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East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

maxhertzberg.co.uk

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Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#61

Post by briandear »

flohofwoe wrote: post #34
paganel wrote: post #3

> than political grassroots activists have today in places such as Western Europe and North America That (2021) from the title is on the mark, as I think that by now, 2025, it has been made quite obvious that political protests in the West can only get up to a certain point, after which you risk prison, job loss or a combination of the two (even bough January 6 and the associated political repression took place in ea…

That looked more like an attempt to overthrow a democractically elected government by a mob of primitive brutes than 'political protest' to me tbh.

If anyone was attempting to overthrow anything, they would have been well armed. Not strolling around as if on a guided tour. Nobody overthrows a government by carrying protest signs. And grandmas aren’t using hanging out on the “front lines” taking photos with their iPhone. The leftist rioters that attacked police stations and burned courthouses — that looked a lot more like an insurrection to me.

https://youtu.be/Y6Apmdeoxys

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#62

Post by Arkhaine_kupo »

okeuro49 wrote: post #25

In the UK there is "social media intelligence", where AI systems scan the firehose of messages as they appear. [1] So people have been arrested for posting something online, even if nobody appears to have seen it, and they delete it shortly after. The policing is selective, depending on political view. For example, there were recently people with placards in London calling for the death of JK Rowling, which is de fac…

Sometimes there is a worthwhile discussion on the reach and breath of policing, sometimes ridiculous people with insane views and 0 technical or legislative knowledge make opinion eds for people to share as rage bait.

Please just look at the other content from the "lovely" Laurie Wastell of the spectator to find the kind of groups, opinions and places she wants to protect vs those she doesn't.

like I would be kinda embarrased to share news sources from people being actively sued for the harm they caused with their misinformation (in their case vaccine lies).

> If someone perceives something you say as "hateful" they can report you to the police, who can record a "Non-crime hate incident" against your name. [3]

this was a law introudced by a conservative goverment, as part of their increase in police tools, which in large part came from support for "anti woke" policing of the pro black protests that came after it erupted in america.

People like the previouslike mentioned Mrs Wastell advocated for stronger sentencing and more police, and now that the leopards are eating the faces of the people who spend all day on facebook sending death threats to muslims she is now so incredibly offended.

Btw another reason for the focus on the NCHI is because the police are swamped, the Conservatives under theresa may cut their budget 40% which meant they have way less people so to keep stats up, you gotta focus on the easy shit.

Maybe if we hadn't brought in consulting types who advocate for stats to show work progress, conservative cuts to salaries and advocated for "blue lives matter" which pushed for stronger sentencing laws we would not be here but somehow Mrs Whitehall and you will take 0 accountability and instead blame "woke judges" or some other nonsense as she does in her article.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#63

Post by starspangled »

baxtr wrote: post #24
kmeisthax wrote: post #5

The section at the end about support and solidarity is the most important bit. Personally, I feel like Zersetzung has already been a thing in the US since at least 2014. Modern social media is very, very good at getting people to shout at each other and do nothing. People don't talk to each other, they shout to themselves while watching the telescreen.

I feel like it started 2001. Unfortunately, it seems as if the terrorists might have achieved many of their goals years later.

Bin Laden wanted to create a unified Islamic Caliphate uniting Muslims around the world, and overthrowing governments in the Middle East and Arabic world seen as usurpers and puppets of the west and zionists.

I don't think he particularly cared whether or not people in England or America got locked up for social media posts or other alleged freedoms. I don't think he would have been thrilled about the state of the Middle East today, if he were alive to see it.

What's happening in western countries is significantly the doing of (and almost certainly in line with the goals of) our ruling classes. Breaking down social cohesion, reducing the population of a country to little more than its head count and what it can do "for the economy", and pitting different groups to fight against one another are all key to ruling in their own interests.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#65

Post by thinkingemote »

It's worth repeating a tactic from every state's intelligence playbook, but I note that this article gives an interesting angle to this.

Informants and spies are almost always those at the top of your group, they are the leaders, the ones with the money, the ones with the van, the people with the time to help out, to print your flyers, the people who can organise and transport. Spies are going to be the people above you that you trust. Spies will be your friends. In the UK, police informants even fathered children with members of their infiltrated groups! They are not going to be the new strange people who join and are look nervous but who make excellent and easy scape goats. States want the maximum value for their intelligence, the spies are going to be at the top of your group.

