Thursday, July 23, 2020

Looking at the world

An 98-year-old man was heard saying yesterday that our perception of the world depends on the type of glasses we are wearing.

Simple, but wise words.

1 comment:

Andreas said...

By changing the glasses with change our perception and our thoughts... here are some wise words from Noam Chomsky about 'Thought Control in Democratic Societies':

“The mass media serve as a system for communicating messages and symbols to the general populace. It is their function to amuse, entertain, and inform, and to inculcate individuals with the values, beliefs, and codes of behavior that will integrate them into the institutional structures of the larger society. In a world of concentrated wealth and major conflicts of class interest, to fulfill this role requires systematic propaganda.”

“The major media-particularly, the elite media that set the agenda that others generally follow - are corporations ‘selling’ privileged audiences to other businesses. It would hardly come as a surprise if the picture of the world they present were to reflect the perspectives and interests of the sellers, the buyers, and the product. Concentration of ownership of the media is high and increasing. Furthermore, those who occupy managerial positions in the media, or gain status within them as commentators, belong to the same privileged elites, and might be expected to share the perceptions, aspirations, and attitudes of their associates, reflecting their own class interests as well. Journalists entering the system are unlikely to make their way unless they conform to these ideological pressures, generally by internalizing the values; it is not easy to say one thing and believe another, and those who fail to conform will tend to be weeded out by familiar mechanisms.”

“Citizens of the democratic societies should undertake a course of intellectual self defense to protect themselves from manipulation and control, and to lay the basis for meaningful democracy.”

From Necessary Illusions (Noam Chomsky): Thought Control in Democratic Societies

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