So one part of the 2016 Resistance™ narrative was true: there was a very powerful outside entity trying to sway our election through internet manipulation, who tried to hide in the shadows while putting its thumb on the scale for its preferred candidate. And there were millions of dollars spent on ads and nudges and rhetorical manipulation by various shadowy oligarchic cabals, all hoping to subvert our holy & sacred Democracy (it dies in darkness, you know!).
Our progressive oligarchy are so besotted by their own wealth and status, plus their shared belief that they are the human embodiment of compassion, wisdom and virtue, that they honestly believe that ANYTHING they do has to be good and pure, because they themselves are so good and pure.
It's not so much that our Tech overlords (and their media mouthpieces) constantly lie, because they aren't even conscious of it: yet, somehow, every statement they make is the total opposite of the truth.
We've arrived at some weird moment where not only will our aristocrats NOT admit they're aristocrats, they really imagine themselves as virtuous altruists fighting on behalf of the oppressed.
The internet and its devices really are magical brainwashing machines—they even brainwash the people who make and sell them! (maybe even more)
great essay B. this goes a long way in describing a phenomenon I see in some of my family and friends. far from being woke, their worldview seems to come from news aggregators (Apple News mostly) and Google search results. this seems to give the powerful illusion that they are carefully weighing both sides and can somehow divine the truth by splitting the difference between Fox and MSNBC.
this is quite the magic trick since the user believes he/she arrived at their conclusions organically and critically.
but being in the middle of two sides of approved propaganda is still propaganda...
I think the stark reactions to the election of Trump in some circles, including crying, grief etc. are also a symptom of people being trapped in these extreme filter bubbles of their own design. First they convinced themselves that Trump is the next Hitler by reinforcing all the propaganda and at that point any measure to stop him is justified. This sort of catastrophizing seems to be typical of large swathes of the population, I think some of it has to do with the sort of reverse therapy you get from consuming to much (social) media and also in the universities. Everything is a catastrophe and you're powerless.
Remember in "House of Cards" when colluding with the fictional search engine of that setting was a scandal that threatened to remove the president from office if the public ever found out about it?
Brad, you have jumped right in where others fear to tread. Thanks for the work you put into this research. The truth is much darker than I could imagine- and I’ve been a certified conspiracy theorist since JFK was assassinated when I was in 2nd grade. Even my 7 yr old mind kept thinking “I don’t believe what they are telling me.”
If ABC Corporation and Google was a German company during the 1930s, Goebbels would have been very happy and the Nazis would likely have been victorious.
We are screwed unless we get an anti-establishment president in 2024, and a national legislature that is strongly new Republican. If so we can get to work breaking up all the corporate monopolies like Google, implement strong new government-private sector collusion and profiting corruption remdies, and cementing free speech protection requirements for all networking platform business... including eliminating or completely changing Section 230 exemptions.
An aside, Sub stack frequently requires me to verify myself by signing in via a link they send to my inbox. This happened three times this past week, most recently five or so minutes ago when I tried to post to this site. Is this normal?
Thanks to Michael Shellenberger (correction, thanks to @Brad for the comment on Shellenberger's post!) for directing me here to this. Not sure I could stomach watching this whole video. I remember a (now former) best friend who works at UC Berkeley telling me she had employees coming into her office in tears or calling in sick the day after Trump won in 2016, and all I could think of was, “what is wrong with these people??”. 7 years later I’m still asking the same question except maybe in ALL CAPS. 🤦🏼♀️ Thanks for sharing the video and the information about this!
...."and the Beast was slouching toward Bethlehem"....very nice.....really the struggle going forward is I think to protect what we can from the almighty algorithms, and to rein in the ascendancy of the progressive corporate techno-state.
I can only reiterate what others have stated; invaluable work!!
It’s been a while since I used Google (the search engine) to google (the verb) things. But I know most people aren’t so discerning in where they get their information, and how they interpret said information, so this post really needs to get more attention. Sadly, anyone I’d send it to would consider it over the top caution and conspiracy.
Outstanding and invaluable. Google is a bastion of US censorship and public opinion manipulation.
The full role of its odious ex-CEO as a key DNC operative is still not well understood.
Google should be broken into independent component pieces and its monopoly curtailed.
