You might want to avoid reading the following tortuous paragraph. I copied it down while in flight today, as it struck me as so obtuse.

“In his book The Psychology of Totalitarianism, clinical psychologist Mattias Desmet provides and initial explanation of how this surveillance program could be so massively advanced with the help of the corona pandemic. In his sociopsychological analysis, Desmet illustrates “how humanity is being forcibly, unconsciously led into a reality of technocratic totalitarianism, which aggressively excludes alternative views and relies on destructive groupthink, vilifying nonconformist thought as ‘dissent'”. He speaks of mass formation (US-American virologist, immunologist, and molecular biologist Robert Malone later even interpreted this condition as mass psychosis), and he rightly warns, with good reason, “of the dangers of our current social landscape, media consumption, and dependence on manipulative technologies.” This silent unchallenged endurance of the deprivation of freedom by the technocratic standards ultimately amounts to mental enslavement. Thus, the slave trade, which Dunning cites as a historical example of extreme predatory capitalism, Finds its modern counterpart. In his book, Desmet offers simple solutions – both individual and collective – to prevent “our willing sacrifice of our capacity for critical thinking.”

I ask that you not so much pore over the excerpt from the book The Indoctrinated Brain, by Michael Nehls, MD, PhD, as set it aside for later interpretation. On the inside of the back flap of the paper cover of the hardcopy edition, Nehls’ CV reads like the second coming of Obama, “the one”, you know, said to have done so much good, and who is so worshiped by liberals and leftists with spinning spirals in their eyes, oblivious to all the real damage he did to the people of this country. He was a terrible leader in terms of actual accomplishment, but man, he could sell it.

Here’s more from the back cover of the book: 

Based on the long chain of evidence of a targeted neuropathological attack on autobiographical memory, I argue before you, as my jury, for the existence of a two-stage perfidious master plan of indoctrination, implemented by a small elite without regard for life and limb, in full awareness of its implications. […] We have no choice but to resist this assault by building resilience against outside influence, and time is of the essence. 

I think it was the year 2000 or so when I first stumbled on the book Propaganda, by Jacques Ellul. Nehls is aware of the two bombastic classics, Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World. He makes no mention of Ellul, though he would have benefited from reading the tract. Written in the 1960s, Propaganda examined it as practiced in the three great centers at that time: The Soviet Union, China, and the United States. My take was the US was far superior to either of the other two, and that the Soviets even came off as ham-handed. It stands to this day. Nehls apparently does not have a clue that propaganda has been with us and studied and practiced for decades, and that he cannot save us. What we have seen with Covid and Climate Change and the ascent of liberalism behind both is merely what I experienced as a boy growing up in the 1950s and 60s: Total immersion in fear. Frightened people are easier to govern. That’s all.

I did not mean to go off on him like that. I copied the opening paragraph from above from page xxii of the introduction. I am of the studied opinion that if a person cannot think properly, then he cannot write clearly. The opening paragraph I used above … I am not clear on its meaning. I do not regard him as a critical thinker. He does not get his meaning across. He comes off, especially with the inside cover CV and back cover braggadocio, as a pompous ass. And anyway, if he thinks propaganda and mind control only came about in 2020, he’s a loon.

He thinks 911 was real, he thinks that the SARS-CoV-2 virus came from a Wuhan lab, even as that is easily seen as misdirection … look here, not there. He thinks, as the subtitle of the book states, that we folks have mental freedom, and we might lose it.  And since he writes like a pompous ass, he cannot possibly reach the very people he claims to be saving.

I had a private email discussion with a friend of the blog who introduced me to a newspaper called County Highway. It is 20 pages deep, large-style old fashioned newspaper print. While one has to go online to order it ($50 yearly) none of its material is available online. 

Central to our discussion was how we receive and process information. Be honest now, how many here see a long paragraph,

and avoid reading it? Too much work. I do that too. But I often force myself to focus and read long tracts, just as I am going to read Nehls’ book. 

I have friends who proudly claim “I don’t read.” How then do they come by their opinions? They are not thinking, cannot be thinking. They are only receiving information from talking heads, videos,  but it is preprogrammed for them, and they accept it uncritically, having decided in advance which ideas they are open to, and which not. Consequently, they are Zombies. And worse yet, they are shielded, cannot be reached with any counter-information. 

That, Dr. Nehls, is how propaganda works, with captive audiences. If we approach these Zombies with anything the are not preprogrammed to accept as true, their eyes roll and dart, and everything bounces off. They are wards of the state.

It is but a very short walk from deliberately not reading to functional illiteracy. Dr. Nehls, with his overly dense writing and multi-syllabic and not clearly explained wording, can only reach a precious few, probably academics. He is not reaching the very people he imagines he is saving.

And, Orwell and Huxley aside, who wrote during more literate times, the true genius of American propaganda is that we here in the land of the free truly believe we are getting it done, critical thinking-wise. You would think a country big and wealthy as ours could produce a few more mirrors.