Wednesday Morning Breakfast For The Brain

Good morning Deplorables! Less than two weeks until election day.

The Covidian Cult

Via The Unz Review

One of the hallmarks of totalitarianism is mass conformity to a psychotic official narrative. Not a regular official narrative, like the “Cold War” or the “War on Terror” narratives. A totally delusional official narrative that has little or no connection to reality and that is contradicted by a preponderance of facts.

Nazism and Stalinism are the classic examples, but the phenomenon is better observed in cults and other sub-cultural societal groups. Numerous examples will spring to mind: the Manson family, Jim Jones’ People’s Temple, the Church of Scientology, Heavens Gate, etc., each with its own psychotic official narrative: Helter Skelter, Christian Communism, Xenu and the Galactic Confederacy, and so on.

Looking in from the dominant culture (or back through time in the case of the Nazis), the delusional nature of these official narratives is glaringly obvious to most rational people. What many people fail to understand is that to those who fall prey to them (whether individual cult members or entire totalitarian societies) such narratives do not register as psychotic. On the contrary, they feel entirely normal. Everything in their social “reality” reifies and reaffirms the narrative, and anything that challenges or contradicts it is perceived as an existential threat.

These narratives are invariably paranoid, portraying the cult as threatened or persecuted by an evil enemy or antagonistic force which only unquestioning conformity to the cult’s ideology can save its members from. It makes little difference whether this antagonist is mainstream culture, body thetans, counter-revolutionaries, Jews, or a virus. The point is not the identity of the enemy. The point is the atmosphere of paranoia and hysteria the official narrative generates, which keeps the cult members (or the society) compliant.

In addition to being paranoid, these narratives are often internally inconsistent, illogical, and … well, just completely ridiculous. This does not weaken them, as one might suspect. Actually, it increases their power, as it forces their adherents to attempt to reconcile their inconsistency and irrationality, and in many cases utter absurdity, in order to remain in good standing with the cult. Such reconciliation is of course impossible, and causes the cult members’ minds to short circuit and abandon any semblance of critical thinking, which is precisely what the cult leader wants.

Moreover, cult leaders will often radically change these narratives for no apparent reason, forcing their cult members to abruptly forswear (and often even denounce as “heresy”) the beliefs they had previously been forced to profess, and behave as if they had never believed them, which causes their minds to further short circuit, until they eventually give up even trying to think rationally, and just mindlessly parrot whatever nonsensical gibberish the cult leader fills their heads with.

Also, the cult leader’s nonsensical gibberish is not as nonsensical as it may seem at first. Most of us, upon encountering such gibberish, assume that the cult leader is trying to communicate, and that something is very wrong with his brain. The cult leader isn’t trying to communicate. He is trying to disorient and control the listener’s mind. Listen to Charlie Manson “rapping.” Not just to what he says, but how he says it. Note how he sprinkles bits of truth into his stream of free-associated nonsense, and his repetitive use of thought-terminating clichés, described by Robert J. Lifton as follows:

“The language of the totalist environment is characterized by the thought-terminating cliché. The most far-reaching and complex of human problems are compressed into brief, highly selective, definitive-sounding phrases, easily memorized and easily expressed. They become the start and finish of any ideological analysis.” — Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: : A Study of “Brainwashing” in China, 1961

If all this sounds familiar, good. Because the same techniques that most cult leaders use to control the minds of the members of their cults are used by totalitarian systems to control the minds of entire societies: Milieu Control, Loaded Language, Sacred Science, Demand for Purity, and other standard mind-control techniques. It can happen to pretty much any society, just as anyone can fall prey to a cult, given the right set of circumstances.

It is happening to most of our societies right now. An official narrative is being implemented. A totalitarian official narrative. A totally psychotic official narrative, no less delusional than that of the Nazis, or the Manson family, or any other cult.

Most people cannot see that it is happening, for the simple reason that it is happening to them. They are literally unable to recognize it. The human mind is extremely resilient and inventive when it is pushed past its limits. Ask anyone who has struggled with psychosis or has taken too much LSD. We do not recognize when we are going insane. When reality falls apart completely, the mind will create a delusional narrative, which appears just as “real” as our normal reality, because even a delusion is better than the stark raving terror of utter chaos.

This is what totalitarians and cult leaders count on, and exploit to implant their narratives in our minds, and why actual initiation rituals (as opposed to purely symbolic rituals) begin by attacking the subject’s mind with terror, pain, physical exhaustion, psychedelic drugs, or some other means of obliterating the subject’s perception of reality. Once that is achieved, and the subject’s mind starts desperately trying to construct a new narrative to make sense out of the cognitive chaos and psychological trauma it is undergoing, it is relatively easy to “guide” that process and implant whatever narrative you want, assuming you have done your homework.

