"Psyops goes after experts, science, democratic institutions so to try to create psychological means to create uncertainty and distrust to ready people for authoritarian influence."
"Victims obey psyops to commit treason through ideology, money, or blackmail."
"Humans are emotional, social beings, so Information overload looks for authoritarian certainty to relieve stress. First of all, we have states, we have governors, I live in Massachusetts which has a gay governor."
"People will lay down only if they believe they have to lay down, and I'm saying, come on we're Americans, we grew up knowing what Russia was like, China was like, we don't want to be Russia, we don't want to be just put into prison like Navalny and murdered, or poisoned, or have a plane blow up, so let's get real and roll up our sleeves and say 'Not on my watch'."
"I want to give people hope and to say, "You are not alone." We're Americans, we believe in the constitution, we believe in human rights, we believe in the rule of law, and anyone who wants to take away the rule of law and just say 'screw it, I'm the king', should irk us enough to action."
"Learn how to regulate your emotional states. Understand breathing is the most powerful way to change your consciousness. If you're feeling anxious, long slow exhales will calm down your nervous system."
"You need to be human. Get hugs, get kisses, eat well, get 7 to 9 hours of sleep, most people are sleep deprived and it's one of the BITE Model criteria of brainwashing. If you are sleep deprived you are not thinking clearly."
"We need people who are going to support independent journalism by subscribing."
"Lets destigmatize being ex-cult. Intelligent people can be hacked, there is life after cult, normalize it and let's connect with people who are in MAGA world so there's an off-ramp, you can share their stories."
"A technique Hassan shares with his clients is to have them visualize the cult leader to be a foot tall in diapers, so they're looking down and they laugh. Think of Donald Trump as one foot tall in diapers whenever you think of Donald Trump. It's gonna have a very different emotional attachment."
Will not make it all the way through, but very interesting and insightful. Though I prefer not to blame the victim. In this case, however, I do blame the victim (e.g., me) in part. I chose to be in a bubble and not be wary or to question me. I really believed that Vice President Harris would win by five-to-seven percentage points with well over three hundred Electoral College votes. 😳
The good doctor makes an interesting point on post hypnotic suggestion, though that strikes me as a bit tin-foil hat. Dr Hassan's admonishment that we be conciliatory toward our fellows who voted for Trump. 😇
These words of Abraham Lincoln ring especially true now: "With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation's wounds . . . to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." 💔
Thanks again and again. The explanation is almost too intelligently rational, while also compassionate. Consensus among people who are naturally diverse but share humanity is the responsible way to advance our humanity. However, there is a vicious cycle of primitive ruthlessness among authoritarian leaders (based on their greedy selfishness), with their inducement of fear, frustration and anger among people, which then has the general populace turn to those very people who created the danger--thus maintaining that ugly means of control. It's a horribly ironic "escape from freedom" (Eric Fromm) among the people who claim to be the true advocates in freedom. The authoritarians' ruthlessness gets the upper hand--at least for a while. The level of danger, however, is now so great that there's far less time for responsible leaders eventually reset things. At least I hope there will be enough time.
I found George McGovern a compelling candidate. He was a genuine war hero, a post-war hero, steady hand, steady heart, a farmer.
But Nixon said I should be afraid, very afraid. He seemed aggressive, tough, confident. Fear was his main point.
I had every intention to vote McGovern but I voted Nixon, stepped out of the booth, and wondered why I did that.
Koestler says we do the opposite when frightened and confused. He said humans have an amygdala, the lizard brain, the fear factor. It triumphs over reason in crucial decisions. The schizoid brain kicked in and I did the opposite.
I didn't read Koestler until I was on active duty years later, in a quonset hut on the edge of oblivion, waiting for them to decide on the table shape in Paris.
"There is a way to diminish international wars, civil wars, civic wars, and individual homicides all at once: it is to care for our world as one." Dr. Lee
To care for the world as ONE, requires we identify, sideline, see-through, tame, and eventually participate in the annihilation of Ego. All scientific disciplines, as well as mainstream spiritual disciplines recognize Ego must go if goals are to be fulfilled. Little is known how Ego is annihilated because science and religion tend to be contaminated by Ego.
….. ….. just when Christianity as a religion became accepted within the Roman Empire many men and women too ran to the wilderness knowing this watered down version of Christ’s teachings would not suffice salvation .. they lived a life of solitude and prayer constantly trying to tame their egos ….
