It looks like were in for some nice Spring weather. It should be in the fifties and a chance for high sixties in the coming week. I have been watching the last of a snow patch disappearing on the North side of the house. There is only a dark grey area of ice left. It may be gone by the end of the day.
Yesterday, in a conversation with Elijah, I said, "I think I will live to be one hundred". He looked at me and said, "I don't think so." In the following conversation, he told me I was going to die when I am eighty-one. I don't know if he knew that was next year. Not that he has shown any inclination toward prescience, but I found it mildly disturbing to hear. He likes to tease his Grandpa and I didn't think much about it. However, it did cause me to be aware that our sojourn on this planet is limited. Knowing that we can leave anytime, can help us keep our minds in the moment. It is not wise to waste our time, mucking, about in unhappiness.
Actually, I hope to stick around until the new civilization, based on unconditional love, is clearly emerging.
On another subject. Why are we so easily manipulated. How do governments, corporations, advertisers etc, get what they want.
There is a formula that has been used since ancient times to manipulate people. There are three simple steps.
Step One: Create a problem [fear] where none existed before. Make it so compelling that folks will want it solved.
Step Two: Use whatever public format available to escalate concern for the problem. Play on the emotions of the people until they clamor for a solution.
Step Three: Provide the solution and get everyone on board.
I have seen this formula used over and over again. Jamie pointed it out to me in an article by Barbara Minton, in a blog called, The Best Years in Life. Barbara Minton called it The Hegelian Dialectic. I did not know Hegel formulated this idea. The method certainly predates him by several centuries.
Barbara uses an example from the dairy industry. The following is quoted from her blog.
Step One: The dairy industry decides to sell skim milk close to the price at which whole milk is selling, thus having the delicious and valuable fat left to sell separately. But skim milk taste terrible and nobody wants to buy it. So it is decided that the public must be made to believe drinking skim milk is healthier than drinking whole milk.
Step Two: The aim here is to instill fear in people, so they will want to start buying skim milk. Strategic people such as mainstream doctors and nutritionists are recruited to help spread the word that drinking whole milk is bad for your health. Perceived authorities make announcements in popular mainstream media claiming that fat in milk is dangerous and responsible for many of the bad health outcomes of today. Parents become convinced that they would be ostracized and thought of as 'bad parents' if they served their children whole milk, even though they themselves grew up drinking whole milk without any problems. When common sense is thrown out the window step two has been accomplished.
Step Three: The dairy industry rushes in to save the public from the terrible fate of having to drink whole milk. Skin milk is presented as the perfect solution. Various products such as flavored, colored and sweetened skim milk appear in school cafeterias and in the grocer's dairy case. Everyone feels good because they have been saved from evil milk fat. And the dairy industry has almost doubled its profits.
She makes the point that it is used in manipulating people in areas other than health issues and demonstrates how Hitler used it to take over in Germany.
Of course, we don't have to use examples from foreign governments or history. It is happening right now. The threat of terrorism uses this model in an attempt to keep us in perpetual war. Many programs, whether exploitative or sincerely thought to be beneficial, are sold to the public using this formula. If we pay attention we will see how often this is used. In a future blog we will examine how some issues are being sold to the public using this formula.
As we become more aware, we will recognize how fear is used to manipulate. When fear is being used, it behooves us to reject the pertinent data until confirmation can be achieved. If the project or issue is worthwhile, fear does not need to be used for its promotion.
Happy Monday Everybody.
Love and Peace, Gregg
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