How China brainwashed American POWs using a classic sales technique

Post by stephengillie » Thu, Sep 19, 2013, 6:27 AM UTC

philwelch wrote: post #86

stephengillie wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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...

What would you have proposed? Leaving Korea in a state of complete anarchy until they somehow sorted things out? The Allies destroyed whatever government Korea had. Without someone to step in to keep the roads maintained, the local cops on their beat, and the courts running, the country would have otherwise collapsed. So of course you step in and try to set up elections so the people in the country can vote in a new…

Post by saraid216 » Thu, Sep 19, 2013, 6:32 AM UTC

dspillett wrote: post #87

stephengillie wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Correct, it just gets call "indoctrination" as that sounds nicer and it is often (though far from always) more subtle as it is more of a "long game" thing. It is one of those "one person's X is another person's Y" comparisons: indoctrination/brain-washing, religion/cult, freedom-fighter/terrorist, cute cat / insane evil sharp edged ball of allergens, ...

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 19, 2013, 6:40 AM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #30

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

There's no such thing as brainwashing. It was a piece of propaganda to use against the Communists during the Korean War, and the fantasy of a bunch of shadowy government agencies that only seem to be able to poison a bunch of people or get them high during brainwashing experiments.

Post by philwelch » Thu, Sep 19, 2013, 7:01 AM UTC

stephengillie wrote: post #91

philwelch wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you have proposed? Leaving Korea in a state of complete anarchy until they somehow sorted things out? The Allies destroyed whatever government Korea had. Without someone to step in to keep the roads maintained, the local cops on their beat, and the courts running, the country would have otherwise collapsed. So of course you step in and try to set up elections so the people in the country can vote in a new…

We couldn't occupy them like we did Iraq? I just want to see Korea reunited.

Post by philwelch » Thu, Sep 19, 2013, 7:09 AM UTC

Volpe wrote: post #56

Aloisius wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also did the communists do a bad job in china? That is at most controversial... not "brain washed". Controversial? Good lord, Mao's Great Leap Forward killed between 23 and 42 million people in just a few years.

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)?