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I feel like you're parroting back to us things that skilled politicians have been teaching the public to think. This is fear propaganda.

Yes, there are serious turmoil problems going on in the world right now. I won't try to moralize on how we put this in perspective and deal with it. It's worth having conversations on this subject but only if that conversation is rich in content and reason, and depleted of propaganda. One thing is that terrorism is a highly asymmetrical thing (quite unlike war). It costs many orders of magnitude more money to directly fight against or rebuild from very low-cost attacks. Effective strategies are non-military ones.

It's not a fallacy even if the slope is imagined, but the progression from one part of the slope to another part is realistic.

The problem is that it isn't. Sure, you can put on your tin-foil hat and declare that some secret society has a step-by-step plan towards abolishing guns and the means to push it through, and that the first step of the seecrit plan it to bribe some scientists into declaring lead is toxic so that bullets have to be made out of more expensive materials. That fails to pass Occam's razor, by a landslide. Lead is a well-established neurotoxin and has been regulated in paint, electronics and gasoline, so it's much more realistic to see this as a logical extension of existing efforts to keep this toxin out of the environment.

Fallacy comes into slippery slope when something like "If you give a mouse a cookie, aliens will abduct you for probing" is expressed.

Nope, that would be a non sequitur. I think you don't understand the slippery slope fallacy. You're committing it if you're saying that a measure that has consequences in a certain direction implies future further steps in the same direction. Like this. The same fallacy is sometimes also called unwarranted extrapolation, which is a more descriptive name in my opinion.

This sounds to me like a reactionary statement that may be fueled by media hyperbole and exaggeration. Have we really thrown out the constitution? Remember that the US Constitution is a living document and was far from perfect at its inception. I have lots of respect for it but do not worship it. I'd like to tell you to actually read it but I'm ashamed to say that I myself have not done so. I've read some parts of it and found that it's actually very readable and not affected much by "legalese" so I plan to read more of it in the future. I'm just trying to say that going to the source sometimes helps de-fuse our emotional triggers that are abused by the propaganda of our day.

Our tax burden is not crippling. Our standard of living continues to improve. Lifespans are improving. Our income tax rates are lower than most developed countries and our corporate tax rates are on a par with others. Government revenue has been between 15 and 20% of GDP since the 1940's, and in the past 4 years it's gone down and is closer to 15%.

There are a lot of political issues today that I'd love to be able to correct, but I don't think everything is "broken." What I most want is more education in propaganda analysis (deconstruction -- see for example http://propagandacritic.com/), and less two-party partisan nonsense. These are both problems as old as our country. Yes, corporate lobbyists are another way of spelling "corruption" but this too is nothing new. The national debt and CO2 emissions are serious problems that are new to the past few decades, and they both frighten me a little, but they are complex problems that will need to be solved in an intelligent manner without reactionary thought.

And finally, as many people pointed out above, these succession petitions are far from representative of the majority opinion. There's a massive gap between a signed petition (to let off steam mostly) and finding that these states want to actually secede.

Not all liberals.

Frankly, I wish more people would become familiar with Mein Kampf because of Hitler's worldview ("I'm intrinsically better than other people and all my problems are their fault") that enabled him to gain sympathy and grab controls of a world power.

In many countries today, there are influential demagogues spouting local adaptations of Hitler's philosophy and gaining followers.

If more people were aware of how propaganda worked, maybe we wouldn't be in so much of a mess.

I know this site doesn't go into as much depth as a book could, but it's a good start. I honestly think that this material should be the basis of a required course in high school, or at least interwoven into english and/or history courses. The widespread use of propaganda is perhaps the greatest threat to democracy today.

The personal attacks, however, are not acceptable. They are outside of the realm of good debate and ARE a sign of zealotry and foolishness. Not just Gates/Hitler comparisons, but ESR/gun-toting Psychopath, RMS/dirty Gnu hippie hung up on one word, Ballmer/sweating monkeyboy, etc. These weak tactics are meant to discredit the message or works because the bearer is discredited, and is a cornerstone of PROPAGANDA.

I have noticed that the Slashdot culture has largely been usurped by Mac OSX. The real zealots here are no longer the Linux fans, but the Mac pushers. The linux fans have largely grown up, while the mac pushers have not. They seem to be just getting started. Read any apple.slashdot.org article to see what I mean. Browse at -1 and tell me the moderating is fair. It can't be 100% fair, of course, but on average, the moderation is of a lower quality than other sections of Slashdot, primarily due to many many good posts being modded down for political reasons. The moderators have a SERIOUS bias towards promoting the "Apple Party Line" at the expense of reality. Excellent arguments against the Apple position are effectively being censored by aggressive and intentional negative moderation. It makes me wonder whether Apple has a room filled with astroturfers much like the one Microsoft reportedly has (no link; hearsay), or does their OS just transmit subliminal messages? (again, no link; hearsay). I know, however, that Mac OSX is by far the favored ("sanctified and holy") OS here. If Linux dies, it won't be Microsoft or SCO who kills it, but Apple.

