Firewall: The Propagandist's Guide to Self-Defense

FIREWALL:

The Propagandist's Guide to Self-Defense

By Jack Nolan

Copyright 2015 Jack Nolan

Smashwords Edition

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Introduction

Hello. I’m a propagandist.

I want to make you understand what that means, why you should feel very, very afraid, and what you can do to protect yourself from those like me. I practice black magic, I'm a sorcerer capable of compromising your most precious gift of free will, while you’re barely aware of it, and even proclaiming to the stars my tricks will never work on you. I tie you with strings and make you sing and dance. Dance, my puppet! Mwah hahah haaah!

I hope you appreciate my evil laugh; I’ve been practicing.

Seriously, you should be scared, though not of me. I’m the one who’s taking you behind the scenes and showing how the black magic works, all the while cautioning you that you can know how a poison is made, how it affects the human body at the molecular level, and it still won’t save you. I'm going to show you why propaganda is dangerous to you, explain how to build a defense, and help you minimize your exposure.

A firewall originally meant a sturdy wall to prevent the rapid spread of a fire. In computer technology, it means a system of security measures designed to prevent unauthorized access or tampering with your electronic devices, such as your iPhone or personal computer. If it’s important to defend your phone, how much more important is it to defend your mind from unauthorized tampering? Sounds like science-fiction, or the blatherings of a paranoid, doesn’t it? Hoo hoo hoo, just wait and see! Propaganda training inadvertently gave me an effective shield against manipulation, one I would not like to live without, and I want to share it with as many people as possible. I want to give you a fighting chance.

Who am I, really? I’m very much like you, a consumer of culture and junk culture alike, surviving modern American life. Unlike the majority of you, I joined the military, specifically the US Army, mainly reserves. Unlike most in the military, I chose to complete training in an esoteric field called Psychological Operations and Warfare (PSYOP for short.) And unlike most of those who completed that training, I’m interested, in fact passionate, about sharing what I learned (within all regulations concerning privileged material, of course!) and showing why a knowledge of propaganda is invaluable in modern life. I retired from the military into film and television production, giving me still more insight into propaganda in our society.

Some credentials: I entered ROTC in 1986, graduated college in 1990, just in time for Desert Storm, with a commission in the Army Reserve, military police (MP) branch. I sought out an assignment with the 353rd Research and Analysis (RAC) company. Completed training, much of it by correspondence, from the JFK Special Warfare Center and School (USAJFKSWCS) at Ft. Bragg, North Carolina. After the 353rd was inactivated, I served with the 15th Tactical PSYOP. Left the service in '96. No war hero here, mobilized twice, but never saw combat. As Tom Lehrer once said, about my military career, I am understandably modest.

While I was phasing out of the Reserves, I began a career in Hollywood. I joined the two actors’ guilds (now merged as SAG-AFTRA) in late '94, and have for two decades made a surprisingly good living as an actor. I have my share of bit parts, been the lead in a handful of fun Youtube videos, and spent a lot of time standing in, or as a humble background player. I also record audio books. I have an insider's view of the practices of the film and television industries, and in this book, I will most certainly bite the hands that feed me.

An important disclaimer: if you're hoping for leaks in classified information -- and I did attend classified briefings -- look elsewhere. I will carefully and conscientiously avoid revealing any information that would make my fellow soldiers' jobs more difficult. Besides, you can find Field Manual (FM) 33-1 and FM 33-1-1 online. It's all there through the Freedom of Information Act. They're dull reading, irrelevant to civilians. (For something more entertaining, enjoy the manual on tactical and strategic deception. It's a dry-as-the-Sahara retelling of history's greatest practical jokes, and I'd pay to hear it read aloud by John Cleese.)

Even with this disclaimer, I expect some benighted souls in powerful positions would rather you stay uninformed and gullible, and may be displeased with me. On the other hand, they might realize the potential benefits of hardening our soldiers and populace against enemy propaganda.

I have spoken to many friends about my background, and my concerns. For example, I love the cinema, and should they go with me, they can scarcely fail to notice when I flee the theater, hands to my ears, if commercials appear before the movie starts, that I wait outside until the show begins and it’s safe to reenter. In most cases, they view my eccentricity with amusement. My attempts to explain myself often meet with a smug, Oh, but advertisements don’t have any effect on me!

How could I explain to them that decrypting the bureaucratese of FM 33-1 is like finding a first-rate horror story masquerading as a tax form, like digging through a pristine snow drift and finding a horrible monster frozen inside? I could only shake my head and sigh in frustration. ...Or I could write a book.

In this book I hope to reveal in broad strokes what propaganda is, how professionals craft propaganda, the forms that it takes, its limits, and how we as individuals and as a culture are harmed by it. I will demonstrate that while propaganda itself is by nature selfish and often reprehensible, the same methods can be used for enlightened purposes. Therefore, this is no polemic against the arts of persuasion, or against capitalism or commercial art per se, but a guide to minimizing the detrimental effects of propaganda upon ourselves and our societies.

Most importantly, I hope to give everyone the tools they need to defend their free will from a society teeming with bad influences. The freedom we cherish is illusory if our minds are shackled.

