This year's flu has been similarly impacted by politics. It's not up to each of us to take sensible measures. Everything has to be dictated from a central command. Even the flu's official name has been determined through political command and spin. To mention that the virus had its origin in Wuhan is considered racist.
Then there's the death of a criminal over in the states, which is supposedly a clear case of racism, even if no proof has been submitted. The police officer was white and the criminal was black. That's all we need to know in order to spin a story about racism and police brutality.
Narrative is all that matters. Truth is only of interest when it serves the greater political agenda. This is abundantly clear when even BBC is caught red handed fabricating news, yet refuse to change their narrative as a consequence.
There are spin doctors everywhere, all intent on pulling our heart strings, and it's easy to get carried away one way or the other. To resist this, we may opt to ignore news all together, or we put our own spin on it. Either way, we'll be much less easily swayed. But it's only by being our own spin doctor that we have the opportunity to change things to our advantage.
As an anarchist, I'm a private king. My domain consists of an apartment, some gold, and some capital. I have four children, a queen wife, and multiple contacts and associates. This political unit needs protection and support just as much as other political factions, and is therefore in need of a certain amount of spin of its own.
As a spin doctor, I view news as little more than spin. It's always framed one way or the other depending on the political faction controlling the narrative. The most common spin is the need for additional legislation, which I'm naturally against. However, I'm pragmatic enough to know that legislation is nothing to fear if it cannot easily be executed. Nonsensical legislation may even play into my advantage by muddling things up for the executive branch of government.
I care about spin and its effectiveness in promoting a particular narrative. Good spin is subtle and ever-present, often barely noticeable in the background, but never quite gone. Bad spin is opportunistic, loud and short lived. I'm not very impressed by the spin made around the latest case of police brutality in the US. I'm more impressed by the spin made around Obama's shady dealings while in the White House. It may be highly effective during the upcoming elections, and I'm genuinely curious as to see how the Republicans play their hand.
As for myself, I follow a simple and reliable recipe when it comes to spin. First, I make a clear announcement about something I'm very sure about, but most people have failed to see. Then I wait, without making much fuzz about what I just said. Whenever the topic comes up, I support the view that I originally promoted by commending the person that speaks up. As more and more people come to agree with my proposal, I become more vocal in my support. But I never push the fact that I had this idea first, or that I was early. I shed praise on everybody for realizing the truth of my narrative, as if the idea came from them.
This is highly effective, because it promotes shared ownership of the original idea. People are far more likely to defend an idea that they view as their own than an idea that comes from somebody else. The more emphasis I put on their ownership, the stronger it becomes.
Anarchists have a huge advantage when it comes to spin because we don't side with either one or another narrative. We have our own narrative. We have something to compare the various narratives against. We can judge the pros and cons of a narrative, its effectiveness and its likely consequence. This is why I suspect professional spin doctors of being anarchists who sell their services to government. Their non-allegiance make them effective in identifying strengths and weaknesses in all narratives, regardless of color. That's an essential quality in any game of politics.
As Fernando Pessoa observed; an aristocrat is an anarchist. Professional spin doctors are these aristocrats who exist as much today as in the past. They find their ways inside government. They cloak their existence in a web of spin, and they provide the government with the essential service of eternally coming up with stories that engage and enrage people to the point where they are easily manipulated.
By Template:Cavalão - Nelson BrazUkA, Public Domain, Link
No comments:
Post a Comment