The Victory of ‘Perception Management’
The Victory of Perception Management
December 28, 2014
Special Report: In the 1980s, the Reagan administration pioneered perception management to get the American people to kick the Vietnam Syndrome and accept more U.S. interventionism, but that propaganda structure continues to this day getting the public to buy in to endless war, writes Robert Parry.
By Robert Parry
To understand how the American people find themselves trapped in todays Orwellian dystopia of endless warfare against an ever-shifting collection of evil enemies, you have to think back to the Vietnam War and the shock to the ruling elite caused by an unprecedented popular uprising against that war.
While on the surface Official Washington pretended that the mass protests didnt change policy, a panicky reality existed behind the scenes, a recognition that a major investment in domestic propaganda would be needed to ensure that future imperial adventures would have the publics eager support or at least its confused acquiescence.
This commitment to what the insiders called perception management began in earnest with the Reagan administration in the 1980s but it would come to be the accepted practice of all subsequent administrations, including the present one of President Barack Obama.
In that sense, propaganda in pursuit of foreign policy goals would trump the democratic ideal of an informed electorate. The point would be not to honestly inform the American people about events around the world but to manage their perceptions by ramping up fear in some cases and defusing outrage in others depending on the U.S. governments needs.
More:
https://consortiumnews.com/2014/12/28/the-victory-of-perception-management/
arcane1
(38,613 posts)Thanks!!
Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)"truth is the first victim......"
yurbud
(39,405 posts)appalachiablue
(41,174 posts)in DC by RR's time thanks to the Powell Memo call to corporate arms in 1971. And they kept on at an enormous pace to what we have now in Wall Street on the Potomac, as some call it. Eddy Bernays and Uncle Miltie would be delighted ! I was in DC for that Nov. '80 election and Jan. Inaugural Proclamation of War on Government. It was shocking. The anti govt. sentiment in the last few years is like nothing I've ever seen. Just noticed a new post about SPLC's new report on recent growth of ant-govt. hate groups. Serious times.