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How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

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

#71

Post by Volpe »

Aloisius wrote: post #61
Volpe wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, so Mao could be argued to be a bad idea, but there was and has been a lot of communism since Mao. Could you say the same for Deng Xiaoping (also a communist)?

At the time of the Korean war, China was still in the Mao period. From any sane point of view at that time, communism was horrible for China. Post-Mao, well... Hua was a disaster and Deng was never a good communist. Mao himself accused Deng of being a capitalist and banished him to the countryside in the 60s. Once he finally gained power and brought back mild capitalism (really, market socialism), it still took 20 ye…

This is over simplistic and wrong. Mao used purging to get rid of others building power within the party. It had nothing to do with whether they were Communist (many good communists were purged).

Sane points: Education, Health, both improved under communist rule.

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

#72

Post by pintglass »

proofofconcept wrote: post #70
pintglass wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing how easily one can translate something these days instead of complain about having to read Chinese ( http://translate.google.com/ ): People [edit] The People's Republic of China since the founding of the ruling Communist Party of China, early through art, propaganda's "no new China without the Communist Party," "stability overrides everything" and other slogans, considered by some to be "brainwashed" beh…

All this does for me is raise the question: why, if it's so easy, wasn't the translation posted to begin with? Keep in mind that the user who dropped that untranslated brick on us has massive karma so that low-effort post is now parked at the top of the thread.

Getting a little too meta here but your original comment was only: "If you actually want to have a discussion of those differences then you're going to need to point them out yourself instead of dumping a homework assignment in everyone's lap" but then you changed it to indicate you didn't think a Google translation was good enough.

He probably didn't post a translation because he knows most of us can either use Google translate or can read Chinese. That doesn't bother me and it shouldn't bother you.

I posted the translation because I think some people (including myself) need help reading Chinese and because I don't see value in bitching about someone copying and pasting Chinese. It's not homework. It's just Chinese.

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

#73

Post by pintglass »

pintglass wrote: post #69
andyl wrote: post #13

Brainwashed? If that is brainwashing, then it seems like there's brainwashing everywhere you look. For example: - http://www.foxnews.com/ - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBbBfrKsVqY

I'd say most news media and many T.V. shows reinforce ideas that oppose accepting that there is an alternative viewpoint. Are you sure you haven't been brainwashed to hate Fox News and anything that shows a flag and an eagle with patriotic music in the background? Let's try this on for size: Is Fox News racist, elitist, sexist, and homophobic? My guess is that you just answered yes to at least 3 of those, however if…

To provide the other side of that coin, I also think that some of what Fox News, the Tea Party, etc. push is bologna.

Consider the conservative view that we need to secure our border because illegal immigrants take jobs away from Americans.

Jobs aren't taken, they are given. Those jobs are not specifically given to illegals. You could have one, too. If they can live off of those jobs and send money home to their folks, it should be enough to live on. Maybe not enough to send your kids to college, but that isn't a guaranteed right.

Higher taxes and loopholes lead to U.S. companies hiring offshore workers, but that isn't the same for immigrants. We need more of them, like we had in the 1800-1900s, to boost our economy. I have never known a lazy, undedicated person to sneak over the border and work summers to send money home to their families. Those families should instead be in the U.S. and not in Mexico, etc. Then not only would the U.S. have a great labor force, but they would be spending that money on food and goods in the U.S.

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

#74

Post by seanmcdirmid »

Volpe wrote: post #68
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in China, it is the most capatalistic country I have lived in. If there is any socialism left, it is quite hidden to me.

It's a bit of a false dichotomy (as I tried to explain earliar). It isn't capitalism vs communism. Capitalism is a form of economy, communism is form of government. The mix of those, I believe china call it: "Socialism with chinese characteristics". The fact primary industry and exports are state owned is a big tick for: Communism. That's true, regardless what you see living there. (People making money and doing busi…

Primary exports are not owned by the government, that is mostly private. Primary imports in natural resources domestic oriented businesses might be state owned, as are companies that produce primarily for the domestic market (like SOE JV car manufacturers). All those little factories that produce for export are very private.

