23 Tools To Brainwash and Influence People Through Media

by jcurcio on April 11, 2007

23_tools_header

‘’till at last the child’s mind is these suggestions, and the sum of the suggestions is the child’s mind. And not the child’s mind only. The adult’s mind too all his life long. The mind that judges and desires and decides made up of these suggestions. But all these suggestions are our suggestions!

- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

The opinions and behaviors of people and societies are easily swayed. Every decade, every year, every week, those who control mass media change the climates of human thought. New pop stars, fashions, and fads are paraded center stage and then exit stage left followed by floods of expendable cash, leaving the path of sordid garbage known as “popular culture” in its wake.

Now the power to rule the world and wag the cultural dog is at your fingertips. What follows are simple instructions, a manual, a playbook of sorts, some simple behavioral tools to influence and take advantage of the nervous systems of all your peers.

The 23 Tools:

1. The key to truly effective brainwashing is to work at people’s most fundamental awareness. Shape them at the neurological level so they develop the faculties to take your input and call it “thinking for myself.” Enable them to stop thinking.

2. Limit any and all faculties for self-awareness and self-sensing. Destroy instinct and intuition. Actively and endlessly encourage external awareness. Make people dependent on your external input for as many decisions as possible.

3. Speed up messages so that the pace and rhythm of information is disorienting and visually biased.

4. Condition people to being bombarded with hundreds of thousands of signals a day. Teach them to attend to this stream of information and to call it Reality. Never let them ask what “reality” is.

5. Framing is everything. Decide what you want people to believe and make sure that any choices you give them are within a framework which assures you of your result. This is called the Illusion of Choice. “Do you want to sweep the floor before or after dinner?” Repeat this formula for economic systems, politicians, news stories, competing product brands and entertainment.

6. Appeal to the lowest common denominator. Make sure that all shows model conflict resolution of people with an emotional and intellectual maturity no greater than that of a six year old. Make it funny so no one notices.

7. Keep people passive. Encourage the Couch Potato Alpha Wave Escape Plan as the healing elixir for all that ails.

8. Don’t make people think. Their days are hard enough as is. Bypass the need for opinion making by giving people ready-made opinions. Do it as though you don’t have a conscience – they are probably too stupid to make their own decisions anyway.

9. Ensure that there are no ongoing storylines with meaning or purpose beyond immediate sensory stimulation. Avoid universal themes as much as possible. Make absolutely certain there is no cultural, societal or global story or mythology present that conflicts with the myths of comfort and consumption.

10. Never encourage responsibility, or so much as suggest that humans could be involved in co-creating their future and the realities in which they reside.

11. Encourage group-sanctioned individuality only. By making ‘individuality” the new conformity you are generating a powerful illusion of free choice.

12. Sensationalize the superficial.

13. Keep information bytes infinitesimally small. Promote Attention Deficit Disorder. Several decades of television have already set this in motion.

14. Repetition is key. Repeat important messages as often as possible.

15. Repetition is key.

16. Repetition is key.

17. Bypass rationality by any means possible. People don’t need logic to accept information. Belief is emotional. Always remember: WAR=PEACE.

18. Remember –- two half-truths make up a whole truth.

19. Demonize self-knowledge technology of all kinds. Throw around words like “cult” and “brainwashing.” Marginalize anyone involved in such pursuits.

20. Keep old models of consciousness alive and well. If you can get away with referring to people’s states as being phlegmatic or sanguine instead of programmable and intentional, do it.

21. Keep people’s attention on what really matters. Emphasize what’s wrong as much as possible.

22. Always give the impression that Everything Is Under Control – but just barely so – hammer into the populace the idea that their greatest fear could strike at any moment.

23. Teach people that they are their thoughts and emotions. Reinforce this by teaching them to feel bad about their ideas, and to feel bad about feeling bad. Remember: Identify, identify, identify –- this will widen the empty void inside of them that only shopping can cure.

By sticking to these simple premises you should be able to produce entire societies capable of ending world hunger, but too selfish to care. You will be able to bring about massive consumer mindsets and buying habits so powerful that logic and reason become superfluous in making the sale. You will be the new face of media. Good luck!

Devon White specializes in PR for the brain, promoting integrity, responsibility and conscious evolution through online video and lecture-performances on sex.

