Daily Archives: June 24, 2017

Self-brainwashing…

from my favorite paper: Funny Times

I know, most of America drives around in their own cars, but those city dwellers who find themselves in the back seat of a taxi or other hired conveyance may sympathize with the situation. Many people that drive for a living have the radio on: talk radio, music, endless news, NPR.  I have to confess, I am a big advocate for silence, and feel there should be a bi-partisan movement for the right to not have to listen to stuff (on airplanes, in elevators, in malls, etc.).

Sure, I could get (and indeed have) earphones.  But I don’t want to block out the world, I want to hear it, just not endless marketing jabber or musak or whatever. But I am particularly unhappy with having to listen to endless news or much of talk radio.  There are a few talk radio stations whose goal is to be entertaining or informative.  But most lure their listeners in with conflict, outrage, fear, danger, scary information, etc. like a fish with a dangler lure….

These kinds of shows—TV, radio, whatever—wind listener’s clocks, pull their chain, and give them some frisson of energy, hate, fear, anger, which seems to be far more addictive and universal (clearly part of one’s “lizard brain“) than a feeling of peace, happiness, learning or engagement. It exhausts me to listen to the streams of exhaust!  And I don’t have adequate shields to effectively block out noise.  Yes, I freely confess, I can’t pack with the TV on.  It’s just too distracting.

Propaganda works if you hear information over and over again, it wears away at your critical faculty (if you have one).  It’s convincing, even it it’s patently untrue and utterly ridiculous.  If you see it, hear it, read it, talk about it it gets truthified through endless repetition.  So I now not only ask the drivers to turn off the radio, but tell them to stop listening to this endless, depressing stream of fairly useless information. It isn’t good for their outlook on life.

It’s all a creepy, voluntary self-brainwashing.

I now feel much more charitable towards endless sports!  But really, they should be reading romances….

Isabel Swift