Once you know the method it looses its power over you. Its easier to manipulate those who are unaware. For all of us to teach and learn about manipulation techniques and thereby become immune to them, is the purpose of this thread.



What follows are just a few examples means of infowar, psychowar and mass-indoctrination. These are used on a daily basis by mass-media, politics, schools, speakers, writers...even here on ATS. Im sure there are psychological labels for these phenomena but I dont know them so Ive devised some of my own.



1. The Yes-Street Technique



I wanna get my audience to agree with something controversial, so I´ll first start by saying a bunch of things that they already agree with and already believe in. This is how I build trust. Then, when I have them all nodding and agreeing at the principles Ive laid out, I can also sell the more disagreeable stuff. This is the basic cult-recruitment technique. You cannot recruit anyone for a cult if you do not first offer enough benefits to get the person hooked. Once hooked you can sell him anything you want. It goes without saying that politicians also love to use this one. This is called "the yes-street technique" because one first gets someone into the habit of saying yes, yes, yes, yes before offering something he/she would have otherwise said "no" to.



Remedy: Discernment. Nothing is completely black or white. Just because organization/politician/book X has said many true things in the past doesnt mean that everything coming from that source is good and true.



2. Create your own enemy



If you secretly create your own opposition this has many, many benefits. This is a technique that goes completely unnoticed by most people. Since you know that everything has its opposite, might as well create that opposite yourself. Once you have created a worldview, religion, politicial agenda, cult, company or whatever and you create the opposing side to your agenda yourself, you can:



* Control the enemy (control the extent of damage they do to you)

* Make the enemy look crazy or goofy

* Make "friends" with real enemies thus getting insight into their operations.

* Create "negative" publicity about you...which is essentially good publicity because everyone is being forced to look at you and what you have to offer. (ATS Example: Notice how negative posts bump your thread to the top of the list? You can be thankful for your enemies without which some of your threads wouldnt be getting any attention).



Remedy: Avoid extremely polarized/fanatical positions. See both sides of an issue.





3. Diverting Attention



If you want to cover something up, you divert attention. One way to do this that we might all remember having done ourselves as children is to admit to a lesser lie in order to cover-up a bigger lie. Mom asks: "Where do you have that money from?" You dont tell her that you robbed a bank but start crying and say "I admit it, I admit it. I found a purse on the street and stole some money out of it. Im so sorry". The global power players use this technique on a regular basis. One conspiracy-example of this would be: "Tell them there was a votefraud-conspiracy 2003 so that they dont recognize that they entire election process is rigged since hundreds of years" or "Tell them we´re in Iraq for oil...give them some bread to eat, so that they dont see the bigger picture" (These are only examples , not proposals for theories or discussion points).



The most basic example of attention-diversion is the politician who wants to get peoples attention away from problems in their own country so he keeps pointing at problems in another country.



Want to know how easy it is to divert peoples attention? Stop on a crowded street and start staring upwards at the clouds. Notice how other people start looking upward too. Monkey see, monkey do.



Remedy: Practice not putting your attention on where everyone else is putting their attention but looking behind the veil. Dont only look at the obvious in front of your eyes but also behind it.



4. Overload, Overwhelm & Confusion



Some manipulators rely heavily on peoples short-attention span. Overhelm and overload someone with so much information and contradictory data that his mind goes into a state of exhaustion and he either a) Doesnt care anymore what the truth is (apathy) or looses sight of the big picture (confusion). Information-overload is what is happening today, with contradictory messages being force-fed on us on a daily basis. Today we learn that coffee causes cancer, tommorow we learn that coffee prevents cancer, then we learn that you have to drink a lot of water if you wanna drink coffee, and next we learn that coffee does not suck water out of the body afterall. Being the superficial information-hounds that we are (sucking up a little bit of this and that without going into depth with anything), we loose sight of what is important and what is true.



Remedy: Choose wisely what you look into. Prioritize your reading. When a subject is overloaded with confusion (ATS-example: The 9/11 Forum), get back to the basic questions of asking what is important, what is really known and what is really unknown. Dont listen to emotionally charged people, dont listen to hysteria and hype. Rest and relax before getting back to a subject.





5. Mystery-Maker



Mystery attracts attention. Present something with a few knowns but many unknowns. What happens is that peoples attention is sucked into the subject, causing hours or even a lifetime of preoccupation. Manipulators use this by making a few remarks about a subject and intentionally withholding the rest. So they get the person interested. Then bits of information are revealed piece by piece to keep the dog on the hook of wanting more food.



Remedy: Give money only to those who can tell you squarely and clearly what something is about.



6. The Fear/Desire Circus



The power player, knowing that humans are driven by fear (survival) and desire (survival) can easily play ball with mass-attention. Find out what someone wants and make the impression you that you offer that. Find out what someone fears and make the impression you offer the solution to that.



Remedy: Dont let your fears and desires be too strong, otherwise you can be played like a ball by any con-man or scam-artist around. Notice how our whole civilization is being controlled with the Fear/Desire Circus. Notice how you can find fullfillment within and dont need all of the stuff they offer. Someone who doesnt need much cannot be manipulated. Neediness = Powerlessness.



I have about a dozen more techniques Id like to write about in this thread, but I dont want to overwhelm the reader so I will add them later.



I welcome your realizations on manipulation-techniques or your examples on how they are applied in world politics, media and "education" and look forward to learning a lot from my fellow ATSers.







[edit on 6-3-2008 by Skyfloating]