Showing posts with label Ego. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ego. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

8/19/20 - Intellectual Populism, Enemy of the People, The Humanovirus Sh*tshow

Detailing the gloriously organic results coming from a month of social media, news, and podcasting detox. Also, boutique "news" & democratized opinion's relationship to mob rule: Ibsen's Enemy of the People, the humanovirus and its ubiquitous invasive species traits, the Dennis Doctrine, and podcasting without Sausage Party Hope and with a severed validation stream leaves one pesky unanswered question: "why the f**ck am I doing this?"

More Drew Michael: https://www.youtube.com/user/drewmichaelcomedy/videos

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Friday, June 19, 2020

6/19/20 - Discourse? Or Just Waiting To Talk?

On the Social Media Disease: how exhibitionist combat and agitprop disguised as "debate" is having an effect on verbal comprehension and the ability to engage in meaningful organic conversations. Also, demagogues exploit and thrive on chaos, boycotting the for-profit Media Division Complex in favor of each other, and the switch: it's internal. It's still the people.



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More: www.facebook.com/escapingthecave

Saturday, May 23, 2020

Joan Didion's 'On Morality': The Extremist Test

There's a Bob Dylan lyric in Highlands that always makes me smile: "She said, "you don't read women authors, do you?"" For whatever reason, I typically don't with one very significant exception: Joan Didion. I bought We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live, a non-fiction collection, with Orwell's. She's fantastic. Slouching Toward Bethlehem's essays/articles are on par with Mencken's, if less vitriolic and venomously entertaining! On Self-Respect and On Morality are worth finding and devouring.

Here's an excerpt from On Morality, written in 1965. That's significant, as you'll see. Crusading moral certitude isn't new. We were hatched in that fire; it's part of the American DNA and what makes us particularly susceptible to propaganda and makes this technologically amplified conflict between our moralistic ideological religions so dangerous. Didion's Lionel Trilling quote deserves its own space and I literally squealed when I saw she used the word, "agitprop!" And the last paragraph? Ooof! We need a test for those infected with the Extremist Virus. Joan Didion has it:

Tuesday, May 19, 2020

5/19/20 - The Stalker Militia, A Hydroxy Hardon, Woke Youth

So, about that whole "in this together" thing... Topics include Trump's bizarre and supernatural hydroxychloroquine erection, quarantine and consumerist withdrawal, free-rage extremism and Michigan's armed stalkers closing the capitol, ideological bleed-over, identity politics infecting the virus, humble ignorance, a COVID-exploiting Woke Youth Recruitment video seizing the national airwaves, and what happens when I go off my gated social media reservation and why it's becoming nearly essential to completely disconnect. This one gets harsh. Beware.

Saturday, May 9, 2020

5/9/20 - Stories, Hope, and The Propaganda Paradox

Todd's adventures in leaving the house after 5-weeks, a quick review of the crappy Vaporesso Target PM-80, the supposed "wisdom" of the bewildered herd, belief and truth are mutually exclusive, atheists: leave the non-phallus swinging faithful alone, the crucial crusading distinction between religious & ideological zealots, and why the simple human need for hope probably makes us powerless against tasty propaganda.




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Saturday, February 29, 2020

2/29/20 - Authentic Courage vs. Crying With The Pack

"God will not have his work made manifest by cowards." Genuine courage is required to stand apart against the deafening conformity of the cowardly mob. Ask Andrew Sullivan! People are inherently tyrannical. Shared secular delusions: our 21st century religions. God needs the devil; Sapiens need an enemy. Lippmann, the fragility of free speech, and democracy's Achilles Heel: an ignorant "public."



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Wednesday, February 26, 2020

2/26/20 - Social Media Disease: The Dopamine Drip

"Whoever owns social validation..." Performance addiction and how the masses have become junkies gorging on validation's dopamine stream. How various influencers, including podcasters, have monetized validation mainlining in the name of "brand building". Propaganda, validation, dopamine, and Ellul's "conditioned response." How social momentum works: Tony McAleer on Your Undivided Attention. Also, how ideological boldness is a surefire sign of a propagandee.

Listen to "Your Undivided Attention" here: https://humanetech.com/podcast/




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Friday, February 21, 2020

2/21/20 - Authenticity, The Mask, and The Beast Unleashed

On independent thought, authenticity, social momentum, and permitting redemption. Also, You're not the Elephant Whisperer, let Dumbo feed! Detecting doctrinaires, the Warm Glow of the Herd's Fellowship, manipulative monkeys dancing for their lunch, and a mask, the core, and the id walk into a bar.



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Saturday, February 1, 2020

2/1/20 - Criminal Conformity & The Beautiful Mutant

"Imitation is suicide." How independent thought gets smothered in infancy, the need to belong: why standing apart from the impaired herd is not only hard, it runs against our social and evolutionary grain. Also, collective and self-delusions protecting us from unpleasant discoveries that might destroy our notions of being special, divine, or even "good."

