and now for something completely different.

[CB..]

Originally Posted by jumpy

NO, no, no, no, no. That is not what I said at all.

I guess I failed to make clear what I was saying

well ok accept my apologies..i must have missed the second part of the reply....so again my apologies...current propoganda is certainly a major catch 22 of gigantic proportions..it used to be said that the first casualty of war was the truth.....now it seems the first casualty of EVERYTHING is the truth...and i for one am no longer able to tell where the joins are any more....and as i was saying one of the principle goals of propoganda is to limit the general populations ability to make clear and reasonable decisions about the issue of the day...to render us passive recipitents of what ever mesage is presented to us..OR at the very least render us less capable of reacting in any organised way against the policys of the day...a march every now and then is fine....looks good on the news ..makes every-one feel better about them selves..but any serious long term protest would be considered tantamount to an act of terrorism..i don't know about the rights and wrongs of this....in an increasingly globalised political landscape it is allmost impossible for the man/woman on the street to make any sort of decision that could stand up to the full impact of all the possible issues ..it's like trying to eat spegghetti with a straw...if our leaders have started to believe their own propoganda or have become so committed to trying to up-hold the policys dictated by their propoganda then things are getting a tadge out of control...dwindling resources....the clash of cultures religions etc etc...our in-ability to take our foot of the gas pedal and slow down for the bend..the last thing we need now is orwellian type propoganda machines blinding us to what we all know is coming...major global up-heaval..if were lucky it will socail and economic up-heaval...if we are un-lucky it will be war..looks like it'll be both at the moment..!

[Yahoshua]

In order as seen:

Korean (North)

Cambodian

South American (Brazil?)

Unkown

And a Chinese- American

[August]

The first one is the President of Bolivia i believe.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by jumpy

http://www.ep.tc/howtospotajap/index.html

more than a little out of date now but an interesting and sometimes amusing glimpse into the past.
I wonder if there are any surviving examples of other nations publishing 'information' pamphlets describing the allies during WW2? Be interesting to see which stereotypes are applied in such a manner.


I especially liked 'the H-bomb and you' lol


hehe, that's right Johnny, you dirty little commie rat!


Classic propoganda from a bygone era. Certainly I think that these days most of us would not be swayed by such naive and obvious attempts, but back in those days the 'media' as we know it was in its infancy and though I consider myself a little bit smarter than your average plonker, I have to wonder how much more sophisticated and subtle these same techiques are today by comparison?

Now, where did I leave my tinfoil hat?

If you understand the H-Bomb, then yes, you could be swayed. This little cartoon represent reality and as long as a full scale N-War does not break out and only a limited exchange happens, then yes, you will be surviving along with the cockroaches. Too much hype that everyone will die in such a war and that is not correct. Only way this could happen is if only one side of the planet is hit so hard that all the H-bombs make a small thruster to push the Earth off its orbit. Then you can have disaster, but only then.

Maybe we should create an H-Bomb thread called "what would really happen?"

-S

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by scandium

Propaganda has become increasingly more prevalent, subtle, and sophisticated (though still sometimes blatant, since "the big lie" will be readily believed if it originates from a credible source and is repeated often enough). Probably this is partly due to much of it being outsourced to PR firms which, as a whole, have considerable knowledge and experience in the art of persausion.


One example of modern propaganda:

The technique of lending credibility to an assertion by linking it to an already credible event that provokes a powerful response in people (the idea being to get people to associate the one with the other). For instance, if you wanted to convince people that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, in order to further drum up support for the war, then you would have different people repeat, as often as possible, statements beginning with 9/11 (the credible even that provokes the powerful emotional response) and ending with a remark about Saddam Hussein. And in fact this was done, repeatedly, and it produced the desired effect:

March 14, 2003:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0314/p02s01-woiq.html

Though effective, there is nothing particularly subtle or sophisticated about that example. It worked because, minus Bin Laden and with the self-destruction of the Sept. 11 hijackers, the American public has never really been given any closure on this event and since Saddam Hussein is already a hated tyrant then perhaps many Americans even wanted to believe he was connected to 9/11 and were therefore not motivated to examine these "connections" any closer.

Better examples of propaganda (because of their ability to turn white into black) are of the Orwellian kind where people can be convinced that:

1. War is Peace (many people believe this already)
2. Freedom is Slavery (ditto)
3. Ignorance is Strength (3 out of 3)

Maybe I will elaborate on this further in a later post.

[Edit] There's an excellent Wiki article on propaganda here, including historic usage and common techniques. Good reading. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

Go research your sources - they are wrong. Start with the Yellow cake and the French - should lead you to some interesting conclusions.

-S

[scandium]

Originally Posted by SUBMAN1

Go research your sources - they are wrong. Start with the Yellow cake and the French - should lead you to some interesting conclusions.

-S

Really? Wrong where? Document the errors. And as to the "Yellow cake and the French", what conclusions am I to be led to and where are your links to lead me there?

Frankly this is old news, and it is "not wrong"; your protestations to the contrary only expose you as one of the few remaining Americans so thoroughly brainwashed by this basic propaganda technique that you still stubbornly cling to the false belief even when its been thoroughly debunked.

One more trip down memory lane:

http://usatoday.com/news/world/2002-...al-qaeda_x.htm

July 29/02

WASHINGTON — Bush administration lawyers have concluded that establishing a link between al-Qaeda terrorists and Iraq would provide the legal justification the White House needs to attack Saddam Hussein's regime, U.S. officials say.

