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Effective Resistance is Impossible
Until we recognize that we have been duped by propaganda
Maybe you’ve heard this joke before:
A Russian and an American get on a plane in Moscow and get to talking. The Russian says he works for the Kremlin and he’s on his way to go learn American propaganda techniques. “What American propaganda techniques?” asks the American. “Exactly,” the Russian replies.
If you are an American, and you think this joke doesn’t apply to you, because you believe that you recognize propaganda when you see it, you are being duped. And, you are far from alone, so no need to feel stupid.
What is stupid is not even trying to learn about the many ways that propaganda invades our daily lives, but instead insisting that your education and your worldliness somehow make you superior to those ignorant saps who fall for all the lies.
From John Taylor Gatto, Confederacy of Dunces, The Tyranny of Compulsory Schooling, December, 1992 (ellipsis my own):
Let me speak to you about dumbness because that is what our schools teach best. Old-fashioned dumbness used to be simple ignorance: you didn’t know something, but there were ways to find out if you wanted to. . . Now dumb people aren’t just ignorant, they are the victims of the non-thought of secondhand…
