing it.
Talking about it instead of the diversion issue. With Cancel Culture and Dr. Sues they are really doing well.

They say Democrats are cancel culture.

As hoped for, we engage and say "No we are not" or even worse accept there definition of the issue and debate whether or not they are worse at cancel culture than we are. Win, win for the bad guys.

There is something called counter PSYOPs. Several methods can be employed. One of the most effective is to judo the PSYOPS back to the primary issue. Orchestrate every opportunity to address the bad guy messaging as a counter message. Do not engage. Dismiss. i.e. "Cancel Culture is an attempt by the bad guys to divert attention from the attempted Coup d'etat and destruction of Democracy. This treasonous act. . . . ." Make their PSYOP message itself an issue proving the diversion issue. The point is to use the opposition's messaging to re-focus back to the primary issue.

Democrats do not seem to get this. We engage. I feel we are gullible. They win.

[AmBlue]

1. Such an important point

Thanks for pointing it out in such a concise way. We all need to be aware and on guard for this.

[DENVERPOPS]

49. Yes, the points are excellent

however, I avoid getting into any discussion or argument with the RepubliCONs and Trump humpers.

Any time you point out convincingly that there point is pure bullshit by comparing it to reality, their patented answer is always:

"OH, THAT'S DIFFERENT"

If they really try to shove their shit in my face, rather than get into it as a total waste of my time, I tell them: You know what? Politics is a total waste of time, they ALL do it.......every single time, they think for a second and say: You're right. It ends everything......LOL

[bbgrunt]

2. thanks for that reminder

From Bernays to Chomsky to magic/hypnotism/mentalism, we have been bombarded by techniques to control the populace. It seems that the CIA/military psyop techniques we use on other populations are now legal to use on domestic populations. I'm not sure the legality makes much difference since these techniques have been employed by politicians, marketers, and public relations specialists forever.

[Karadeniz]

3. Excellent! Thanks for the illuminating analysis!

[Irish_Dem]

4. The GOP is a criminal enterprise with tremendous resources being directed to a Putin style

propaganda machine. It is highly organized and coordinated. The crime family follows the daily talking points to the letter.

Since we are dealing with a ruthless sociopathy, the Dems need a highly trained and experienced team, including psychologists and Psyops people to begin to counter the GOP propoganda.

[judesedit]

5. Agree

[triron]

25. Nailed it.

[DENVERPOPS]

27. The RepubliONs

really started kicking in a tsunami of this Psy ops attack shit during the Cheney/Rumsfeld administration.
Several shrinks, really good ones I asked said they had a hard time realizing what was happening, even with their vast knowledge of how the brain works. One said they finally think they figured it out........the RepubliCONs figured out that if they could bombard their people with 24-7-365 of nothing but Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and Right wing Radio, it would have a profound effect on their brains.
Much the same as the Nor Coms do with their "re-education camps" brainwashing in North Korea, China, and Russia.......

If you look at anything and everything they put out continuously with these three things in mind, you see what is going on:

1) they lie about every last single thing. Seriously! And create massive, continous diversions.

2) they have mastered the art of hypocrisy

3) everything they say, is always 180 degrees from reality and truth....

Was it Goebells? under Hitler who said that you tell a lie and just keep repeating it over and over and it becomes truth?????
With 80+% of all media in the U.S. owned and operated by RepubliCONs they tend to warp everything quite a ways to the right.....

Putin has been grooming Trump and a boatload of other politicians since the 90's and collecting Kompromat, knowing full well that
there would come a time to use it to bring down America and Democracy.

If every time you saw Trump or his minions do something radical, you just have to ask: "what would Putin do" and it makes things crystal clear.......Think about it.....especially with Trump, McConnell, and Graham......