The communist party doesn't really follow any tenants of Marxism at all. Most are only concerned with propping up their families and embezzling enough money to send their kids to a nice school abroad that doesn't suck.

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

#75

Post by ma2rten »

Volpe wrote: post #68
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in China, it is the most capatalistic country I have lived in. If there is any socialism left, it is quite hidden to me.

It's a bit of a false dichotomy (as I tried to explain earliar). It isn't capitalism vs communism. Capitalism is a form of economy, communism is form of government. The mix of those, I believe china call it: "Socialism with chinese characteristics". The fact primary industry and exports are state owned is a big tick for: Communism. That's true, regardless what you see living there. (People making money and doing busi…

Communism is a revolutionary socialist movement to create a classless, moneyless and stateless social order [...] Wikipedia

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

#76

Post by md224 »

stephengillie wrote: post #48
grandalf wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

This is why I find the concept of brainwashing/deprogramming fascinating from an epistemic perspective; you're essentially substituting one set of axioms for another. And it's often hard to determine who occupies the epistemic higher ground, since all camps will claim to do so. For example, liberals think Fox News is brainwashing people, and conservatives think academics at liberal schools are brainwashing people. Sometimes the only thing you can use to figure out what's true is secondhand knowledge (via a network of cognitive authorities that you've chosen to trust) plus your own judgment, which itself has inevitably been influenced by some set of chosen axioms.

And often each system of beliefs has epistemic protection against debunking... for example, religious believers may view debunkers as agents of evil/Satan, while conspiracy theorists may view debunkers as agents working on behalf of the conspirators. In both cases, one has a "rational" reason to be skeptical of (or even outright disregard) any arguments that attempt to undermine one's axiomatic system.

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

#77

Post by proofofconcept »

pintglass wrote: post #72
proofofconcept wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All this does for me is raise the question: why, if it's so easy, wasn't the translation posted to begin with? Keep in mind that the user who dropped that untranslated brick on us has massive karma so that low-effort post is now parked at the top of the thread.

Getting a little too meta here but your original comment was only: "If you actually want to have a discussion of those differences then you're going to need to point them out yourself instead of dumping a homework assignment in everyone's lap" but then you changed it to indicate you didn't think a Google translation was good enough. He probably didn't post a translation because he knows most of us can either use Goog…

I don't know what you thought you read but I did not at any point edit the post you replied to. If that's what you're getting worked up over then you can calm down now because it was just a mistake and I'm not trying to manipulate the discussion to make you look bad.

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

#79

Post by gruseom »

asveikau wrote: post #67
gruseom wrote: post #2

Cialdini's book is one of the best and most readable pieces of popular science writing ever. It's fascinating from start to finish, frequently hilarious, and pretty hard to summarize because there's so much cool stuff in it. The brainwashing scare from the Korean War is central to at least one classic movie, The Manchurian Candidate (1962). It was unavailable for 25 years, which rumor had it was because of its simila…

For the record The Manchurian Candidate was a book before it was a movie. I read the book once long ago but don't remember much about it. In contrast the imagery of the movie is very hard to forget.

I never read the book but apparently it was a favorite of JFK's and he was instrumental in getting the movie made. That explains how something so politically edgy could have come out of Hollywood in 1962—it had the President vouching for it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/14/movies/film-a-co-productio... <-- Contains Spoilers

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

#80

Post by duuuuurrrr »

proofofconcept wrote: post #77
pintglass wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Getting a little too meta here but your original comment was only: "If you actually want to have a discussion of those differences then you're going to need to point them out yourself instead of dumping a homework assignment in everyone's lap" but then you changed it to indicate you didn't think a Google translation was good enough. He probably didn't post a translation because he knows most of us can either use Goog…

I don't know what you thought you read but I did not at any point edit the post you replied to. If that's what you're getting worked up over then you can calm down now because it was just a mistake and I'm not trying to manipulate the discussion to make you look bad.

Jeez, calm down.
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