An intensive effort by U.S. intelligence to establish a link between al-Qaeda and Iraq is being driven, in part, by a conclusion reached in recent weeks by White House and Pentagon legal and legislative advisers. They believe that connecting Iraq and the Sept. 11 attacks would allow the administration to avoid debates at the United Nations and in Congress over what some would call an unprovoked strike.

The administration has sought the connection since the first days after Sept. 11.

There is the motive and the means laid out in black and white before the propaganda operation even
begins.

September 2/02

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLI.../26/time.iraq/

Republican Senator Chuck Hagel, a Foreign Relations Committee member who has warned against a pre-emptive strike, insists, "Saddam is not in league with al-Qaeda. Of course he cheers and encourages them. But I have not seen any intelligence that would lead me to connect Saddam Hussein with al-Qaeda."

Evidently Chuck hadn't read the memo, but not to worry.

September 28/02

http://www.la.utexas.edu/~seant/gop.html

In Phoenix this evening, Mr. Bush made his most direct connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda, describing Mr. Hussein as "a man who hates America, a man who loves to link up with Al Qaeda, a man who is a true threat to America."

And so it begins.

November 1/02

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/relea...0021101-5.html

It's going to take a while. It's going to take a while to make America safe. It's going to take a while to do everything we can to fulfill our responsibilities and protect you. The American people understand that, they understand it's a new kind of war. They also understand there's a -- they also understand there's a new reality we face, and that's important. The new reality is oceans no longer protect us. After September the 11th, 2001, every threat that might be emerging overseas we need to take seriously. In the old days we could sit back and say, well, there's something emerging over there and these oceans protect us and we're safe, and we can decide whether or not we want to be involved in that theater, we can decide if we really think it's in our national interest, because our people aren't threatened.

We have a new day here in America. It's a sobering reality. It's one that you better make sure your elected officials are clear-eyed about the threats that we face. And we face a threat in the form of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Saddam Hussein is a man who has told the world he wouldn't have weapons of mass destruction, and yet he deceived the world. He's got them.

Not only does he have them -- remember, this is a guy who was a short while away from having a nuclear weapon. Then they dismantled it. Then he started deceiving the world again and no telling how close he is to having one now. We know he's got chemical weapons, probably has biological weapons.

But, more significantly, we know he uses them. He uses them not only on his neighbors, he uses them on his own people. That's the nature of this man. We know he's got ties with al Qaeda. A nightmare scenario, of course, is that he becomes the arsenal for a terrorist network, where they could attack America and he'd leave no fingerprints behind. He is a problem.

Repeat after me: 9/11.... Saddam Hussein... Al Qaeda ....

February 5/03

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2727471.stm

There are no current links between the Iraqi regime and the al-Qaeda network, according to an official British intelligence report seen by BBC News.

The BBC and British Intelligence hadn't gotten the memo either, apparently, but that's ok - it was intended for domestic consumption and its not like Americans watch the BBC anyway so they don't even count.

August 8/03

http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0803/080803nj2.htm

Three former Bush administration officials who worked on intelligence and national security issues have told National Journal that the prewar evidence tying al Qaeda to Iraq was tenuous, exaggerated, and often at odds with the conclusions of key intelligence agencies. The Bush alumni, as well as other intelligence veterans and some members of Congress, say they see parallels between how the administration painted the Qaeda connection to Iraq and the way that the White House often portrayed intelligence about weapons of mass destruction as being definitive or rock solid.

"Our conclusion was that Saddam would certainly not provide weapons of mass destruction or WMD knowledge to al Qaeda because they were mortal enemies," said Greg Thielmann, who worked at the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research on weapons intelligence until last fall. "Saddam would have seen al Qaeda as a threat, and al Qaeda would have opposed Saddam as the kind of secular government they hated."

Other Bush veterans concur that the evidence linking Al Qaeda to Iraq was overblown.

It was BS then, they knew it was BS, but they used it anyway to sell a war nobody wanted. Though unless you read the foreign press you'd never know any different anyway because the "left-wing" media was entirely complicit in selling it - the entire televised "Shock and Awe" spectacle probably set record ratings - it was like the 4th of July, only on steroids and 4 months early.

[TteFAboB]

Originally Posted by Yahoshua

In order as seen:

Korean (North)

Cambodian

South American (Brazil?)

Unkown

And a Chinese- American

Good effort.

1. August got it right, it's the President of Bolivia. Difficult one. There's two ethnicities in Bolivia, one of them shares similarities with the guy from the next picture, but the subject at hand is far too mixed to identify at a single glance. The hints are subtle and come from his great-grandfather.

2. He's a peruvian Inca. And a rather fine example too.

3. This one looks like a Mexican, hopefully he is because I took it from Google, in a sort of Aztec costume. He almost looks like an impostor though, if he has any native blood, it didn't marked him very much.

4. What an irony, this one is a South American Brazilian indian.

5. This one is great. He looks alot indeed like a Chinese, but, guess what, he's Japanese! His eyes might give him away, because he's mixed with, not American, but Portuguese blood.

[Yahoshua]

Oh well...I threw out some wild guesses but at least I pegged one (although it was the wrong number).

Maybe we should have a "Name that (whatever it is)" thread.