Well, it's a highly developed and systematized form of gaslighting. A significant technological advancement over the common amateur gaslighting.

Like the machinegun isn't just another musket.

Consider the progress of technology in the field of lying, bullshit and propaganda.

We've been developing that stuff for literally thousands of years. It has surely been refined to such a height as to be nigh-perfectly secret, invisible and powerful.

It's a good thing it isn't used against the population at scale, huh.

Are you sure?

That is exactly what they were implying.