Listen to "Your Undivided Attention" here: https://humanetech.com/podcast/



ALSO:
  • Tending to personal and commercial attachments
  • How political and marketing swine manipulate attachments via identity
  • Meditation and Buddhist philosophy as tools to disconnect
  • Blank Slatists: Beware
  • Emerson's Self-Reliance: read it. 
* Subscribe on any podcatcher that doesn't suck.
* Also check out www.escapingthecave.com and www.christophermedia.net

Tuesday, January 28, 2020

1/28/20 - The Boldness of the Herd, Political Atheism, Our Glowing Christ

The next great war: intellectual autonomy. The bold certainty of the herd, the challenges of independent thought and why seeing someone who is genuinely their own Man is so rare, the media has supplanted the church, disengaging from the ideological Holy War in favor of political atheism, and Toddzilla's Paradox: the conflict between intellectual independence and the desperate human need to belong. Still available for children's parties! Now doing bat mitzvahs!



ALSO:
  • A quick impeachment fart
  • You want an authoritarian
  • Political Vampires
  • Algorithms, Lippmann, Bernays, and You
  • Silver Spoons: A Hate Crime
  • The filthy Centrus Americanus
  • Friendship: Loyalty & Support vs. Honesty
  • Nothing can be done about climate change
  • Data Overload revisited 
* Subscribe on any podcatcher that doesn't suck.
* Also check out www.escapingthecave.com and www.christophermedia.net

Thursday, October 24, 2019

10/24/19: Presidential Anarchy, Goebbels' Ad Company, and a Prayer

Trump's not actually retarded, is he? Pray with me, won't you?

Also:
  • Quitting smoking: it sucks
  • No, seriously. I prayed.
  • Nicholas Carr and the "influencer"
  • Joseph Goebbels and Edward Bernays
  • My poor little podcast is attacked by a zombie
  • Happy Halloween?
  • Fu*k Twitter
*Subscribe on any podcatcher that doesn't suck.
*Also check out www.christophermedia.net  www.escapingthecave.com

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

9/10/19: Iceberg Ahoy! Validation Junkies & The Chosen Ones

Social validation, dopamine, and social media's Walter White; the predictably ridiculous reaction to Dave Chappelle's latest Netflix special and how comedy has evolved from truth telling to Wokeflake proselytizing; more on how people are more willing and eager than deceived when it comes to swallowing fiction and disinformation; choking on data leading to confused gullibility; honesty in a crisis; Sausage Party Hope: children demanding their happy ending. Where's the spring of genuine hope?



ALSO:  
  • The Battle of the 21st Century
  • The iceberg bobbing off our bow
  • Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube: Walter White cutting his meth supply? 
  • Pinker's Utopian and Tragic Visions
  • Evolution and self-awareness
  • The apocalypse and its "chosen ones"
  • Progress's Myth and becoming organic

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*Also check out www.christophermedia.net

Saturday, August 17, 2019

8/17/19: Propaganda: Dependent Drunks In Denial

On Ellul's "The Need For Propaganda." We've both developed a tolerance for and a psychological dependency on propaganda's certainty-stoking, justifying, and and self-worth generating narratives, social media is a propagandist's dream, desensitization and an increasing desire for the excitement felt from being immersed in the constant, and necessary stream of propaganda, how our addiction has allowed both traditional media and social media "influencers" to monetize the Outrage Industrial Complex, our role as retained ideological attorneys, and wishful thinking (and possibly disastrous effects) of suddenly eliminating 320-million people's propaganda narratives. Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. Grab a sammich for this one. And maybe a stiff drink. Hey! I never said this would be easy!



ALSO: 
  • This is a triage situation; not a search for the "cure"
  • Disinformation bit me again!
  • Why we won't quit the informational drug
  • A possible path to empathy
  • The culture war is a War of National Narratives
  • Chosen perspective becomes "personal truth"
  • Provoking shame as a "debate" tool: a boomerang
  • Social media "influencers": personal brands hocking a product while posing as "journalists"
  • The IDW: agitation propaganda
Jacques Ellul's "Propaganda": https://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-Formation-Attitudes-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0394718747

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*Also check out www.christophermedia.net & www.escapingthecave.com

Thursday, August 15, 2019

8/15/19: Propaganda: Righteousness And Simplicity

The Propaganda opus resumes with Ellul's take on psychic "dissociation". Includes more on wordknapping, how righteous and simplistic propaganda narratives silence the self and numb natural cognitive dissonance, replacing reality with the electronic eyes of the "verbal universe", the effects of disconnecting a person's personal opinion in favor of an acceptable "public" opinion, and how opposing propagandas affect the target.



