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How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

atroche.org

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Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#41

Post by tokenadult »

clicks wrote: post #31
rayiner wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love the rationalization people have to use to explain China's economic success. If what Deng brought was capitalism, then Obama is an anarcho-libertarian.

What was behind China's economic success then? (not snark, genuinely interested in hearing your thoughts) As far as I know Deng did advocate a more open and free policy when it came to the markets, not in very concrete terms but certainly in veiled terms like "pragmatism" and "we must do whatever works" [1]. I'm not saying Deng made China a Randian libertarian's wet-dream but it seems he did push for free markets a l…

What was behind China's economic success then? (not snark, genuinely interested in hearing your thoughts)

Imitating the free-enterprise model of Hong Kong and Taiwan, decades after those territories had far outpaced China in prosperity. And one of the great advantages China has enjoyed in economic development, as compared to several other territories, is the large number of people who can communicate in local languages (various forms of Chinese) but who grew up without communist influences on their primary and secondary education. "Compatriots" from Taiwan and Hong Kong, and also "overseas Chinese" from many places in southeast Asia played a crucial role in boosting China's economic growth through direct investment after the beginnings of system reform in 1978. (Basis of knowledge: I began studying Chinese during the Cultural Revolution, and have met quite a few people from outside China who have invested over there, after investment began to be permitted.)

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#42

Post by pyre »

pessimizer wrote: post #33
[deleted] wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

Convincing someone of something that later, under investigation, turns out not to be true, is not brainwashing.

I thought that brainwashing was a label applied to the technique used to convince someone. You can brainwash someone that holds strong convictions which are wrong to believe in the truth.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#43

Post by dsrguru »

mikegagnon wrote: post #14
Volpe wrote: post #9

I thought america WAS the aggressor? (Korea isn't really near the US), and it was quite apparent the US wanted satellite states near russia/china, to potentially launch further attacks. Also did the communists do a bad job in china? That is at most controversial... not "brain washed".

"Brainwashing" isn't a precisely defined word. I believe the word is often used to describe persuasion via psychological vulnerabilities. In this sense, the article is correct in calling the technique a form of brainwashing.

Interestingly enough, it comes from the Chinese word 洗脑 (xǐnǎo), literally meaning to "wash brains", which was used to describe the 1984-like attempts Mao used to re-educate dissident intellectuals.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#44

Post by tokenadult »

rxin wrote: post #29
mynameishere wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also did the communists do a bad job... Compare West and East Germany. Compare North and South Korea. Compare Mainland China and Taiwan. And once you've done those comparisons ask yourself about what kind of job the communists have done. Many millions dead. Many more millions in poverty. That's the job they've done.

What about comparing mainland and Taiwan? I don't think there exists an obvious conclusion from this comparison if you look at status quo. If you are judging based on the situation before 2000s, I agree with you that there is an obvious conclusion.

Taiwan is still well ahead of the P.R.C. both in economic development and personal liberty.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#45

Post by LiweiZ »

rayiner wrote: post #27
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me give you a tl;dr: the North Koreans started it by rolling over into South Korea, McAuthur went too close to the Yalu in the counter attack, Chinese entered the war, Truman fires McAuthur. Stalement ensues, borders preserved, Kim Jong Un has ex-girlfriend executed. The communists of the 50s were busy starving their own people in great leaps forwards, in the 60s they innovated on that with a cultural revolution;…

I love the rationalization people have to use to explain China's economic success. If what Deng brought was capitalism, then Obama is an anarcho-libertarian.

Time frame is an essential factor for assessing if it's a success. In 5 years? 10 year? 20 years? 50 years? What if the previous level was actually very high, say 50%, and the job was to increase from the low level 10% to 15%? With different time frames for evaluation, even someone do not have in-depth knowledge of a topic, she/he could still have some facts to raise valuable questions which can lead to an answer closer to the truth, if there is any we can find eventually. Sorry to not answer your question directly, but I think a different angle might be a better start point.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#46

Post by flatline »

pessimizer wrote: post #33
[deleted] wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

Convincing someone of something that later, under investigation, turns out not to be true, is not brainwashing.

I don't think there's any such thing as what the term "brainwashing" implies, but it is effectively a systematic form of mind control. If you can implant a thought and have it take hold, have the person own it and believe it and ultimately defend that position, that's pretty powerful. If you can do that in a systematic way, you can potentially get a large number of people to take actions that are in your own self-interest and not necessarily in theirs. Pretty heady stuff, there you have the foundations for a religion, a revolution. I think this type of thing is about as close to brainwashing as it gets.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#47

Post by stephengillie »

comex wrote: post #25
daenz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds more like de-brainwashing to me. If those soldiers go in with this perfect idea of America, how we can do no wrong, and how everything we do is justified, then turning that on its head seems more like...rational thinking.

If an opinion is being slowly but inexorably pushed on you from all sides by your captor over a long period of time, as part of an explicitly designed program of of propagandizing, it's brainwashing, regardless of the opinion's merit!

The religious education that my parents gave me through childhood counts as brainwashing.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#48

Post by stephengillie »

grandalf wrote: post #35
comex wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If an opinion is being slowly but inexorably pushed on you from all sides by your captor over a long period of time, as part of an explicitly designed program of of propagandizing, it's brainwashing, regardless of the opinion's merit!

It could still move the person's mental state toward improved rationality.

Is this what "deprogramming" a brainwashed person is? Moving them from the position of their captors' propaganda to a position within the propaganda believed by an entire society?

Patriotism being one example of this type of propaganda -- the idea that some of us are better than others because we were born on one side of a line in the dirt.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#49

Post by sp332 »

This technique was something that came to mind when I heard about Occupy Wall Street's use of the "mic check". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_microphone Getting lots of people to repeat borderline-reasonable things, even if they don't really quite agree with them, can make them change their position.

Re: How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

#50

Post by stephengillie »

tokenadult wrote: post #36
w1ntermute wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody has explained to me why Korea was even divided up into the North and South in the first place. It should have been left to its own devices after the Japanese empire collapsed at the end of WW2. That is, the US/UN shouldn't have been occupying the South and the USSR/China shouldn't have been occupying the North. Seems to me that the fault should be assigned to all of those countries/organizations.

The problem at the time was the Allied Powers (the Western non-Axis powers and the Soviet Union) were not united about how to resolve the issue of the sovereignty of Korea after the end of World War II. Germany was divided, over in Europe, for much the same reason, but there wasn't an invasion across the line of control between the Soviet occupied zone and the Western occupied zone in Germany, as there was an invasio…

To me, this sounds like "The neighbors were not united about which parent should get custody of the children when they divorced." I cannot fathom why we all would be involved in an internal dispute. And the USSRussia would have invaded western Europe...where the US & allies had set up many military bases?

"Communism" was the "terrorism" of my parents' generation...

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