I use and love Apple computers. I think they have good enough qualifications to STAND ON THEIR OWN. If you have faith in Apple's products, you shouldn't have to lie in order to promote them. You shouldn't have to try to discredit those who disagree with you. It's not possible that Apples are the fastest, freest, best networking, most standards-oriented, best GUI, easiest to use, least expensive, coolest, etc. but that is *exactly* what I'd gather from reading Slashdot. This place is a paid advertisement for Macs. Apple's zealous followers REFUSE to believe that they can be second best in ANY area, though historically, they always have been. Zealotry is deceptive, but it's not the Linux fans who are doing it.

Attention Apple Paid Shills: Flame Away and Mod me down. I don't care.

Things will get better and better and better and better! Trust me, it's only a matter of time!

.... this isn't the only time I've seen it, but I've never seen so many otherwise level-headed people buy into evidenceless assertions about the future about China. Sure it's a nice theory that China will slowly slide down an inevitable slippery slope to a capitalist democracy, but can you give me a reason why I should find this rationally compelling?

I agree, this sounds like a big brewhaha between ati, nvidia and microsoft

I remember not so long ago how Rambus was the black sheep. And how Intel was the maker of the new evil Rambus. Well, did you know that AMD was part of the companies that helped define Rambus?

This is business boys... not kindergarten. In this arena, bending down to get the soap gets you an ass load. It's reality. Face it. As linus said, Grow up.

Ohh, I feel so proud to apply my first propaganda technique, thanks to SilentMajority's post.

I agree, this sounds like a big brewhaha between ati, nvidia and microsoft

I remember not so long ago how Rambus was the black sheep. And how Intel was the maker of the new evil Rambus. Well, did you know that AMD was part of the companies that helped define Rambus?

This is business boys... not kindergarten. In this arena, bending down to get the soap gets you an ass load. It's reality. Face it. As linus said, Grow up.

Ohh, I feel so proud to apply my first propaganda technique, thanks to SilentMajority's post.

The best strategies are to debunk, ridicule and associate valid stories/opinions with undesirable words/people like "communists", "lefties", "conspiracy theorists", etc.

For example, when interviewing "people off the street" make sure you have only the wackos presenting opposing views while you pick out "decent-looking, well-dressed" people to present your own views. And if there aren't enough people who share your views, hire some people off the street or go with local actors/models if your budget allows. Even if both views get equal airtime, the opposing views will be associated with ugly weirdos and who the hell wants to share the same views as them even if they're right?

A similar strategy is to hire strong-looking & charismatic tv/news personalities that support your own views while hiring ugly-assed & uncharasmatic "wimps" to offer very pitiful opposition. I'm sure you can find a decent example of this tactic by watching TV.

As you can see, your previously unpopular views can be easily associated with "winners" and opposing views are associated with "whiners, losers, traitors, communists, etc." without resorting to outright censorship.

The best part of this strategy is that it works because the average joe-sixpacks don't understand how to detect bullshit.

To sum it up: associate undesirable words/concepts/people to opposition and associate desirable words/concepts/people to your own views and don't let the pesky facts or Truth get in the way because perception is usually more important in manipulating the public.

This of course goes hand-in-hand with manipulating opinion polls and surveys by carefully crafting questions in ways that lead people to pick desired answers and then hiding the exact original wording of these questions when presenting the results to the public.

Who needs censorship when these tactics work so well?

DISCLAIMER: I'm not a lawyer or doctor or counselor. My messages are for entertainment purposes only and are not to be taken as advice to be carried out.

During college years, I had similar problems but I've learned to overcome them.

A lot of this will sound like common sense but sometimes it helps to hear/read it from another person. Most importantly, its a lot easier said than done for some people.

BASICS:

1. KNOW THYSELF: Stop lying to yourself and making excuses. Find out why you do or don't do things. Keep asking "why" when you get shallow answers like "because you're a lazy undiciplined moron" :) -- this simple exercise can be life-changing if you have the courage to do it properly (I permanently & instantly stopped smoking due to this 10-minute exercise after many failed attempts over many years to stop smoking 2 packs/day). Then ask yourself the right questions like "how" you can correct it. Yea it sounds like common sense but you'd be surprised.

Speaking of asking the right questions....try Personal Power II CDs from Anthony Robbins. If you can't afford it, buy it used on EBAY or check out one of his books at the library that talk about Neuro-Associations. If you get the CD and are able to finish it within 30 days (doing all the assigned work & exercises on time without skipping any days) then you'll probably have positively changed your life beyond recognition--but that's easier said than done because the assignments can be very tough (but worthwhile if you're into designing your life to be what you want rather than being on autopilot).