ALSO:
  • Democratic Socialists: as ridiculous during Occupy as at their "convention"
  • Aligned, Premeditated, and Secret Consciences: Individuality and Haidt's Elephant
  • Disconnecting thought & action  
  • Opposing propagandas: political abstention or fanaticism?
  • The IDW: Agitation Propaganda
  • Data Overload and the Defective Human Mind
  • Your congenial host and the Ideological Riptide
  • No one's immune. Not even you.
Jacques Ellul's "Propaganda": https://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-Formation-Attitudes-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0394718747

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*Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, and your favorite podcatcher.
*Also check out www.christophermedia.net

Friday, August 2, 2019

8/2/19: Propaganda: Slogans, Rationalizations, The Religious Mind

The conclusion of Ellul's psychological crystallization segment featuring the makeup of its slogans & how they're used to replace thought, collective belief and obsessions, self-justification/rationalizations and how they spawn the self-righteous Puritan, the closing of the crystallized mind, propaganda's religious personality, and a bizarre 21st century media phenomenon: monetizing mind rape.




ALSO:

- Marianne Williamson: The New Trump?
- Introducing the father of American propaganda: Edward Bernays
- They know you better than you know yourself
- Propaganda's side-effects and how they mirror the '60's definition of "neurosis"

Jacques Ellul's "Propaganda": https://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-Formation-Attitudes-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0394718747


*Like the pod? SPREAD IT! You are the marketing team.
*Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, and your favorite podcatcher.
*Also check out www.christophermedia.net & www.escapingthecave.com

Tuesday, July 30, 2019

7/30/19: Propaganda: Manufacturing Proselytes & Militants


Propaganda isn't what you may think. Ellul's ideas on pre-propaganda, propaganda's conditioned reflexes, myths, and "orthopraxy". Including the triggering of active and passive action (activists, influencers, collaborators), widespread participation by "committed" zealots, the separation between thought and action, exploiting the abyss between what we say and what we do, mobilizing men for action counter to their own values, and being unable to reverse ourselves once "action" has begun.



ALSO:
  • Exiling naked sectarians
  • Agitation and organization
  • How the Internet rejuvenates and revives conditioned reflexes
  • Technology indoctrinates us much faster than before
  • Presuppositions, stereotypes, and political education disguised as universities
  • Mind-hacking thru a broken firewall
  • Seizing your intellectual autonomy
  • Excommunication is painful. But Necessary.

Jacques Ellul's "Propaganda": https://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-Formation-Attitudes-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0394718747


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*Also check out www.christophermedia.net

Monday, July 22, 2019

7/22/19: Humanist Puritans, Wokeflake Jesus, Manchurian Crusaders

The extreme left's totalitarian purity test and its search for Utopia's messiah; self-righteous moral certainty and the narcissistic narratives of the secular humanist religion. Then, agitation propaganda creates armies of proselytes and militants while unleashing an uncontrollable and destabilizing primal hatred for "the evil other." No one's immune; would you even know if you're devouring propaganda?



ALSO: 
  • Silent Collaborators
  • The Sunday School of political insemination
  • Political missionaries always rapping at the smart phone's door
  • Being right vs. "looking" right
  • Ignoring history
  • You're solely responsible for protecting and maintaining your own mind 

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*Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, and your favorite podcatcher.
*Also check out www.christophermedia.net and www.escapingthecave.com

Friday, July 5, 2019

7/5/19: Agenda + Journalism = Propaganda

Definitions, journalism as a euphemism for propaganda, Amash goes rogue, Antifa gets played by Patreon's punching bag, I have a creative reparations solution, FOX gets savvy and begins filling a glaring void. Part two coming soon.




Also:

-What happened to our Nuremberg rally?
-More on these ridiculous Democratic debates
-Justice isn't real
-Is the extremist worm turning?

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*Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, and your favorite podcatcher.
*Also check out www.christophermedia.net and www.escapingthecave.com

Thursday, June 27, 2019

6/27/19: Convulsive Twitch and The Damage Done

Are we representing ourselves accurately via these one dimensional social media avatars? I update the digital detox progress and talk about my over-amplified virtual projection, Toddzilla, destroying meaningful relationships, how the tweet is in the eye of the beholder, missing a funeral for a friend, and maybe a faint glimmer of not-so-Sausage Party Hope.



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*Also check out www.escapingthecave.com and www.christophermedia.net

Thursday, June 13, 2019

6/13/19: The Social Media Disease - The Virtue Batsignal, Moral Authoritarianism, The Exhausted Majority

Todd, Rich, and Chris discuss the unwiring of social evolution, totalitarian tribes spawning skittish clones, and an exhausted "center" with nowhere to land that's not infested by puritans.




Also:
- Is your child "really" transgendered, or is their gender voice really yours?
-The outright refusal to see our own team's propaganda.
-The "wisdom" of youth.
-More on thoughtless opinions.
-More on Social Media Intellectual Influencers and their "brands".


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Also visit: www.christophermedia.net