As someone who learned this black magic from the best, I firmly believe propaganda is bad for us. To show the evil potential of propaganda, I’ll introduce you to an expert practitioner, arguably one of the worst human beings to have ever lived -- you have been warned. But I will also show how enlightened artists have used propagandistic techniques for the betterment of humankind.

Finally, I hope to offer a manifesto of sorts, not a political or economic manifesto, but an artistic one. I care about culture, the set of ideas, norms, values and aspirations we pass from one generation to the next. When toxic, harmful ideas flowed into and from the mass media, enormous suffering resulted, time and again in the twentieth century. By similar means, culture has helped uplift us all to new heights of civilization, when we as artists, and as patrons of the arts, have so chosen. Culture is too important to be abused or taken lightly.

This book does not pretend to make its case with exhaustive and didactic evidence. I’m a soldier, not an academic subject to peer review. Nor is this some one-sided diatribe by a politician with a personal stake in convincing you, though I intend to use all my tricks to convince you.

The most effective ways to persuade a target – excuse me, a person! – is face-to-face communication. Since that’s impossible in any quantity, instead allow me to address you, patient reader, as if we were sitting together over tea.

Yes, I hope to persuade you. If that disturbs you -- good! You're ahead of the game. Even should we ultimately disagree, I applaud your thinking for yourself, and please remember that I mean well and have good intentions. If you’ll hear the professionally-trained propagandist out, I’ll do my best to see you get your money’s and time’s worth in this book.

One last thing… in the Wachowskis’ film The Matrix, the character of Morpheus memorably gave the protagonist a choice. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed, and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Now, I’m not gonna blow your mind by showing you reality’s a simulation, but we will be visiting some dark places, and I will share a scary way of seeing the world, a way that may be new, disorienting, and distressing to you. Fair warning.

Chapter 1: Definitions

Glad you decided to continue. Welcome. Lots of material to cover, so let’s get started. First, we need to define some terms. Gets a bit dry here. Bear with me, it’s less than four pages.

What is Propaganda?

According to the dictionary, propaganda is the systematic propagation of a doctrine or cause or of information reflecting the views and interests of those advocating such a doctrine or cause, or material disseminated by the advocates or opponents of a doctrine or cause.

Ugh, what a mouthful! That’s not the military definition, and I prefer our pithy, simple, easy-to-remember version:

Propaganda: any message that directly serves the needs of the sender.

That casts a wide net. For example, the doe-eyed pleeeeaaase! that a child gives a parent when they beg for ice cream is propaganda, under that definition. Though this child is practicing the crudest and simplest form of manipulation, it is effective, as any parent will tell you. It's perfectly normal for humans to learn these tricks, at least a little. What we are not taught is how to recognise and resist manipulative messages. This definition is a fine place to start. Repetition's one of the keys to good propaganda, so let's repeat this key point in different terms.

Propaganda means any message that directly serves the needs of the sender.

If a message you receive directly serves the sender, it qualifies as propaganda.

Let’s plant the cornerstone of your shiny new mental firewall. This system will make you more resistant (but not invulnerable!) to propaganda. The first tripwire, the first checkpoint of our firewall is this: does the sender benefit from your receipt of the message?

➢ Does this message serve the sender?

If so, that's your cue to raise your mental shields.

Propaganda vs. Advertising

The dictionary lists advertising as the activity of attracting public attention to a product or business, as by paid announcements in the print, broadcast, or electronic media. That’s a quiet, staid definition, and it fails to capture the manipulative quality of modern advertising. As you have deduced, advertising fits within the definition of propaganda. Ads are indeed messages that directly benefit their sender. However, advertising is a subset of propaganda, so its definition must be more restrictive.

For the purposes of this book, advertising is any message that directly serves the economic needs of the sender. So, the World War II slogan Loose lips sink ships was propaganda, while the message Buy war bonds was an advertisement. Older brother propaganda works for the government, while little brother advertising found a job in the corporate world.

Passive vs. Assaultive Propaganda

Your humble author is neither anti-capitalist, nor anti-corporate. I recognize the value, and the disadvantages, of both institutions.

If one is in business, say a sole proprietorship or mom-and-pop, of course you take out an ad in the phone book. You hang your shingle outside your place of business. You advertise in periodicals. You'd be a poor business owner not to. I've been a small business owner; there's nothing wrong with these things, and there’s nothing wrong with earning money.

I call this shingle-hanging passive advertising. The person seeking the product or service has to seek out your message. I consider passive advertising harmless and beneficial.

Now suppose you extend your advertising to posters in public places, or leaflets placed on car windshields. You've crossed the border into what I call assaultive propaganda. The old Soviet Russia jokes are fading from memory, like In America, you watch TV; in Russia, TV watches you.

Well, in the USA, the advertising finds you. Assaultive propaganda seeks you out.

Posters and leaflets are small-scale stuff. A businessperson would be hard-pressed to get results from them. Large-scale assaultive advertising has a high threshold cost. It's expensive to get your business on a billboard or a TV commercial! To benefit from assaultive advertising, you need the resources of a successful corporation, franchise, or other source of capital. Assaultive advertising is too expensive for a dinky sole proprietorship.

Assaultive propaganda includes radio spots, loudspeaker broadcasts, television commercials, billboards, ads plastered across public busses, bus benches, posters in bus stops, leaflets on your