Thread: “The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable o

Sounds about right to me, or you could go with lobotomy or death.

Sounds very true in my book too. There are thoughts that I probably wont tell many people or anyone, just because it would be to provacative due to easy missunderstanding of an otherwise neutral and innocent concept. And it's probably the same for many people I guess.

Sounds like a short term solution, not a long term one. It might work but eventually people are going to think about those issues you are trying to avoid.

Suggesting that global warming might not be happening or might not be caused by humans is considered taboo by many. The dogmatic global warming fanatics don't even want to debate the issue. They just say terrible things about people who question it and claim that there is no other side of the argument. It's mostly about pressure and not too much about reasoning. Questioning Obama's policies is viciously claimed by a lot of people to be automatically racist. The point of that claim is to squash debate and pressure people into acceptance. Religious dogma is another example.

Originally Posted by Universal Mind

Suggesting that global warming might not be happening or might not be caused by humans is considered taboo by many. The dogmatic global warming fanatics don't even want to debate the issue. They just say terrible things about people who question it and claim that there is no other side of the argument. It's mostly about pressure and not too much about reasoning. Questioning Obama's policies is viciously claimed by a lot of people to be automatically racist. The point of that claim is to squash debate and pressure people into acceptance. Religious dogma is another example.

A double-edged sword. Perhaps I am interpreting what you are saying incorrectly, but I am assuming what you mean to say is just the opposite that is contended by the OP. That is to say, allow now discussion for it at all. I think this very act is really a somewhat cleverly hidden means of doing what the OP describes. People now hotly debate the topic not only because it controversial but because people are so emotionally evolved that they step in if only out of offense and for no other reason than to offend and serves to further cloak the real issues at play and those responsible for perpetuating this process. What better way than to limit the spectrum of debate than to call those who wish to debate a subject racist simply because Obama is black? Now the topic will always be about racism and will be widely debated.

On the other hand, if I am indeed reading your post wrong, then may I interject just the opposite. There are certainly those who believe in the opposite doctrine and would prefer the subjects never to be recognized or debated at all, and assuming your grasp is indeed that far reaching over your constituents and their actions and livelihoods then I suppose it could be just as effective because in either case the truth can still be revealed, just given enough time and effort.

edit:

Essentially, if you are a manipulative power corrupt bastard with the will to confuse and misinform the masses, we are all too willing to be misinformed. You can have your cake and eat it too, by limiting the spectrum of discussion but promoting debate and also shaming and guilting others into absolute inaction. Throw in a few curve balls, maybe a few Fruedian Slips from some key figures, "leaked" information, spy and intelligence agencies, etc. and then you wind up with the entire world as you see it today.

I focused entirely on the limitation aspect of the OP's point. I think the propagandists I referred to want to make certain subjects off limits, but those subjects are parts of bigger subjects, like who should be elected and which party is better than which. They know there will be major debates on the bigger issues, and they want to limit those debates to where certain areas of propaganda are touched as little as possible.

The full quote is this:

"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate."


Hm. Edited out my first take on it, that wasn't what I wanted to say. Maybe later, or not.

I suspect that many times what is ascribed to deliberate measures to keep people obedient is in fact due to the myopia that society's constructs inflicts upon us.
In this sense, the conspiracy theorist's world is almost an escape from a far more awful truth. What is more palatable: that the human race has deliberative dark rulers from the shadows or is led by people who would not be able to spot a gorilla if they were distracted counting basketball passes.

Not disagreeing with Noam Chomsky here btw. Just saying that this societal control may be far more phenomenological than intentional.

UM, I think you're half right. I mean, you're definitely right with what you said, but there's a bigger limitation - the 2 party system. It's getting more and more polarized, thanks to internet channels and 24 hour news stations that push their own politics rather than reporting the news honestly. This encourages people to separate into opposing sides and get to arguing, and once that starts all thought is generally shut down and mob mentality kicks in. It's a lot easier to argue using bumper-sticker phrases you've been fed than to break free of your bias and try to see the bigger picture.

Heey - Deviant - nice to see you around again!
I've been writing this before, and then I got an edit-impulse, but it's still what I think, and I'm too lazy to put it in a nicer shape. I think it's about how people can be led to think their energy best spent with intellectually tussling on the socially accepted battle-grounds, like - exactly - this two-party system provides you Americans with. They think, if there's so much to fight about already in the mainstream, they better take part there, instead of searching out more exotic fields, because there it seems to matter.
It's like every topic has it's - only - two viewpoints coming with it, rep or dem. Sure, here we also have the classical right/left thing, but we've got five parties with actual power in the Bundestag, and such it's not so much restricted, what to think within the lines.
Maybe Chomsky also means actively fuelling dissent, like letting people have a podium, who want to make us believe, that man-made climate change would be a controversial topic, or evolution would be only a "hypothesis", or let some Sandy Hook bullshit run wild - a fine distraction for people, who might otherwise invest their energy into investigating real dark secrets, whatever those might be.