And this is why so many people — people who are able to easily recognize totalitarianism in cults and foreign countries — cannot perceive the totalitarianism that is taking shape now, right in front of their faces (or, rather, right inside their minds). Nor can they perceive the delusional nature of the official “Covid-19” narrative, no more than those in Nazi Germany were able to perceive how completely delusional their official “master race” narrative was. Such people are neither ignorant nor stupid. They have been successfully initiated into a cult, which is essentially what totalitarianism is, albeit on a societal scale.

Read the entire article HERE.

The Antifa Industry at Work

Via American Greatness

Professional left-wing organizers, planning for post-election chaos, promise to “shut down” the capital and engage in “civil resistance.”

When, in 2008, then-candidate Barack Obama’s career as a community organizer was lampooned at the Republican National Convention, few understood what the words meant. Most sympathetic voices in the media stressed “community,” evoking images of soup kitchens, clinics, and shelters. Republicans had every reason to look more darkly at what this kind of work meant and, probably due to Obama’s race, were inclined to associate the candidate’s time “organizing” in Chicago with New York racial demagogues and shakedown-artists like Al Sharpton.

That description was closer to the mark, but the full truth was deeper and considerably more sophisticated; left-wing organizing is a robust intellectual universe. Thanks largely to talk radio, conservatives soon learned the name Saul Alinsky and began to digest his now-infamous Rules for Radicals.

After several brilliant investigative pieces into Obama’s time among left-wing organizing meccas like the Northwest Academy, Stanley Kurtz wrote the valuable Radical-in-Chief. Unfortunately, for much of the public, the thread frayed shortly after the election that November; emboldened by Democratic control of both houses of Congress, the newly elected Obama would use what he’d learned from Chicago activism to instigate and win battles on more pressing political issues.

For those eight years, the organizing ecosystem that would eventually erupt into Antifa and Black Lives Matter street violence and direct-action grew in strength, sophistication, and funding. Obama’s own career in Chicago should’ve been a kind of clue: the former president served on the boards of Public Allies, the Woods Fund of Chicago, and the Joyce Foundation, which together distributed tens of millions of dollars to various local left-wing groups—some of which themselves were organizing for street-level direct action.

Antifa, of course, is far more than an “idea”—even as ideas, themselves, can be serious threats with which it is necessary to contend. But it is also far more than just an organization. Even as it traces its origins to pre-war Germany, one might think of “Antifa” as a relatively new product line from a larger industry that has existed for decades. That industry is the giant ecosystem of left-wing direct-action and organizing, with its own history, pedagogy, institutions, as well as tens of thousands of career professionals operating in the open, and funded every bit as well as the staid network of establishment conservative think tanks and magazines that tend to cluster along the Acela corridor.

Writing at the American Mind last month, Michael Anton, author of The Stakes: America at the Point of No Return, brought attention to a war game report issued by the Transition Integrity Project, an ad hoc group associated with the George Soros-funded Democracy Integrity Project. Anton’s widely read essay, “The Coming Coup?” was heavily discussed on social media and by conservative talk show hosts including Dan Bongino, Mark Levin, Rush Limbaugh, and Glenn Beck.

What conservatives found so alarming was that the Transition Integrity Project urged Trump’s opponents to wage a “street fight, not a legal one” in the near-certain event of a contested election. In other words, forces arrayed against the president’s reelection should abandon the American political system—and pin their hopes of election victory not on the Constitution-mandated quest for the most electoral votes, but upon the street mobilization and direct-action capabilities of Antifa and the Left’s other professionally-staffed organizing groups.

As a heavily contested Election Day approaches, it is crucial for both conservative activists and officials in law enforcement to understand that left-wing organizing for direct-action and “nonviolent” civil disobedience is being planned by career organizing professionals working within well-funded, interlocking organizations.

“Uprisings, Resistance, and Mass Direct Action”
Americans watching videos of Black Bloc activists tearing apart Portland, Seattle, or other cities are seeing the results of thousands of training sessions, budgets in the tens of millions, and a carefully mapped radicalization process as extensive as those used by Islamists or any other ideological on-ramp toward extremism.