So one part of the 2016 Resistance™ narrative was true: there was a very powerful outside entity trying to sway our election through internet manipulation, who tried to hide in the shadows while putting its thumb on the scale for its preferred candidate. And there were millions of dollars spent on ads and nudges and rhetorical manipulation by various shadowy oligarchic cabals, all hoping to subvert our holy & sacred Democracy (it dies in darkness, you know!).
Our progressive oligarchy are so besotted by their own wealth and status, plus their shared belief that they are the human embodiment of compassion, wisdom and virtue, that they honestly believe that ANYTHING they do has to be good and pure, because they themselves are so good and pure.
It's not so much that our Tech overlords (and their media mouthpieces) constantly lie, because they aren't even conscious of it: yet, somehow, every statement they make is the total opposite of the truth.
We've arrived at some weird moment where not only will our aristocrats NOT admit they're aristocrats, they really imagine themselves as virtuous altruists fighting on behalf of the oppressed.
The internet and its devices really are magical brainwashing machines—they even brainwash the people who make and sell them! (maybe even more)
Brad -- yours analysis is frightening and of major importance -- THANK you !!!
great essay B. this goes a long way in describing a phenomenon I see in some of my family and friends. far from being woke, their worldview seems to come from news aggregators (Apple News mostly) and Google search results. this seems to give the powerful illusion that they are carefully weighing both sides and can somehow divine the truth by splitting the difference between Fox and MSNBC.
this is quite the magic trick since the user believes he/she arrived at their conclusions organically and critically.
but being in the middle of two sides of approved propaganda is still propaganda...
I think the stark reactions to the election of Trump in some circles, including crying, grief etc. are also a symptom of people being trapped in these extreme filter bubbles of their own design. First they convinced themselves that Trump is the next Hitler by reinforcing all the propaganda and at that point any measure to stop him is justified. This sort of catastrophizing seems to be typical of large swathes of the population, I think some of it has to do with the sort of reverse therapy you get from consuming to much (social) media and also in the universities. Everything is a catastrophe and you're powerless.
Remember in "House of Cards" when colluding with the fictional search engine of that setting was a scandal that threatened to remove the president from office if the public ever found out about it?
LOL
Brad, you have jumped right in where others fear to tread. Thanks for the work you put into this research. The truth is much darker than I could imagine- and I’ve been a certified conspiracy theorist since JFK was assassinated when I was in 2nd grade. Even my 7 yr old mind kept thinking “I don’t believe what they are telling me.”
If ABC Corporation and Google was a German company during the 1930s, Goebbels would have been very happy and the Nazis would likely have been victorious.
We are screwed unless we get an anti-establishment president in 2024, and a national legislature that is strongly new Republican. If so we can get to work breaking up all the corporate monopolies like Google, implement strong new government-private sector collusion and profiting corruption remdies, and cementing free speech protection requirements for all networking platform business... including eliminating or completely changing Section 230 exemptions.
Brilliant!!!!!
An aside, Sub stack frequently requires me to verify myself by signing in via a link they send to my inbox. This happened three times this past week, most recently five or so minutes ago when I tried to post to this site. Is this normal?
This is the scariest post I've read on substack.
Can you imagine a CEO exclaiming to his employees that marijuana was just legalized (somewhere -- Mountain View?)? The CEO?
Does anyone know why Brin's family was kicked out of Russia?
Thanks to Michael Shellenberger (correction, thanks to @Brad for the comment on Shellenberger's post!) for directing me here to this. Not sure I could stomach watching this whole video. I remember a (now former) best friend who works at UC Berkeley telling me she had employees coming into her office in tears or calling in sick the day after Trump won in 2016, and all I could think of was, “what is wrong with these people??”. 7 years later I’m still asking the same question except maybe in ALL CAPS. 🤦🏼♀️ Thanks for sharing the video and the information about this!
I wonder how Google’s algorithm’s would effect the UK’s elections. What with labour being left wing and the Tories being centre left.
...."and the Beast was slouching toward Bethlehem"....very nice.....really the struggle going forward is I think to protect what we can from the almighty algorithms, and to rein in the ascendancy of the progressive corporate techno-state.
I can only reiterate what others have stated; invaluable work!!
It’s been a while since I used Google (the search engine) to google (the verb) things. But I know most people aren’t so discerning in where they get their information, and how they interpret said information, so this post really needs to get more attention. Sadly, anyone I’d send it to would consider it over the top caution and conspiracy.
The good news is that RFK is already suing Google/Youtube for censorship and election meddling!!