Probably true, Chomsky's assertion, but I also disbelieve in actual intent behind this to really matter, it's mainly just happening naturally, and people are taking advantage of it, if they're shrewd. But sure it's a tactic, too, to create a distraction, something people bash their heads in over, if you want to hide your problems/mistakes/plans, draw attention away from them. Old and effective measure, start a fight somewhere else, off your turf, in order to let your concerns be drowned out in the furore.

I agree that it is probably a mixture of intentional moves and blind fumbling and I guess it is irrelevant as to which of the two is most prominent.

I tend to stay away from politics since it is dubious as to how much of an effect they have in society compared to other factors such as technology, economics and culture. Of course politics influences those to an extent but only in the short-term.

For this reason, I have an ambivalent attitude at best to the concept of voting. I will vote for or against proposals but people? People are too inconsistent.

Democracy should be about a free market of ideas and not a popularity contest.

I think climate change is an issue that neoliberalists attempt to sweep off debate entirely, and when they do, they firmly plant themselves in the position of questioning the evidence rather than allowing the conversation to move forward into action (because that action threatens the owners of the republican party). Debate within the US is also typically limited to movies and football. When it touches politics it's about abortion and gay marriage, policy in congress is limited to those things as well as social welfare and oil pipelines while the entire block of conversation regarding military action, technology and the gathering of intelligence takes place between private entities and the pentagon. A very small minority of government challenges the deep state, and the fascist media responds by hijacking their followers' prefrontal cortex with a chorus of terrorism. The FBI follows up by foiling a terrorist plot they clearly and evidently planned and funded themselves in order to reinforce the necessity of this untouchable entity. These are important issues within a free society, so important and so challenging to a status quo exploring brave new depths of wealth and power that they will do whatever necessary to retain them in stagnation or even better, pretend they're not important issues at all. Regarding issues of moderate importance, liberal progressives are gaining major victories to grant the image of progress, and if it were not for the actions of the deep state we could even call this a glorious time for society; we have healthcare, recreational marijuana and gay marriage now. Unfortunately, this comes hand in hand with deplorable levels of income inequality, resulting in more slavery than ever seen before on this planet, and deeper depravity than ever witnessed by those in power. And yet all that power and not a drop of value from it, their empire corroding and their fragility growing evident, not just to us but themselves as well. The information is out there, people have died and disappeared for it but it's out there, could you imagine what would shift if people were as interested in the crimes perpetrated by the executive producers of a Hollywood movie rather than the movie itself?

“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum....” (Noam Chomsky).

The theory behind this quote parallels the agenda of the global Zionist media corporation, it seems to correspond to beliefs in the way that if one believes something, they divide the whole concept which that belief is based upon and ignore every other opinion in order to defend the divided portion they wish to emphasize. The way you could relate this to media is that the media only shows you very specifically divided portions of what they actually record, in turn propagating their perspective while ignoring the rest of the details. This creates an atmosphere which seems like the "whole" story, from which people form even more opinions (lively debate), while completely oblivious to the rest of the story they never were exposed to.
The method behind this concept is: to make people think that what you have shown them is ALL there is to see . This is basic propaganda, and it has kept billions of people ignorant and blind to the actual situation around them.

I think the major foundation behind this problem is the fact that industrialization has led people to believe everything without rational skepticism and probing criticism. The way it has done this is the same way the corporations have monopolized effort into a middle man called money. It's pretty clear that before technology people relied on themselves to gather food, create shelter, and survive on their own. After however, people began to rely on factories for food, corporations for heat and water, and pretty much rely on governments to survive. Instead of thinking for themselves, people now depend on computers and media to think for them, and in turn their attention is directed at what they are shown instead of what they actually emit. People used to depend on their own experiences for knowledge and wisdom (family), but now depend on external means. In this way it is easy to see how people are blindly accepting everything they are shown as if it's all there is to be shown (simple manipulation/mind control). Just like a kinder gardener kid coming up to another and telling them a lie, the media tells people lies and they believe them because they are too lazy to go and find out for themselves. That's why more money ($600,000,000,000+) is spent on advertising then war in the US ($600,000,000,000-). I think the moral of this quote is to not believe anything the main stream media/government tells you, not pharmacy, not corporations, not military, not police, not psychiatry, not science, not nasa. Everything that revolves around centralized power = corruption, therefore every large institution is corrupt at the core and relies on the ideology of this quote to dumb people down.