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Rewriting History to Fit the Agenda
Propaganda assumes its full
power convincing people to do, support or advocate something
their principles, morality, values or common sense would
otherwise prevent if they had the full story. Operating within
convenient truths, half-truths and outright lies, propaganda in
effect convinces each to abandon his values and faith,
subsidizing morality through exception. Like persuasion,
propaganda uses facts; the difference between the two falls upon
these facts, easily challenged by historical data, though often
revised, rewritten or discounted to parallel the objective.
Discovering revision is a task in itself.
The most egregious yet brilliant
example of recently revised history concerns the rewriting of
the The Scofield Study Bible
(also known as The
Scofield Reference Bible) beginning in 1908 and
drastically altered from 1962 through today. This book is the
primary source of study and inspiration for a large portion of
America's 70-million evangelical Christians. Prior to 1908,
bibles did not include or reference today's agenda; Palestine
and the Holy Land are referred to as Palestine and a number of
other names, but never as Israel. The Israelites are mentioned
within a few passages. This began to change and accelerate with the
Balfour Declaration of 1917 and by 1962, The Oxford Press
effectively rewrote hundreds of pages of footnotes establishing
the current state of Israel as the fulfillment of biblical
prophecy. As the fulfillment of biblical prophecy, it earned
the protection of Christians adhering to this bible as their
study manual. Through viral sharing, others accepted the idea
without question.
TOP
What makes this brilliant is
within the rewriting; the Oxford Press added what can be
considered an eleventh commandment, subtly making it a sin to
criticize Israel in any way, regardless of its policies. This is
why evangelical Christians consider it a sin to "Go against
the State of Israel" (See
Example) and will angrily and at times viciously
accost verbally or physically anyone whom criticizes the state's
policies. It is also the source of a deepening chasm existing
within Christianity today: Christian Zionists led by Pat
Robertson, Trinity Broadcasting, The World Bible Society, Dr. James Dobson, Jerry Falwell and others on one side, and non-Zionists
led by the Catholic Church with fundamental portions of the
Lutheran, Presbyterian, leaders like Ken Olin, Billy Graham, Rick Warren, organizations including The Crystal Cathedral and additional denominational and
selected non-denominational churches on
the other. Judaism is experiencing the same issues and
struggling with its own chasm between
Torah Faithful Jewry
and
Talmudic inspired Zionism.
By subtly changing the source of values and
morality, facts and opinions in the Scofield Study Bible,
and later integrating similar statements into other study bibles, these new entries become real, accepted and defended.
After all, the bible says so. Its teachings are the only bible
teachings most evangelical Christians have known. To know
differently, one needs to devote serious time to researching and
cross-referencing the Bibles and Torahs of the late 20th Century
with those created prior. Upon doing this, the manipulation is
clear and the propaganda is exposed.
Today tens of thousands of
Christians derive their inspiration and justification from
The Scofield Study Bible and its offspring using its teachings to defend and
support polices they denounce in the United States but support
and defend vehemently in the Middle East including apartheid,
ethnic cleansing, murder, white slavery, state funded abortion,
homosexuality, racism and segregation. Though strong advocates
against these policies in America, in the Middle East they are
seen as justifiable and necessary. To not support them or to try
to point out these policies are hypocrisy considering the
foundations of the faith is to "Go against the State of
Israel," and sin. In reality, each of these policies is
fundamentally in opposition to beliefs and values of
Christianity, Judaism and Islam...a fact that reaches
irrelevancy in the fulfillment of biblical prophecy, as it is
now understood by them.
"How does one take an educated population of basically good
people and turn them against their principles, while at the same
time motivating them to actively participate, promote and defend
atrocities?"
This illustrates a point and
provides one of many answers to the complex question above.
Effective propaganda can cause a person to abandon his faith and
morals by espousing what common sense and humanity consider an
abomination. Nazi Germany is one example of this. Propaganda
becomes the justification through repetition, causing people to
alter their beliefs in favor of another's agenda, generally to
their own detriment and to the detriment of mankind. For those
doubting this, simply replace common slogans or accusations
against the Palestinians, Muslims or Arabs with the words
"Israeli" or "African American", "Asian" or any other ethnic
group or faith. Suddenly the persecution becomes racist, simply
by switching words.
Reversing the reference
illustrates a powerful anti-propaganda tool, basically putting
the issue on the other foot to look at it from both sides.
Through reversal, crimes against humanity and reason become
clear as propaganda is revealed through a simple slight of
words. Racism is racism. Oppression is oppression. Neither
allows for selectivity in its targets or absolution of another.
Propaganda props one group of people up above others and
convinces those buying it to empower the favored group while
dehumanizing the target.
TOP
Propaganda thrives upon a
collective conscience and
cognitive dissonance, the practice of
creating confusion through misinformation or sullying of facts
with irrelevant details. One is left defending the
inconsequential, while the real agenda gains strength and
further displaces objection. Propaganda depends upon society's
laziness, apathy and distraction by lesser issues like bills, celebrities, reality TV or
the day-to-day with the willingness to accept spoken explanation
in sound bites rather than engage in research, reason and question. It
requires society place me above we or us. It requires society
remain mired in an illusion of powerlessness. By its very
nature, propaganda demands each feel he or she cannot make a
difference; yet history has proven it is the common man with
conviction by which change occurs.
Keeping Propaganda at Bay
Education and critical thinking
continue as propaganda's most ardent threats, which is why those
in positions of power and influence are targeted unmercifully
through defamation and characterization. When a conquering
country takes over another, the first order of business is to disarm
the population. The second necessity is rounding up the leaders
and influencers: Clergy, Teachers, Intellectuals, Artists and
anyone else whom assists in determining public opinion. Once
rounded up, they are imprisoned, exiled or killed. Stalin began
his wave of terror in this fashion and ultimately thirty-million
people, seen as threats to the agenda, were slaughtered.
TOP
Public characterization
accomplishes this in times where no invasion exists. Banning
books, censoring media either intentionally or through the
omission of key facts and persecuting those with a different
opinion illustrate methods used to squash any information
contrary to the party line from reaching the masses. Ergo,
education is key, specifically history and current events. Once
one gets past the propaganda the facts never hold up. Critical
thinking occurs once one stops and compares the facts to
principles and morality; at this time one sees the lie.
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