[certainot]

40. thanks for pointing to RW radio, which got going after reagan killed the fairness doctrine in 87

by the early 90s they had 600 stations for limbaugh who was used to pilot messaging for 1500 raddio stations - his dittoheads couldn't get through the call screeners to lick his ass so they learned to call the other hosts instead and eventually all rw blowhards and republican politicians had to follow the limbaugh lead/spin, etc. or get yelled at and lose their jobs

fox started about 10 years after in 96, basically as the cartoon cliff notes for talk radio. only radio can do the unchallenged repetition.

all the russians had to do was figure out how to use limbaugh, and probably have been since maybe as early as 2008 when limbaugh wouldn't support mccain until he picked palin over others, and manafort was his campaign cochair. in 2009 russian hackers and wikileaks were coordinated with limbaugh to create 'climategate' and sabotage obama at the copenhagen climate conference to keep putin rolling in fossil fuel profits.

limbaugh was perfect for selling lies to authoritarians. like trump they both lie with total royal sex-on-the-wrong-brain certitude. authoritarians need certainty more than liberals (authoritarianism is sometimes measured with the uncertainty avoidance index or UAI) for the cons certainty is more important than truth - the secret of authoritarian power.

a main limbaugh function that he was genius at was rationalizing the denial of reality that allows authoritarian leaders to create and sell certainty through absolutism, simplification, judgmentalism etc) to ease the fear their sex on the wrong brain followers get when faced with the infinite complexity and uncertainty of nature

cancel culture is just a more recent social media version of 'political correctness', a straw man limbaugh used for decades, yelling about some sensitive hippy that got noticed by the heritage foundation news watchers, turning molehiills into mountains, and howling basically about how terrible it was to be criticized for using the N-word, for instance. that shit from 1500 radio stations is the real cancel culture, and they are the real PC cops

hallelujah limbaugh croaked and central messaging is starting to fall apart. they can't replace him. dems shouldd take this opportunity to boycott rw radio until the ad industry has to break up the monopoly

[Duppers]

43. Excellent post.

TY.

[Irish_Dem]

44. It was very obvious during the Cheney years. "Weapons of mass destruction" BS.

I didn't have any problem figuring out what was going on back then.
But then again I am quite familiar with sociopathic behavior.

Sociopaths lie for a number of reasons, to con others, to obtain power or money.
To create chaos and confusion so people do not know who is guilty, who is innocent.
To make their victims look like the bad guys, to make themselves look innocent.
I could go on and on, but you get the drift.

Yes it was Goebbels who said if you keep telling a lie often enough, people believe it as the truth.

It is now obvious that Putin has been directing a the GOP leadership in a number of ways for quite some time.
Propaganda is one of Putin's significant strengths.

[DENVERPOPS]

47. I will never

forgive Colin Powell for selling out and getting up on stage and lying about something he knew wasn't true. He sooo much wanted to be a part of the good ol' white boys club and he thought that would seal the deal. LOL, they kicked him to the curb once they got the go ahead........

Everyone should have known Colin Powell's morals from the Mai Lai coverup that Powell helped create during Vietnam......

[Irish_Dem]

48. Colin Powell was always a "good solider" doing whatever the brass wanted him to do.

Most generals have to do that to make rank.
But yes, rotten to the core.

[DENVERPOPS]

50. The U.S. military is in some ways, just as guilty

of messing with the soldiers heads.........

[Irish_Dem]

51. Oh yes, that is quite true and well known inside the military.

It is all about playing the game.

[CaptainTruth]

37. Agree 100%. I've wondered if the DNC could play a role?

I've seen some folks say the DNC doesn't do much, except for election years, & my response is "well, why not?"

Could there be a marketing/PR branch of the DNC that works on messaging (Psyops) all the time? We NEED full-time marketing/PR to counter right-wing messaging.

[Irish_Dem]

45. Military psychologists who do psyops. Forensic psychologists who understand sociopaths and criminal

minds. Psychologists who specialize in PR, marketing.

If they work with other marketing and political strategists, it would be a start.

It is way past time for the Dems to fight back hard, but in a clever, sophisticated way.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Thanks, thanx, and THANKS for this post, PSYOPS is unexplored territory

for most of us and probably a lot of Democratic politicians too. Yet your post accurately defines what is being done and has been done to us for decades. Take your expertise, use it, alert others, find supporters, run with it. I always thought we lose because of weak, leaky ideology, but PSYOPS might be a better descriptor.

[paleotn]

7. Thanks! We need this. We need it badly....

I'll admit it, I fall in the same trap time and again. But, knowing where the trap is, that's the first step in evading it. That's Frank Herbert, not me, but no wiser words have ever been spoken or written.

