It's called TV and movies, which the rest of the world eats up. People in and out of America need to wake up and realize that Hollywood is mostly psychological warfare.

I'm sure there are other more covert disinformation campaigns, but we can't ignore the elephant in the room.

How does this square with Hollywood's bending towards China? Or, the fact that Hollywood is fully independent from the US government?

It doesn't. Hollywood is private and profit-seeking. They will soon start paying more attention to the demands of the Chinese government than they ever did to the US government. Because that's where the future growth in revenue is.

Great question ...

(In fact, I've been waiting for the entrance into the worldwide "mainstream" of big Chinese productions ...

... ostensibly showcasing different values / agendas ...)

It's not like the US government pursued, investigated, or ran smear campaigns against people in the entertainment industry, right?

Content as psy-ops. That's a thought ...

Is this a new concept to you? Cool!

offers you red pill

Here’s a good starter article: https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/07/op...

hesitantly takes the pill ... :)

... interesting article, appreciated - though it speaks more of how CIA and the like operate to have themselves be portrayed favourably ...

... that's more good PR than psy-ops!

You're not up on your conspiracy theories I see: https://thegreatwork208716197.wordpress.com/2020/03/09/%E2%9...

I always appreciate a pointer ... :)

(The link is actually interesting, in a convoluted way ...)

You gotta do your reading just so you can stay involved in conversations. You know, at parties. Remember those?

> You know, at parties. Remember those?

Ah! Yes! So-called "social interaction"!

Yeah, I vaguely remember :)

No. Europeans / US seek to convince people of their ideology which is called propaganda (democracy, human rights, climate change, etc.) They don't launch offensive operations with the sole goal of destroying the ability to have a conversation around the above (disinformation) and convince people there is no truth.

The fact people think everyone behaves the same way is, in a large way, a big victory for authoritarian govs trying to convince people this is the case.

After all, if everyone is guilty, no one is.

> They don't launch offensive operations with the sole goal of destroying the ability to have a conversation around the above

Maybe not the US government itself, but American corporations and various political and corporate interest groups do literally this all the time.

Yes, but it's not coming from the government. Key distinction.

Should there be stronger laws about dodgy private PR firms running disinfo and smear campaigns? Yes. Should platforms be held more responsible for not allowing their networks to be so easily gamed? Yes. But that is a separate matter.

And, also, as stated below, use "content" / culture to project and persuade as per their values ...

> ffensive operations with the sole goal of destroying the ability to have a conversation

This here being the differentiating factor here, indeed.-

There's a difference between attacking a rival political position, and attacking the concepts of truth and shared objective reality. Authoritarians want to spread cynicism and nihilism so their populations won't one day stop tolerating their corruption and oppression and demand political agency.

It's literally a life or death conflict for them. If the whole of Russia or China wakes up tomorrow and demands free and fair elections, it's game over.

> If the whole of Russia or China wakes up tomorrow and demands free and fair elections, it's game over.

I've often seriously wondered about this ...

Would they not just as well be gassed, fired upon, ie. have the full brunt of their respective militaries turned upon them for the sake of "public order" or, as China would have it "Social Harmony"? Would they not just get "harmonized"?

Realistically it wouldn't be "everyone" it would be perhaps a slight majority of the total population. That way the gov could still mobilize half the population against the other half, respond with violence, and probably still retain power.

But ideas spread quickly. If anything close to 80-90% of a population demands something, that thing is likely to happen.

That's why the fight in the information space is so fierce, that's why the police response in HK was so violent, etc. Authoritarians know the stakes couldn't be hirer, so they fight this battle with everything they got. If a critical mass one day demands freedom their very lives are now at risk.

Keep in mind, the people that ordered the military to fire on Chinese students in Tiananmen square, they are still in power. If the CCP were to fall, I would assume those people wouldn't escape justice. So they will fight like hell to avoid accountability.

> mobilize half the population against the other half,

This, a likely scenario under such circumstances, sounds atrocious ...

It would be a human tragedy on a scale we've never seen before. This is why an authoritarian government of 1.4 billion people terrifies me. If history is any guide, the state will fall. But if it doesn't happen peacefully, god help us.

> This is why an authoritarian government of 1.4 billion people terrifies me.

Your terror is well-founded, I'm afraid.

(And, they are showing themselves to be increasingly nervous ...

... see the latest crackdown on academia, and student organizations ...)

The more weak they know their internal state to be, the more aggressive externally they will become. War or revolution are horrific outcomes, yet one or both seem almost inevitable.