The article suggests one way around it, to have flat organisations: to not have leaders. It gives resilience if when a person is compromised the group can continue, or when there is no leader the amount of information or damage that leader can cause would be less. Another way potentially would be the cell format, used in some of the worst terrorist groups, only operate in cells of 5 or less and only one of those in each small group have contact with only 1 other cell.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#66

Post by thworp »

sien wrote: post #4

It's remarkable how quickly Communism collapsed in Eastern Europe the moment Soviet support went. Despite decades of intense propaganda, killings of people in uprisings and the methods of Stasi as described in the article. Even with all that effort most people didn't believe in the regime. So it's hard to say whether the Stasi's tactics worked. Only people in the regimes like Ceausescu and Honecker actually thought p…

Actual support from the people was not wanted or needed by these regimes. They were content with having support by their party lapdogs, the kinds of people with no skills or personality, that would inform on their peers and magically become the factory's overseer. Those people owed everything to the system and they were the key to it continuing.

Everyone else was just kept in line. They set up both positive and negative incentives. Be neutral and you can live an OK life. Be a good communist and you can climb socially. Meet your West German uncle too often, or don't show up to the Labor Day parade and get a threatening talk. Actually voice your opposition to the regime and you may well find yourself in a Stasi torture prison.

Socialist doctrine said that socialism would be so good that people would soon(TM) embrace it organically. Of course they didn't, because it never delivered on anything and some western media still made it behind the iron curtain. Seeing a western supermarket shelf while you had to bribe someone to get spare parts for your washing machine is stronger than any propaganda.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#67

Post by School-Cotton »

szszrk wrote: post #48
quantumgarbage wrote: post #9

On this topic, I can't recommend enough the movie "The life of Others" (2006). Depicts surveillance in Eastern Germany and the state of sheer fear and paranoia its citizens had to live in.

Have you seen it available somewhere in Europe recently? I've been looking for it for a while, with no success. I'd be happy with anything from DVD to archive.org/youtube upload or whatever.

It is available from Amazon.de on blu-ray (probably also on Prime Video depending on the country), under the original German title: Das Leben der Anderen.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#68

Post by anovikov »

e40 wrote: post #53
anovikov wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Communism was seen by countries we call "Communist" (GDR, Soviet Union, Red China in Mao era, and the like), as something potentially possible in some distant future, it was their endgame (some claim, only notionally so, with no actual plan of getting there, but it doesn't matter really). What they had in reality, they called "Socialism". Socialism is the "form of industrialised society where private ownership…

The above comment chain is what is wrong with us. We talk about labels more than we talk about issues. Labels are a distraction. If you have a conversation about real things I find we agree nore than we disagree. But disagreement is what is fomented by our oppressors, because it distracts us from fighting them.

I agree. No matter how you call it, society without private ownership of means of production - without legalised ability to build capital and gain economic power by extracting value from productive assets for private gain - cannot work except by hard coercion provided by relentless, unblinking, crushing force. Just because a society like that is contrary to human nature and every bit of freedom we get, we will use to circumvent and undermine it.

And difference in terms - socialism vs communism - is just a west/east terminology difference.

Soviets called what they had "socialism" and what they (as they claimed) wanted to get, "communism".

The West called what Soviets had, "communism" and the social order in "soft" Western countries like Sweden or 1960s UK, "socialism". Which was "a society where private ownership of means of production still dominates, but is heavily taxed, and proceeds are used to fund a lot of social programs and public infrastructure, housing and other programs are centrally planned long term". Soviets never accepted that as "socialism" and kept saying that this term was only used by the West manipulatively to disarm the Western working class, and they were probably right.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#69

Post by atoav »

baxtr wrote: post #24
kmeisthax wrote: post #5

The section at the end about support and solidarity is the most important bit. Personally, I feel like Zersetzung has already been a thing in the US since at least 2014. Modern social media is very, very good at getting people to shout at each other and do nothing. People don't talk to each other, they shout to themselves while watching the telescreen.

I feel like it started 2001. Unfortunately, it seems as if the terrorists might have achieved many of their goals years later.

I had a similar thought a while ago. If the goal of the terrorists was to shake the system in such a way it destroyed (or seriously harmed) itself, that goal was achieved. I believe the authoritarian ICE deportations without due process are essentially the imperial boomerang of the Guantanamo Bay-style human right abuses that followed 9/11.

In human history stretching the homelands rules beyond recognition when acting abroad has rarely turned out well for the homeland in the long run.

Re: East German Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung (2021)

#70

Post by [deleted] »

szszrk wrote: post #48
quantumgarbage wrote: post #9

On this topic, I can't recommend enough the movie "The life of Others" (2006). Depicts surveillance in Eastern Germany and the state of sheer fear and paranoia its citizens had to live in.

Have you seen it available somewhere in Europe recently? I've been looking for it for a while, with no success. I'd be happy with anything from DVD to archive.org/youtube upload or whatever.

[deleted]
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