[KS Toronado]

8. With the pandemic & unemployment issues we are currently facing

Qpublicans want to talk about Mr Potato Head & Dr Seuss....nothing but smoke & mirrors. Ironic that Dr Seuss cares
more about people than they do, and Mr Potato Head has more brains than they do.

[peggysue2]

9. Good post!

I don't think there's any question that Dems need more than a few lessons in counter striking the impressive (though wrong-headed and duplicitous) deflecting messages of the Republicans. The messaging is consistent, repetitive and often provocative. When the Republican reps are interviewed, the message is nearly word-for-word across broadcasts. Regardless of what question an interviewer might ask, the message of the day/week is the same, always worked into their non-answers.

And yes, we do engage with the mantra of the day, rather than steering back to the clear, anti-democratic, lie-strewn issues the GOP are really pushing: the fraudulent election (no evidence), the January 6th siege of our Capitol (merely a festive family affair), the Republican-led state legislators pushing voting rights back to the Jim Crow era (see election fraud), the ongoing congressional obstruction (because . . . inflation, debt, deficit or we can't have the Dems succeed in Covid/economic relief) etc.

I'd say Governor Abbot's announcement that Texas was open for business (no masks needed) was another deflection from the mega-disaster he and his cronies inflicted on residents through deregulation and persistent climate change denial. No need to winterize those energy systems because climate change is just another Dem hoax! But hey, you get to throw your masks away. Even-steven, folks.

We need to win this ongoing narrative war. Because if we don't get it right on this round, we'll lose everything.

[Tommymac]

10. TLP. MeidasTouch. Late Night TV Hosts. MSNBC Progressive Hosts. CNN Progressive Hosts.

James Carville.
Progressive Twitterites. (Who btw rule the nest after the former guy lost his voice there.)
Run For Something.
AOC & The Squad
Katie Porter
Vice President Harris.
President Biden

My god the list goes on and on.

Democrats get it. I am tired of hearing we don't. This is NOT 1988, 1993, 1997, 2000, 2004, 2006, 2009, or 2013, or 2015.

[3Hotdogs]

11. C/C lost me when they went after Fuckin' Bugs Bunny. BUGS BUNNY, for fuck's sake.

He's a fukin' hero.

Guy on the radio last week, said he wasn't. And Mickey Mouse, too.

Fuck me.

[magicarpet]

32. Bugs Bunny did this it is unforgivable,...

Bye bye trDumpie,

Bye bye De Satanist,

Bye bye Rubio

Bye bye Rick Scott

[3Hotdogs]

33. Yeah, it should'a been Mississippi.

[luvtheGWN]

12. In basketball, a great defence wins games.

In politics, playing defence by answering the other party's accusations does not win. I think one of tRump's most effective defences was the one where he would answer by saying "No, you are".

"Do not engage" is the best defence. That's what my father always used when I asked a stupid question or wanted to do something which I knew, in my heart, probably wasn't a good idea! And it used to drive me nuts! But it worked.

[erronis]

13. Agree. Do not use their words/phrases at all. Ignore them. Focus on our messages

and we have plenty of our own messages that are about improving this country and helping the world.

[Fla Dem]

14. The Right wing of the GOP has NOTHING to offer the American people,

so they propagate stupid, meaningless fantasies to keep their base agitated. They label things so they can repeat the phrase over and over again making the RW think they are being stifled, ignored, and penalized. It's been their tactic for the last 25 years ever since FOX News hit the airwaves.

And yes, we should challenge them on every thing they say that is false and misleading. I feel we're doing a better job at this, but the media still gives the RW too much attention on their derisive and stupid pronouncements.

[KPN]

24. We should anticipate and defuse their misdirecting, false arguments before they even think

of them. As you said, they've been doing this for 25 years (I agree -- at least 25 years) and we keep falling for it by engaging after they make their argument, at which point it's already too late -- we are already on the defensive.

We don't need to challenge them on what they say. We can easily predict what they are going to say. Just think of every conceivable red herring and craft a simple message to counter it; undermine it before its even been stated. We need to bury their arguments before they've already said them. We need an arm in the Democratic Party that is dedicated solely to messaging and getting preemptive messaging in place before we even roll our policy proposals out. When re we going to do that. We've been talking about it for at least 10 years.