For tactical reasons, much of the expected actions will take place in heavily Democratic cities—as well as in the nation’s capital. Breitbart’s Joel Pollack recently identified a document called “Stopping the Coup: The 2020 Guide,” distributed by one such group, Shutdown DC. As he notes, it is described as an organizing how-to guide by The Disruption Project, seeking to use, in its words, “uprisings, resistance and mass direct action” in order to prevent President Trump from “stealing” the election.

Shut Down DC was founded in 2019 as a coalition of DC-based direct-action groups, initially launched around the climate change agenda, and focused primarily on agitating for the Green New Deal. The group was sponsored by All Out DC, a local Antifa group with a professed objective of, according to its Twitter profile, “Burn Down the American Plantation.”

The group’s ambitions are greater than the November election, of course; its members are not simply Democratic partisans. The Disruption Project urges its supporters to “stand up and take action against the unjust systems of racial capitalism, the heteropatriarchy, white supremacy and settler colonialism.” Its more immediate goals include an effort to

Read the entire article HERE.

Dr. Fauci suggests canceling Thanksgiving gatherings amid COVID uptick

Via The New York Post

With Thanksgiving around the corner, Dr. Anthony Fauci issued a dire warning about the surging coronavirus cases around the country — saying that people “may have to bite the bullet and sacrifice that social gathering,” according to a report.

The 79-year-old top infectious diseases doctor told “CBS Evening News” on Wednesday that his three children will not be coming home for the holiday because his age puts him at increased risk.

“You may have to bite the bullet and sacrifice that social gathering, unless you’re pretty certain that the people that you’re dealing with are not infected,” Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told anchor Norah O’Donnell.

Noting that COVID-19 cases are surging in 37 states, Fauci said that “what we really have to do is double down” during the cooler weather on preventive measures like social distancing, wearing masks and washing hands.

“They sound very simple, but people are not doing that and that’s why we have an uptick in cases,” he said.

The situation could get even worse as families across the country travel and gather for the holiday season, Fauci added.

“That is unfortunately a risk, when you have people coming from out of town, gathering together in an indoor setting,” he said. “It is unfortunate, because that’s such a sacred part of American tradition — the family gathering around Thanksgiving. But that is a risk.”

Read the entire article HERE.

San Diego Unified School District Changes Grading System to ‘Combat Racism’

Via NBC San Diego

Students will no longer be graded based on a yearly average, or on how late they turn in assignments. Those are just some of the major grading changes approved this week by California’s second-largest school district.

The San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD) is overhauling the way it grades students. Board members say the changes are part of a larger effort to combat racism.

“This is part of our honest reckoning as a school district,” says SDUSD Vice President Richard Barrera. “If we’re actually going to be an anti-racist school district, we have to confront practices like this that have gone on for years and years.”

According to data presented by the district, under the old grading system, teachers fail minority students more than White students – a lot more.

During the first semester of last year, 30% of all D or F grades were given to English learners. One in four, 25%, of failing marks went to students with disabilities.

By ethnicity, 23% went to Native Americans. Another 23% of failing grades went to Hispanics. And 20% of D or F grades went to Black students.

By comparison, just 7% of failing marks went to White students.

In an effort to change that racial imbalance, the school board voted unanimously this week to make several big changes to its grading system.

Academic grades will now focus on mastery of the material, not a yearly average, which board members say penalizes students who get a slow start, or who struggle at points throughout the year.

Another big change, teachers can no longer consider non-material factors when grading. Things like turning work in on time and classroom behavior will now instead count towards a student’s citizenship grade, not their academic grade.

“I think this reflects a reality that students have described to us and it’s a change that’s a long time coming,” says Barrera.

Read the entire article HERE.

Health Experts Now Recommend Maximizing Social Distance By Attending A Biden Rally

Via The Babylon Bee (Satire)

U.S.—Health experts across the globe are recommending a new strategy for maximizing your social distance: attending a Joe Biden rally.

Officials say there’s no better place to be miles away from most other humans.

“When you attend a Joe Biden rally, you’re very unlikely to get infected, since, you know, there’s no one else there,” said one CDC official. “We’ve found that Trump rallies are super-spreader events since there’s a ton of people. Biden rallies are great for stopping the virus. You just stand in the middle of a field while an old guy shouts from a podium hundreds of feet far away from you.”

“Plus, you can rest and relax. Get away from the busyness of modern life: attend a Biden rally. BIDEN-HARRIS 2020!”

The health experts named several alternatives that are also acceptable for maximal social distancing, including attending a Biden boat parade, a Biden car parade, and a Nickelback concert.

Check out all of the Bee’s takes on politics and culture HERE.

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