The contemplative tradition grew out of this. Many were successful on their way, but without a more accomplished psychology, philosophy, and theology it was hard for them to articulate what happened.
Dr Lee, Assad and Gaddafi were brutal dictators. Now US, Israel and Turkey have replaced Assad with Islamic fanatic terrorists. Al-Jolani, the leader of terror organization HTS, on bounty list of US is freely giving interview to CNN.
Israel and Turkey are carving out territory of Syria as per their interests. Everything is sanctioned and supported by Biden administration. These rebels are not any humanistic social democratic people. They are killers and mercenaries. They murder, loot & rape minorities, Kurds, Christians, Alawites, Druzes etc. My analysis on Syrian situation is here.
I encourage everyone to watch an in depth discussion of the ramifications of the fall of Assad with Alistair Crooke on the Chris Hedges show...I learned so much...I think the more of us that are informed by truly experienced geopolitical analysts, the less we will fall prey to propaganda...Here is the link....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgEgHVtRbg4&list=WL&index=2&ab_channel=TheChrisHedgesYouTubeChannel
Of course there is so much in this essay with which I identify. When the fleeing Assad came to power, I wondered if he really wanted to succeed his father. He did not impress me as a brutal man. He certainly became one -- a sobering testimonial to struxural violence. When I worked for the U.S.G. in the field in Iraq, I remember how Syria had taken in something like two million refugees from the mess the Coalition made of the initial occupation. 😵
It was a shame that people could not think ahead in 2012 and try to give Assad a way out through transitioning toward an interim government and placing him and his family -- together with top members of the government -- in various witness protection programs with enough looted money for them to live quietly and comfortably. Sanctions would never work. With the looting of dictators, sanctions harm only the poorer subjects. They are struxural violence. 🤬
The bigger problems involve the war crimes committed by Israël in Gaza and, likely though on a smaller scale, in Lebanon as well as Putin's campaign of genocidal intent against Ukraine. One involves an ally and one involves an adversary. Unfortunately, people seem ill-equipped to manage ambivalence; to understand that a good people can do bad things. The other involves an adversary cut out like a paper doll from the Black Books of Nazism and Communism. 😯
The invasion of Ukraine is overt violence. While sanctions wear down Russia, they harden the commoners who suffer, they believe, from the malevolence of the West. Such overt violence, unfortunately, must be met and broken with a counter-attack. I have felt for at least a year that we are already in World War III; that World War II started in 1936. We know the lessons of history, bitter as they are. Yet the violent response is not an orderly one with the election of Trump. 🤢
Recently, I read a remarkable book, 'ON KILLING: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society' by West Point psyche teacher, Lieutenant Colonel David Grossman. A cousin had recommended the book and I read it reluctantly. LTC Grossman documented how, in most previous wars, far less than half of the soldiers on the fighting lines would shoot at the enemy. Training simulations elevated that percentage of soldiers ready to kill to 95% in Viêt Nam.✍️
The simulations used by the military to enable soldiers to kill others have been replicated in realistic video games. Additionally, the increasing verisimilitude of violent films and television shows -- often depicting violence as a solution favoured by the likes of Dirty Harry -- has not only de-sensitized millions of of impressionable young people to violence but catalyzed a propensity to use it. Scarey times indeed. 😱
"Do You Know Someone in a Cult? 🔸️Evaluate any group now with Dr. Steven Hassan's BITE Model of Authoritarian Control." 🔸️The BITE test finds out if any group is helpful or harmful, honest or dishonest, healthy or unhealthy.
This is so far the most accurate, precise, and useful commentary on the world’s present course. I wholly agree with the concise solution you present. If we would deeply feel our truest, most real circumstance, that we are spinning and speeding through space-time, perhaps we would begin to make more healthy choices.
Can't argue with that. Which is a bit of a stumbling block to.... pretty much everything. My topics evolved because I started from the grass roots level on local school issues and our board got to 7-0 in 2 cycles.
But I was formerly lobbying for Immigration reform and it was my single issue for several years. IImmigration will be killed as much as legally possible, and I don't think enough people understand how bad the situation is about to get.