As a trained hypnotist, video podcaster, writer and teacher, he supports broadcasting which goes beyond simple stimulus-response conditioning to engage the intentional, participatory and evolutionary functions of the brain. In other words – he thinks it’s really cool if you know how your brain works and use it to participate in the co-creation of your world. But he’s not a brain-centrist–he’s all about the body.

To find out more about Devon and his efforts to stimulate “a cultural climax” you can visit him at his website, www.SexWithDevon.tv.

{ 36 comments… read them below or add one }

lasticko April 17, 2007 at 12:42 pm

nice! Good stuff in here. I think I’ll use it to my advantage starting today :)

PS good quote I heard : “never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option. “

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Mario April 20, 2007 at 1:26 pm

Ain’t that the truth!!

Brilliant!

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Steve10025 May 13, 2007 at 2:37 pm

Very liberating insights here -
the only thing I disagree with is the “conspiracy” framework it’s presented in -
sure there are many powerful interests in the world taking advantage of the direction our culture is going in, but I think of it more as a group consciousness experiment rather than an imposition from sinister powers above -

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Emily September 4, 2010 at 6:40 pm

I like your post. The older I get the less I think things are about conspiracy and the more they are about unintended consequences and mass marketing. Put that together with a culture continually learning about the functions of the brain and how to use that knowledge to sell you things.

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Emily September 4, 2010 at 6:43 pm

Although somethings like mass marketing and it’s influence on our thinking and manipulation of thought processes is pretty scary.

Bernard September 19, 2010 at 2:20 am

Fact is that the “origin” doesn’t make any difference ; naming mass marketing or secret conspiracy is simply blaming something for the facts : ie wasting the time and thoughts on a secondary matter, which may precisely be part of the “strategy” or “process”. Getting out of the logic of being a victim of such process is the first step that may eventually lead to answers to this kind of questions (still secondary, not goals).

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pixiequix May 15, 2007 at 12:04 am

While it would be nice to believe that there are no sinister forces at work calculating how they can best cash in on persuading the human psyche, it’s just not true. One of the men who pioneered the current age of psychology based PR, Edward Bernays, was none other than Sigmund Freud’s nephew. Some days it seems like psychology and marketing are no longer separate disciplines, but have become one and the same.

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Bob Miller September 30, 2007 at 8:28 am

Please edit…”MUSH” should be much. Thanks!

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Talmadge October 1, 2007 at 3:18 am

this seems like too much work for too little pay-off. can’t you physically lobotomize people to get the same results, probably be cheaper too.. i mean, if you were so inclined..

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Hyrum November 30, 2007 at 1:03 pm

This is crazy because its exactly whats going on with our limited choices in the two party system and the mass media.

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Scott December 9, 2007 at 4:43 pm

Sounds EXACTLY like television to me.
Think Fox news.

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Orion December 18, 2007 at 3:11 pm

I just saw Chavez: Inside the Coup (2003). It’s surreal to see how the private TV stations tried to mindcontrol the Venezuelan public into accepting the (probably) CIA backed coup.

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lynx October 18, 2008 at 4:29 am

scott -

yeah, def. fox news. and cnn and nbc and all the other news networks too. fox is one half of a false dichotomy, but that doesn’t make the other half any less false.

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Psuke Bariah October 19, 2008 at 9:16 am

@Talmadge lobotomies leave a trace.

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Skye December 3, 2009 at 3:17 pm

I am dissapointed by society and the compliciance of the common American to let a system of brainwashing dominate pubic media and pretty much agree with everyone who has posted. However, I really don’t think race has to do with this at all a human brain is a human brain, color of skin does not affect the way we think.

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Skye December 3, 2009 at 3:19 pm

Sorry this was supposed to be after peyplayz comment

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peyplayz September 9, 2009 at 2:37 am

I believe its in the faucet water. This passive compliant population of consumers and hedonistic people will destroy themselves. That is what is heart breaking to me. It is always the people of color who see the writing on the wall and they are most ignored are the ones who know. yet the rest of that Larry Elders, Rush Limbaugh, Hannity and AeG, Sony, Blackwater, and the Family cult who continue to make Bile slime and decomposition out of every thing. I hate to say this but if it took an act of God to destroy those idiots I would jump for joy even though the out come for the rest of us who know will endure suffering. We have the feather in the cap because we could never lower our selves to the along the anal part of the snake

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Jenna April 23, 2010 at 11:55 am

I have a theory that the US gov’t is using flouride and television to control the masses.

