BuzzFlash Reviews
State of Confusion: Political Manipulation and the Assault on the American Mind
By Bryant Welch
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--Laurence H. Tribe, Carl M. Loeb University Professor, Harvard Law School
BuzzFlash Review:
This is one of those few books -- and a bit undernoticed -- that is a virtual Rosetta stone to understanding how so many Americans are living in an alternative reality.
They have been emotionally and psychologically manipulated by a "manufactured reality" of the right wing consortium: think tanks, public relations spin, advertising techniques, corporate media, psychological tactics, and politicians, among others.
The author, a psychologist/attorney, compares the process we have gone through as a nation in the last 30 years -- and particularly the last 8 years -- to a film from 1944: "Gaslight" (starring Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman). Directed by George Cukor, it is distinctly Hitchcockian in its rendering.
We will quote directly from the first chapter of "State of Delusion":
"The term gaslighting comes from the 1944 film...in which a psychopathic husband coveting his wife's property tries to drive his dependent young bride insane by covertly manipulating her environment, making her increasingly perplexed and uncertain. Among other things, he raises and lowers the gaslights in the house while denying to the wife that there has been any change in the lighting. While he feigns genuine concern for her, he cleverly isolates her from any contact with the rest of the world that might interfere with his propaganda-like assault on her sense of reality....
"In the mental health profession, gaslighting refers to a series of mind games that prey on our limited ability to tolerate much ambiguity or uncertainty about what is happening in our important areas of our lives. It is a highly destructive form of psychological manipulation that undercuts trust in our sense of reality and results in confusion and perplexity. If the victims of gaslighting do not come up with a resolution for the perplexity, they will act in an increasingly primitive and irrational fashion. This is what has been done to large segments of America."
Oh, dear me, how elitist to reveal the truth!
We could say much more, particularly the tell-tale sign of attacking and then claiming "victimization." Rove is a master at this and that is what John McCain did after subliminally raising race in an ad (black man/white women) and then claiming that Obama "played the race card." This is just one of the recurrent patterns that appears in the process of "gaslighting" the American people by the immoral right wing.
Of course, the corporate media (which controls most book reviews) isn't eager to publicize a book that posits that a large segment of the American population (you can find a chunk of them regularly watching FOX News) have been brainwashed, emotionally manipulated, and embedded with a false sense of reality. That's because the corporate media is one of the main vehicles for accomplishing this Lee Atwater/Karl Rove/Roger Ailes Psy-ops strategy.
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From the publisher:
Finally, the answer to the many questions that have been preying on the minds of millions of Americans has arrived. Why are Americans so vulnerable to divisive political tactics? Why did Americans get dragged into such an unwise war in Iraq? Why do fundamentalist religious groups, Fox News, and right-wing radio still play such influential roles in America�s political landscape? And why are long-accepted rational scientific ideas like evolution under siege? These questions hold America�s future in the balance. Ultimately, they are questions about the American mind. Psychologist-attorney Dr. Bryant Welch has the answers.
If America is going to change the mind-set that led us to war in Iraq and left us unable to confront our serious national problems, this book is vitally important. Drawing on his unique experience both as a clinical psychologist and a Washington, D.C., political figure with the American Psychological Association, Dr. Welch shows how the long-term effects of sophisticated new forms of political manipulation have not only led to our debacle in Iraq but are also currently undercutting America�s ability to address its very serious problems. In the 1944 movie Gaslight, a husband drives his wife to the brink of insanity by playing games with her sense of reality. Just as in the movie, America�s most recent political �gaslighters,� such as George W. Bush, Karl Rove, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, and many religious leaders, have generated and exploited confusion in the minds of countless Americans.
Gaslighters prey on their victim�s vulnerability to paranoia, sexual perplexity,and envy to undermine the mind�s ability to function rationally. Welch examines why millions of Americans, in response to such assaults, subconsciously and dangerously create their own simplistic reality, even if it is completely different from the more complex reality of the world.
Most important, State of Confusion explains how and why Americans must act now to fight back against this harmful manipulation before it�s too late. Dr. Welch�s exploration of the American mind is both fascinating and frightening, and State of Confusion is a must-read for everyone who cares about the future of this great country.
About the Author:
Bryant Welch, J.D., Ph.D. has more than thirty-five years of experience in law, psychology, and politics. He spent seventeen years in Washington, D.C., where he built the American Psychological Association�s Practice Directorate, and has held faculty appointments at the University of North Carolina and George Washington University. He currently lectures and consults nationally and practices clinical psychology on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, where he lives with his wife, Debbie. His Web site can be found at bryantwelch.com.
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