“Care for our world as one”. I’m sure most people are not paying attention to what happened in Haiti this week. Every day sounds like hell on earth and since the early colonization of Haiti. This week a ‘warlord’ and his gang slaughtered over 150 elderly people with machetes. Haiti has historically experienced so much violence and the world doesn’t seem to care. The same with Palestine, Syria and Sudan. One need only look at the US as apathy to certain groups applies here as well. The hundreds of Murdered and Missing Indigenous People (MMIP) that most don’t even know is a thing, the exploding houseless/homeless populations and the wildly unequal justice system. There is a thread that makes this ‘history’ unimportant- a white CEO is killed and the entirety of attention (reporting) is on sympathy for him, private security for the privileged and wealthy and “thoughts and prayers”. Heck, the irony is a young white man of privilege murders one of his own.
Thank you, Dr. Lee, for a pithy summary and analysis of recent world events that are related to structural violence. The "Molotov cocktail" image is graphic and powerful, almost as the explosive itself, so let us hope that this will not be fulfilled literally. Someone did say of the Soviet Makarov pistol that, if all attempts at hitting the target failed, the user could try throwing the pistol at the target. However, it would be helpful for humans to safely "throw away" as many guns, explosives and other armaments as possible, to steadily reverse injury, loss of life, and environmental damage. Yes, Barnier's three-month tenure has given some comfort to Truss, who was in office for not quite 50 days, although her party remained in office until quite recently. Social or corporate continuity is significantly affected by the extent of individual continuity...
"Think of Donald Trump as one foot tall in diapers whenever you think of Donald Trump"
LIVE: Trump Cult Expert Reveals PSY-OPS that Swung Election | The Weekend Show
https://www.youtube.com/live/WcxjsWnHtk4?si=RLFRz1Q-rS5zivXi
In a nutshell:
"Psyops goes after experts, science, democratic institutions so to try to create psychological means to create uncertainty and distrust to ready people for authoritarian influence."
"Victims obey psyops to commit treason through ideology, money, or blackmail."
"Humans are emotional, social beings, so Information overload looks for authoritarian certainty to relieve stress. First of all, we have states, we have governors, I live in Massachusetts which has a gay governor."
"People will lay down only if they believe they have to lay down, and I'm saying, come on we're Americans, we grew up knowing what Russia was like, China was like, we don't want to be Russia, we don't want to be just put into prison like Navalny and murdered, or poisoned, or have a plane blow up, so let's get real and roll up our sleeves and say 'Not on my watch'."
"I want to give people hope and to say, "You are not alone." We're Americans, we believe in the constitution, we believe in human rights, we believe in the rule of law, and anyone who wants to take away the rule of law and just say 'screw it, I'm the king', should irk us enough to action."
"Learn how to regulate your emotional states. Understand breathing is the most powerful way to change your consciousness. If you're feeling anxious, long slow exhales will calm down your nervous system."
"You need to be human. Get hugs, get kisses, eat well, get 7 to 9 hours of sleep, most people are sleep deprived and it's one of the BITE Model criteria of brainwashing. If you are sleep deprived you are not thinking clearly."
"We need people who are going to support independent journalism by subscribing."
"Lets destigmatize being ex-cult. Intelligent people can be hacked, there is life after cult, normalize it and let's connect with people who are in MAGA world so there's an off-ramp, you can share their stories."
"A technique Hassan shares with his clients is to have them visualize the cult leader to be a foot tall in diapers, so they're looking down and they laugh. Think of Donald Trump as one foot tall in diapers whenever you think of Donald Trump. It's gonna have a very different emotional attachment."
Will not make it all the way through, but very interesting and insightful. Though I prefer not to blame the victim. In this case, however, I do blame the victim (e.g., me) in part. I chose to be in a bubble and not be wary or to question me. I really believed that Vice President Harris would win by five-to-seven percentage points with well over three hundred Electoral College votes. 😳
The good doctor makes an interesting point on post hypnotic suggestion, though that strikes me as a bit tin-foil hat. Dr Hassan's admonishment that we be conciliatory toward our fellows who voted for Trump. 😇
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7259852498906025984/ 😢
These words of Abraham Lincoln ring especially true now: "With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation's wounds . . . to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." 💔
Thanks again and again. The explanation is almost too intelligently rational, while also compassionate. Consensus among people who are naturally diverse but share humanity is the responsible way to advance our humanity. However, there is a vicious cycle of primitive ruthlessness among authoritarian leaders (based on their greedy selfishness), with their inducement of fear, frustration and anger among people, which then has the general populace turn to those very people who created the danger--thus maintaining that ugly means of control. It's a horribly ironic "escape from freedom" (Eric Fromm) among the people who claim to be the true advocates in freedom. The authoritarians' ruthlessness gets the upper hand--at least for a while. The level of danger, however, is now so great that there's far less time for responsible leaders eventually reset things. At least I hope there will be enough time.