[NoMoreRepugs]

15. Real estate is location location location.

Politics is becoming messaging messaging messaging.

[CaptainTruth]

39. +100k

[Mersky]

16. Will kick this again later

[plimsoll]

17. While the actions may be PSYOPS, the reasons are largely financial.

We live in a society that has been educated to conflate skeptical with cynical. So the negative connotations of associated with cynicism get attached to any endeavor to ascertain the truth of a statement or proposition. Humans are story tellers and our brains seem hard wired to listen to stories, a good narrative sticks in our heads and can override a reasoned evaluation of facts and probability. We've known about confirmation bias for a couple thousand years, we've just used other words to describe the phenomenon.

If you combine those 3 elements together you have a recipe for disaster, we believe what we already believe, we can be mislead by a good story, and questioning the good story will invoke social pressure not to question it. It's not that we're gullible, we've created a system designed to mislead people. Historically we may have done that for relatively benign purposes, selling more laundry detergent for example. It was simply a matter of time till one faction figured out how to use those factors to manipulate enough of the population to wreak havoc.

[Martin Eden]

18. Culture War

Engagement in Culture War is the key strategy of "conservative" politics in America today. It is the means by which they convince voters "their country" is under assault by sinister forces of "The Left" which is antithetical to their ostensible values of God, Country, Family, and the US Constitution.

The mere fact that we fight back against the scurrilous lies and propaganda of the rightwing smear machine constitutes further "proof" we are their enemies, guilty as charged.

Of course, the authors of this PSYOPS campaign and Republican politicians serve not the people but the malefactors of great wealth who finance their careers.

Their true purpose is revealed by their actions:

Huge tax cuts for the rich
Opposition to unions and a living wage
Opposition to universal affordable healthcare
Voter suppression
Poisoning our environment for profit

Abortion, racial animus, and LGBTQ bigotry are not profit centers so much as they are hooks used to ensnare and manipulate voters in the Culture War.

In order to defeat this mendacious strategy we must first understand it, then develop a better strategy based on truth and compassion for all people -- including those who've been hooked into the poisonous ideology of lies.

As long as we treat them like enemies they will remain so, firmly in the camp of the malefactors.

This does not mean we should turn a blind eye or compromise away our principles and goals, or fool ourselves into believing vicious racists can be made to change their hearts and minds.

But neither should we fan the flames of animus merely for the temporary satisfaction of feeding the flame of anger in our own hearts.

Does engaging in the Culture War in that fashion truly serve our long term goals of social & economic justice and a representative democracy which serves all The People?

[KPN]

30. OUr best strategy is to do good things for average people. Things that directly benefit the avin a

direct and tangible way. We need to do things that are popular. Ignore the "cancel culture" BS and plow ahead with doing things that are popular together with preemptive messaging that counters the numerous red herring arguments we know they will throw at every proposal. Put them on the defensive from the get go. Then we can just call the "cancel culture" and "leftist socialist" crap what it is -- a massive misdirection effort to divert public attention away from real issues that affect real people and that we can actually do something positive about that would affect most Americans in a positive way.

Actually, the Biden administration is doing a better job of this than any I've seen already. But we could still do better. ... Do we have an entity or arm of the Democratic Party that focuses on preemptive messaging ahead of policy proposal rollouts? If not, we need one.

[Martin Eden]

46. +1

It's encouraging that the leader of the Democratic Party appears to understand this and is on a wise course.

[KPN]

52. Yup.

[KPN]

19. Yup. It seems quite obvious to me that, as a whole, we are quite ineffective in countering

the non-stop smear and misdirection that overwhelms every form of media. We react as opposed to act. That's why AOC and Bernie have been so refreshing. They consistently put the rightists in a defensive position. AOC is particularly good at this.

An recent example of how we engage: did we hear any concerted effort to point out that the $15 minimum wage is barely adequate in Mississippi, Alabama, West Virginia, etc., to keep millions of Americans afloat, let alone CA, MA, NY, WA OR and other red States? Why wasn't this a primary talking point from the get go?! The "disparate cost of living across States" red herring argument, followed by the "another one of those dumb, simplistic leftist ideas by Democrats" argument were both predictable. Why didn't we diffuse them from the get go? No, we let them raise the issue and then countered with policy adjustments because their argument took root.

