Quote of the day: "I believe I had anger welling in me" - Timothy McVeigh
Research topic: Leon Czolgosz
Glenn Beck started his recent radio program talking about a twenty year old female being mayor of a drug-war ravaged town in Mexico. He talks about her courage, her needing support and then goes on to say; "...they're just killing everybody. Anybody who stands they'll kill. Do we have this kind of courage?..you're going to you're going to need to know because you're going to be forced to stand at some point...Our schools are under siege. Our churches are under siege..." Mr. Beck very artfully segued from the horrible drug violence in Mexico to his sick take on the current situation in America. This can all be taken as the hyperbolic, self-serving rants of a charlatan or the perfectly organized, thoughtfully administered and very effective moves of a master of propaganda.
"Propaganda is the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behavior to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist." This quote by Garth Jowett and Victoria O'Donnell defines perfectly what Glenn Beck is all about. The very interesting phrase "manipulate cognitions" is descriptive of Beck's motives. Cognition is the process of thought. It's about how we process information and accept or develop concepts. The compartment of cognition that applies directly to what Beck does is cognitive dissonance.
Cognitive dissonance according to Wikipedia is: "...an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and actions. Dissonance is also reduced by justifying, blaming, and denying. It is one of the most influential and extensively studied theories in social psychology." Beck's entire oeuvre is predicated on this concept. Mexico is not America, drug violence is not besieging our churches, the head of Beck University is not college educated, therefore: Professor Beck has shown us that President Obama is a Socialist with violent tendencies and will overthrow our churches. Once the initiated have accepted that Glenn Beck is right they cannot simultaneously hold in their minds that what he says his wrong. This was the underlying principal behind the rise of Nazism and the horrors of the final solution. Once Hitler was made a savior
it obviously was impossible for many Germans to accept that the murder of the Jews was wrong because how could Hitler, the savior, be wrong? They could not hold in their heads, simultaneously, Hitler as bad and Hitler as good.
I certainly cannot prove it, but I know he is very aware of all this and is using it to his very profitable advantage. I read all the time about Beck not being intelligent - it is quite the contrary, he is very intelligent. This is what makes him dangerous. He is thoughtfully, purposefully and with malice propagandizing Americans who have very legitimate reasons to feel powerless and angry. Anger is the polar opposite of despair and depression - individuals will embrace anger to stave off despair and there is quite a bit to be depressed about these days. However, Glenn Beck's fear-based, negative propaganda is promoting a vengeful, violent, mugging of "the better angels of our nature".