1972...
I did the schizoid switch in the voting booth.
It was now legal for me to vote at 18.
I found George McGovern a compelling candidate. He was a genuine war hero, a post-war hero, steady hand, steady heart, a farmer.
But Nixon said I should be afraid, very afraid. He seemed aggressive, tough, confident. Fear was his main point.
I had every intention to vote McGovern but I voted Nixon, stepped out of the booth, and wondered why I did that.
Koestler says we do the opposite when frightened and confused. He said humans have an amygdala, the lizard brain, the fear factor. It triumphs over reason in crucial decisions. The schizoid brain kicked in and I did the opposite.
I didn't read Koestler until I was on active duty years later, in a quonset hut on the edge of oblivion, waiting for them to decide on the table shape in Paris.
"There is a way to diminish international wars, civil wars, civic wars, and individual homicides all at once: it is to care for our world as one." Dr. Lee
To care for the world as ONE, requires we identify, sideline, see-through, tame, and eventually participate in the annihilation of Ego. All scientific disciplines, as well as mainstream spiritual disciplines recognize Ego must go if goals are to be fulfilled. Little is known how Ego is annihilated because science and religion tend to be contaminated by Ego.
….. ….. just when Christianity as a religion became accepted within the Roman Empire many men and women too ran to the wilderness knowing this watered down version of Christ’s teachings would not suffice salvation .. they lived a life of solitude and prayer constantly trying to tame their egos ….
The contemplative tradition grew out of this. Many were successful on their way, but without a more accomplished psychology, philosophy, and theology it was hard for them to articulate what happened.
Dr Lee, Assad and Gaddafi were brutal dictators. Now US, Israel and Turkey have replaced Assad with Islamic fanatic terrorists. Al-Jolani, the leader of terror organization HTS, on bounty list of US is freely giving interview to CNN.
https://www.ft.com/content/fd08cc4c-6e37-440a-acbb-303615099bea
Israel and Turkey are carving out territory of Syria as per their interests. Everything is sanctioned and supported by Biden administration. These rebels are not any humanistic social democratic people. They are killers and mercenaries. They murder, loot & rape minorities, Kurds, Christians, Alawites, Druzes etc. My analysis on Syrian situation is here.
https://takeindiaforward.blogspot.com/2024/12/bidens-last-acts-in-foreign-policy.html
I encourage everyone to watch an in depth discussion of the ramifications of the fall of Assad with Alistair Crooke on the Chris Hedges show...I learned so much...I think the more of us that are informed by truly experienced geopolitical analysts, the less we will fall prey to propaganda...Here is the link....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgEgHVtRbg4&list=WL&index=2&ab_channel=TheChrisHedgesYouTubeChannel
Of course there is so much in this essay with which I identify. When the fleeing Assad came to power, I wondered if he really wanted to succeed his father. He did not impress me as a brutal man. He certainly became one -- a sobering testimonial to struxural violence. When I worked for the U.S.G. in the field in Iraq, I remember how Syria had taken in something like two million refugees from the mess the Coalition made of the initial occupation. 😵
https://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2013/08/letter-83-thoughts-on-syria-case-for.html (2013)
It was a shame that people could not think ahead in 2012 and try to give Assad a way out through transitioning toward an interim government and placing him and his family -- together with top members of the government -- in various witness protection programs with enough looted money for them to live quietly and comfortably. Sanctions would never work. With the looting of dictators, sanctions harm only the poorer subjects. They are struxural violence. 🤬
https://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2014/03/letters-to-friends-and-family-94.html (2014)
The bigger problems involve the war crimes committed by Israël in Gaza and, likely though on a smaller scale, in Lebanon as well as Putin's campaign of genocidal intent against Ukraine. One involves an ally and one involves an adversary. Unfortunately, people seem ill-equipped to manage ambivalence; to understand that a good people can do bad things. The other involves an adversary cut out like a paper doll from the Black Books of Nazism and Communism. 😯
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6963114645016461313/ (2022)