For people who think Tony Robbins is corny (he is sometimes), they should compare their own bio to Tony's bio (deep link so it looks funky)--that said, don't treat any author as a "perfect" guru because their shit stinks too--think of them as a coach and experiment with what they teach and throw away the stuff that doesn't work for you. Basically, be aware of the 10 most common bullshitting methods when reading anything so you can throw away the nonsense parts while keeping the useful bits--IMHO, there's even a few BS methods used in Tony's bio & work but they're still highly useful after throwing those out.

Discover what pain/pleasure you associate with tasks you procrastinate--and force yourself to consciously consider/feel the pain/pleasure of what will happen if you continue procrastinating important tasks.

2. APPLY what you read or learn--without action, they are useless. Reading Seven Habits or other books won't help unless you actually apply what you learn from reading it. DO NOT read another book until you actually apply the stuff you learned from the current one because you might be reading self-help books to avoid real work rather than to change yourself. A clue might be the tendency to read these books while you have a important and probably unpleasant stuff to do that is more urgent than reading these books.

3. Start simple and begin a sleep schedule you KNOW you'll succeed at following. Like going to bed 10 minutes earlier each night and getting up 10 minutes earlier NO MATTER WHAT until you reach a normal schedule. Then set a HARD STOP where you go to bed by midnight NO MATTER WHAT--face the consequences if you didn't get stuff done by midnight when you wake up 7-8 hours later.

4. Write down your goals for the day and prioritize them--actually INCLUDE things like web surfing, etc. but place them at the end of the list and put a time-limit on that like 1 hour (use an alarm clock/phone or stopwatch). DO NOT do lower priority tasks until the high priority ones are done. Keep this tasklist short and doable--if there's clearly too much for 1 day, then be realistic and schedule accordingly.

5. Become more predictable in a good way--form good habits like having productive da

If we really had a massive terrorist threat including cyber-terrorism, why the hell are they adding this to the FBI's plate?

Did they already fix the problems within the FBI and among different agencies that led to the tragic failure to prevent 9/11 despite having all the info they needed?

Shouldn't the FBI investigate Enron, etc. and the role they played in influencing our government's energy policy with VP Dick Cheney in a manner that might've been illegal? Or investigate VP Dick Cheney's alleged fraudulent accounting practices while he was director of Halliburton? Given the HUGE relevance to this story after millions of us lost a big chunk of our pensions, why didn't we hear about this as much as even 1/1000th of Monica's story?

Oh, I forgot, we the public aren't supposed to care about things that actually impact us like (inflated gas prices or losing hard-earned pension funds)--we should only care about sex scandals of politicians because we're illiterate morons that believe corrupt politicians when they tell us they believe in the same God or religion as us since we don't have the ability to detect bullshit.

I suppose making govt larger and more intrusive is seen as a better strategy than fixing the specific problems that led to the failure to prevent it.

I lost someone who was working in the World Trade Center on 9/11 and I'm very dissappointed at how they've handled it BEFORE and AFTER that tragedy.

We're the most technologically advanced nation on Earth...we can do better than this.

I rediscovered this guide today after many years and had a good laugh when I ran into a few of the propaganda techniques after lunch.

After 15-30 minutes reading this guide, you'll be amused if you practice it on:
1. Fox News Channel (easy place to start for beginners--you can sometimes detect 5 different techniques within a few minutes)
2. Slashdot Posts (if you're into picking apart someone's flawed argument, you'll become a pro)
3. CNN Crossfire (watch 2 pros battle each other using these techniques)

IMHO, they should teach this (bullshit detection) in high school and assign homework to find specific examples of common propaganda techniques in advertising, news media, etc. Can you detect which one(s), if any, I'm using in this post?

Index of 10 common techniques

Word games
....Name-calling
....Glittering generalities
....Euphemisms

False connections
....Transfer
....Testimonial

Special Appeals
....Plain Folks
....Bandwagon
....Fear

Logical fallacies
....Bad Logic or propaganda?
....Unwarranted extrapolation

Source: http://www.propagandacritic.com/

Here's the thing. I don't think that Rumsfeld et al. really want that to happen. I think they don't believe that will happen because they are completely out of touch with reality.

For instance, Paul Wolfowitz said before the war that "An explosion of joy will greet our soldiers" and the Iraqi regime will tumble "like a house of cards". These assertations were based on absolutely nothing. Based on that, they believed that the war would actually be "self-legitimizing" because it would actually make a lot of Arabs very happy, bloodlessly, and the Arab world would see that, become more favorable to the United States, and it would lead to "waves of democratization across the Middle East".

In other words, they believed things because they wanted to believe them, adamantly smacked down contrary evidence because they didn't like the way it made them feel, and based a superstructure of arguments on that imaginary foundation.

In other words, it's simple, terrible judgment.

Mandatory propaganda reference

This matches the rules for propaganda

Check the section on Fear

This matches the rules for propaganda

Check the section on Fear