We absolutely have to get batter at messaging and putting the righties on the defensive immediately when it comes to policy proposals. We need a "messaging" arm in the Democratic Party. Do we have anything like that?

[pandr32]

20. Five star message

[zaj]

21. Read Malcom Nance

The Plot to Hack America,
The Plot to Destroy Democracy, and
The Plot to Betray America

[betsuni]

22. No, we just make fun of them.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

23. Good post. Think you mean "Cancel culture", not "Counter culture". But the last line is flawed

Democrats do not seem to get this. We engage. I feel we are gullible. They win.

Actually it is because we are NOT gullible that we engage. We tend to think that the other side is a thinking entity and persuadable. It is not nearly as much as we Democrats and progressives and liberals are. So we engage and find the other side is more like a pigeon playing chess by knocking over pieces and crapping on the board.

You make a number of good points, such as psyops works, and there are counter-measures.

One countermeasure you don't discuss much is critical thinking. It has been de-emphasized in grade school education for years, particularly from teach-to-the-test effects resulting from RepubliQon mandates for milestones and teacher performance reviews, etc. Those result many from the RepubliQon love of conformity and white male supremacy and monoculture and their general reluctance to stretch and exercise their minds.

[The Wizard]

26. One of the reasons

for Bill Clinton's success was his rapid response team that countered Republican propaganda / misinformation as quick as it was published or broadcast. Hit back hard and fast, and when they're down we put our heels on their necks and rotate.

[Escurumbele]

28. Excellent Post...This should be sent to the DNC, unfortunately here at DU you are preaching to the

choir.

You are 100% correct, please send it to the DNC, it will do more good there, if they listen.

[leighbythesea2]

29. Great post

Thank you for this. Jan 6 was so visual and viserally it should be easily used to refocuse anyone. Everyone saw it. Those of us watching in abject horror, those of them cheering. No one can say its obscure or a fuzzy concept, that they are diverting attention from.

[Wild blueberry]

31. Excellent post

Especially your last full paragraph about counter PSYOPS.
Thank you!

[BobTheSubgenius]

34. Why are the GOP so much better at messaging?

To put it more simplistically than PSYOPS is to make it seem gentler. "Negative messaging" seems so much less threatening than Psychological Warfare, which is what it resembles far more than it resembles PR.

From the bumper-sticker sloganism of their policies, through attack ads, push polls, shameless lies, religious divide, up to incredibly duplicitous leaders, their campaign is incredibly broad and relentless.

It's difficult to win a fight if you insist on "point fighting" the way martial arts tournaments used to be, and your opponent is using MMA without rules.

The point of that stupid analogy is that the Democratic ptb need to start countering this on a united front. They cannot leave staffers, candidates or reps - especially new ones - and the general population of the party to fend it off for themselves as best they can. Even recognizing it on one's own could be difficult.

[Qutzupalotl]

35. A fun way to counter it:

Link to tweet

first they came for the plastic toy potatoes, and I did not speak out— because nobody is coming for the plastic toy potatoes, you whiny paranoid attention-seeking grievance-babies

[CaptainTruth]

36. Excellent post, thank you! Again: Messaging is crucial to winning.

You've all seen me go on about messaging & this post is an excellent example of the kind of thing I'm talking about. When we win the messaging war, we win elections.

[PCIntern]

38. Great post Thank you K and R

My line to these distractor folks is...I listen real carefully to what they're saying, nod my head and then say "No....and by the way, (slight pause for dramatic effect), fuck you."

[earth2jim]

41. Thanks for this conversation

Why is the MSNBC media so complicit in echoing and reinforcing the right wing messaging and diversion tactics? It seems they start with restating and repeating the diversion several times and then countering it just once.

[earth2jim]

42. Other resources on PSYOPS thoughts?

Malcolm Nance is good and where can I find out more on this subject? It is core to the programming of us all.

[Skittles]

53. what kills me is

these seemingly ridiculous tactics seem to work on both the non-educated and the educated - I have noticed that although these groups often have different sources, the result is the same......Hillary's emails! Hunter's laptop! Benghazi! Dr. Seuss! It is disturbing and pathetic.