The invasion of Ukraine is overt violence. While sanctions wear down Russia, they harden the commoners who suffer, they believe, from the malevolence of the West. Such overt violence, unfortunately, must be met and broken with a counter-attack. I have felt for at least a year that we are already in World War III; that World War II started in 1936. We know the lessons of history, bitter as they are. Yet the violent response is not an orderly one with the election of Trump. 🤢
https://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2023/10/letter-180-post-107-in-israel-and-time.html (2023)
Recently, I read a remarkable book, 'ON KILLING: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society' by West Point psyche teacher, Lieutenant Colonel David Grossman. A cousin had recommended the book and I read it reluctantly. LTC Grossman documented how, in most previous wars, far less than half of the soldiers on the fighting lines would shoot at the enemy. Training simulations elevated that percentage of soldiers ready to kill to 95% in Viêt Nam.✍️
https://thevoicesofwar.com/26-ltcol-dave-grossman-on-killing-combat-sleep-blind-spots-and-everything-else-in-between/
The simulations used by the military to enable soldiers to kill others have been replicated in realistic video games. Additionally, the increasing verisimilitude of violent films and television shows -- often depicting violence as a solution favoured by the likes of Dirty Harry -- has not only de-sensitized millions of of impressionable young people to violence but catalyzed a propensity to use it. Scarey times indeed. 😱
"Do You Know Someone in a Cult? 🔸️Evaluate any group now with Dr. Steven Hassan's BITE Model of Authoritarian Control." 🔸️The BITE test finds out if any group is helpful or harmful, honest or dishonest, healthy or unhealthy.
https://bitemodel.com/
This is so far the most accurate, precise, and useful commentary on the world’s present course. I wholly agree with the concise solution you present. If we would deeply feel our truest, most real circumstance, that we are spinning and speeding through space-time, perhaps we would begin to make more healthy choices.
Please consider reading and subscribing to my Substack which is similar in philosophy, but covers public education, immigration and extemism.
And those require a healthy society to work.
Can't argue with that. Which is a bit of a stumbling block to.... pretty much everything. My topics evolved because I started from the grass roots level on local school issues and our board got to 7-0 in 2 cycles.
But I was formerly lobbying for Immigration reform and it was my single issue for several years. IImmigration will be killed as much as legally possible, and I don't think enough people understand how bad the situation is about to get.
“Care for our world as one”. I’m sure most people are not paying attention to what happened in Haiti this week. Every day sounds like hell on earth and since the early colonization of Haiti. This week a ‘warlord’ and his gang slaughtered over 150 elderly people with machetes. Haiti has historically experienced so much violence and the world doesn’t seem to care. The same with Palestine, Syria and Sudan. One need only look at the US as apathy to certain groups applies here as well. The hundreds of Murdered and Missing Indigenous People (MMIP) that most don’t even know is a thing, the exploding houseless/homeless populations and the wildly unequal justice system. There is a thread that makes this ‘history’ unimportant- a white CEO is killed and the entirety of attention (reporting) is on sympathy for him, private security for the privileged and wealthy and “thoughts and prayers”. Heck, the irony is a young white man of privilege murders one of his own.
Excellent piece BXL.
Needs to be spread far and wide as you make many insightful comments and observations.
Division is one of our core dysfunctions.
Always comparing, measuring, judging that creates envy, jealousy, conflict that leads to aggression and violence. Repeat endlessly.
Thank you, Dr. Lee, for a pithy summary and analysis of recent world events that are related to structural violence. The "Molotov cocktail" image is graphic and powerful, almost as the explosive itself, so let us hope that this will not be fulfilled literally. Someone did say of the Soviet Makarov pistol that, if all attempts at hitting the target failed, the user could try throwing the pistol at the target. However, it would be helpful for humans to safely "throw away" as many guns, explosives and other armaments as possible, to steadily reverse injury, loss of life, and environmental damage. Yes, Barnier's three-month tenure has given some comfort to Truss, who was in office for not quite 50 days, although her party remained in office until quite recently. Social or corporate continuity is significantly affected by the extent of individual continuity...