In case any FUDD you know thinks we are dealing with an honest, reasonable opposition, send them a link to this.
We are dealing with a hard-core minority of skilled left-wing propagandists desperately trying to create a voting army of (mostly female) "True Believers" who are completely factually ignorant but fanatically convinced of the rightness of their cause.
Facts to the contrary need not apply. Because you CANNOT have a rational discussion with a True Believer. Having adopted a position based on emotion, they are now invulnerable to facts or to the truth itself.
That is the goal of:
GUNNED DOWN: THE POWER OF THE NRA
You can go to the PBS web site to watch it
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gunned-down/
or you can watch on youtube:
GO AND WATCH IT NOW.
While you watch, keep in mind a few things about the presentation.
"Reason cannot displace what Reason did not emplace."
"The only effective defense against truth is emotion.
The show opens with a massacre, to put the audience in the right frame of mind. After about 15 min of priming the audience's hormonal pump, the VILLAIN is introduced, the NRA, personified by Wayne LaPierre.
The Narrative requires a principal straw-man Villain for all to see! With personalities and emotions, but never the detailed facts.
Notice that NO technical, legal or constitutional fact details about the history of gun control proposals are discussed. Just the controversies involved. In other words THE EMOTIONS.
The 2nd Amendment is mentioned a total of ONCE, in one brief passing sentence in the middle of the show. The US Constitution is not part of the Narrative.
The ATF debacle at WACO is NEVER mentioned at all. Much less as a factor in the resurgence of progun voters and anger at the anti-gun agenda under the Clinton administration.
Although the entire show is about Wayne LaPierre and the NRA, NO CURRENT OFFICER OF THE NRA WAS INTERVIEWED OR ALLOWED TO SPEAK FOR THE SHOW. A brief blurb at the end claims they refused - gee, imagine that. Only chosen blurbs of news footage are shown and a few former NRA officers and lobbyists.
Gotta keep to the Narrative. Real facts just get in the way.
Persons quoted are always quoted in snippets. The only context allowed is by the Frontline producer's Narrative.
There is NO examination of the ineffectiveness of antigun efforts to date (especially the disasterous outcomes in England and Australia). OR the fact that none of the antigun proposals would have stopped ANY of the school massacres that have prompted the outrage. Because that would spoil the Narrative.
A few of the many other American progun groups are mentioned only once and briefly. Jews For The Preservation Of Firearms Ownership are not mentioned at all. (Gotta conform to that narrative!).
What is mentioned, over and over, are PEOPLE, RELATIONSHIPS and EMOTION, EMOTION, EMOTION. In other words it is presented JUST LIKE A SOAP OPERA EPISODE. Targeted toward exactly the same audience.
Yeah, its all about the NARRATIVE: ALL GUNS EVIL. WILL KILL YOUR CHILDREN. NRA KILL YOUR CHILDREN. EVIL EVIL NRA!
This has been only a VERY brief summary of some of the propaganda techniques involved. But just being aware of them is being forearmed.
George Orwell once wrote that the meanest propaganda comes not from telling lies, but from suppressing parts of the truth. (I can't find the exact quote).
Please feel free to chime in on the propaganda techniques you notice in the production that I have missed.
We are dealing with a hard-core minority of skilled left-wing propagandists desperately trying to create a voting army of (mostly female) "True Believers" who are completely factually ignorant but fanatically convinced of the rightness of their cause.
Facts to the contrary need not apply. Because you CANNOT have a rational discussion with a True Believer. Having adopted a position based on emotion, they are now invulnerable to facts or to the truth itself.
That is the goal of:
GUNNED DOWN: THE POWER OF THE NRA
You can go to the PBS web site to watch it
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gunned-down/
or you can watch on youtube:
GO AND WATCH IT NOW.
While you watch, keep in mind a few things about the presentation.
"Reason cannot displace what Reason did not emplace."
"The only effective defense against truth is emotion.
The show opens with a massacre, to put the audience in the right frame of mind. After about 15 min of priming the audience's hormonal pump, the VILLAIN is introduced, the NRA, personified by Wayne LaPierre.
The Narrative requires a principal straw-man Villain for all to see! With personalities and emotions, but never the detailed facts.
Notice that NO technical, legal or constitutional fact details about the history of gun control proposals are discussed. Just the controversies involved. In other words THE EMOTIONS.
The 2nd Amendment is mentioned a total of ONCE, in one brief passing sentence in the middle of the show. The US Constitution is not part of the Narrative.
The ATF debacle at WACO is NEVER mentioned at all. Much less as a factor in the resurgence of progun voters and anger at the anti-gun agenda under the Clinton administration.
Although the entire show is about Wayne LaPierre and the NRA, NO CURRENT OFFICER OF THE NRA WAS INTERVIEWED OR ALLOWED TO SPEAK FOR THE SHOW. A brief blurb at the end claims they refused - gee, imagine that. Only chosen blurbs of news footage are shown and a few former NRA officers and lobbyists.
Gotta keep to the Narrative. Real facts just get in the way.
Persons quoted are always quoted in snippets. The only context allowed is by the Frontline producer's Narrative.
There is NO examination of the ineffectiveness of antigun efforts to date (especially the disasterous outcomes in England and Australia). OR the fact that none of the antigun proposals would have stopped ANY of the school massacres that have prompted the outrage. Because that would spoil the Narrative.
A few of the many other American progun groups are mentioned only once and briefly. Jews For The Preservation Of Firearms Ownership are not mentioned at all. (Gotta conform to that narrative!).
What is mentioned, over and over, are PEOPLE, RELATIONSHIPS and EMOTION, EMOTION, EMOTION. In other words it is presented JUST LIKE A SOAP OPERA EPISODE. Targeted toward exactly the same audience.
Yeah, its all about the NARRATIVE: ALL GUNS EVIL. WILL KILL YOUR CHILDREN. NRA KILL YOUR CHILDREN. EVIL EVIL NRA!
This has been only a VERY brief summary of some of the propaganda techniques involved. But just being aware of them is being forearmed.
George Orwell once wrote that the meanest propaganda comes not from telling lies, but from suppressing parts of the truth. (I can't find the exact quote).
Please feel free to chime in on the propaganda techniques you notice in the production that I have missed.
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