I could be wrong, but once I stopped watching TV and started using toothpaste without flouride, my mind was exponentially clearer and my supposed “mental illnesses” (yes, plural) disappeared. Yeah, there is some serious mind-f*cking going on.

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Tricia July 19, 2010 at 8:19 pm

Whoops, this comment was supposed to go under your other post. I’m sure you get the picture. However, I forgot to mention that I am totally with you on the fluoride thing.

Chachi July 19, 2010 at 10:00 pm

Did you happen to notice if your teeth got any whiter?

Tricia July 19, 2010 at 8:18 pm

I’m sorry Jenna, but I have to say he’s right. I wouldn’t say this just because it’s Barack Obama, but I’m talking about any & all politicians. How did Bush get voted into office? Same deal. I don’t watch TV, especially not Fox News or any of the other major news networks, I do however have the internet & I do use it, and I also like to read. I still have no fucking clue why this Obama guy got the Peace Prize. Needless to say, it does not matter who you vote for, they’re all using the 23 tools, and they’re all fucking with us because they can.

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The Poetic Terrorist December 2, 2009 at 7:45 pm

Fantastic list, Devin. You’re making us proud :)

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Garrett Daun January 1, 2010 at 7:16 pm

Sweet article. Thanks for posting it! It reminds me of the Catalog of Esoteric Psychological Lore… This kind of stuff goes well with a side of Logical Fallacies and a few hours of undoing yourself…at least a few belly laughs…

Cheers,

-G

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Chris April 11, 2010 at 3:43 pm

For some similar/complementary ideas to those expressed above, check out some of the work by the Frankfurt school of thought from the early 20th century. Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse… Particular concepts like the ‘Culture Industry’ are especially relevant here. These social theorists already had some great insights about cultural and media-based mass deception back then, and the dangers have only become more pervasive yet subtle over time.

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Joseph Matheny April 12, 2010 at 7:18 am

Indeed. As did the Situationist International.

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Guitarzan April 12, 2010 at 6:10 pm

Can you say Barack Obama? He’s mastered all 23 tools. Why else would the Americam public elect someone who never sponsored a bill, promised “change” without explaining what or how and is given the Nobel Peace Prize for doing nothing.

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Jenna April 23, 2010 at 11:50 am

Wow. You’re the perfect example of the effacacy of the 23 tools.

Stop watching Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly et al and learn something someplace OTHER than television. You have the internet…..USE IT.

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Amanda September 4, 2010 at 2:32 pm

Ya know, I don’t own a tv, wouldn’t have voted for McCain, but you kind of have to admit that Guitarzan has a point. And, at the same time I wonder, if the people who voted for President Obama just want a change so badly that they aren’t stopping to realize he actually isn’t doing all that much. Which isn’t the fault of those people. Desperation?

madeline May 20, 2010 at 1:53 pm

I see this a lot in my school, awfully

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JuAnCcKoAvSeSr September 3, 2010 at 7:48 pm

The truth, mass manipulation is a simple mechanism. We understand, a lifetime of wading through manure up to the chin explaining the effects and not once recognizing the smell.

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Varun Mahajan September 4, 2010 at 2:11 pm

Great… I’m influenced by your list, now need to brainwash some people…

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Joanna September 8, 2010 at 5:59 pm

What about using your free will and doing your own research and not buying main stream rubbish? When you induce the alpha waves while listening to music you reduce stress and build your immune system. Happy stress management everyone!

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Ron September 25, 2010 at 2:30 pm

This is Religion in a nutshell.

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angelica October 30, 2010 at 8:12 pm

I heard of that topic but when Im sleep that in a momento of the dream anybody else can program the brain for good or bad things.

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angelica October 30, 2010 at 8:12 pm

excuse me a fugitive “o “

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Monica Sanchez November 1, 2010 at 10:04 pm

Wow¡¡, is pretty amazign how many of those thing make you think about what of those item sometimes did affect you… some of them cause a big impact on me like: “Teaching them to feel bad about their ideas, and to feel bad about feeling bad”.

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