How Trump's Obsession with BBC Will Be His Undoing
Understanding the 2024 U.S. Election Psyop - Part II
Hold up a sec. Trump? BBC? C’mon now, that can’t be a thing… can it? Ewww!
In “Understanding the 2024 U.S. Election Psyop” I explored a theory of how the Republicans have employed psychological warfare tactics to manipulate voters through suggestion, repetition, and time. When we left off, the problem had been defined but no solutions offered.
To recap, Republicans have a semi-predictable script by which they exert covert influence through psychological manipulation. It starts with nuggets of truth (or acceptable half-truths) to prepare a fertile mindset, followed by an emotional trigger, capped off with suggestive questions to set the hook.
Once a mind is open to suggestion, it can be influenced in any number of ways. In other words, the planting of one suggestion does not stop the mind from being ripe for additional seeds of influence. By providing a steady diet of suggestion and careful repetition, over time a person’s mental field can be planted with all sorts of ideas.
With your permission, I’d like to conduct an informal experiment. The goal is to see if we can draw a misleading mental picture in your mind. If we can accomplish that, similar tactics might be applicable to deprogram the MAGA cult with stronger influence, hopefully leading to a breakthrough with the millions of people who are absolutely clueless that their thoughts are not their own.
Before we begin, we must consider the ethical implications of this experiment. Republicans have been using psychological warfare for decades, influencing the party faithful into choosing captivity over freedom, fealty over empowerment, and anger over joy. Therefore, it would be wrong to be like them and take advantage of people who are, shall we say, “ripe for the picking”. Instead, our goal should be to break down the walls of artificial reality that Republican programming has constructed, allowing people access to truth that has been previously firewalled. The full recipe follows, but for the experiment we’re going to focus on inserting doubt.
Also, please be aware that this experiment is (intentionally) going to cross some not-quite-safe-for-work boundaries. It is ridiculous. It may offend or trigger outrage. Should that occur, please remind yourself that this is merely an experiment. I appreciate you following all the way to the questions and look forward to your answers in the comments. (What, you didn’t expect homework?)
For all of the terrible qualifies of Donald J. Trump, he’s certainly a prolific name-caller. Consider: “little” Marco Rubio, “lyin’” Ted Cruz, … it seems DJT can pull a pejorative out of his ass at a moment’s notice. But can you think of any disrespectful names he’s given specifically to Black men? He always seems to have one Black person on his rally stage, and he did one disastrous interview at the National Association of Black Journalists. And who can forget his whole repulsive schtick about “Black jobs?”
DJT is an unapologetic rapist… I mean, racist. All members of the billionaire boys club in his proposed clown cabinet are pasty white. Yet, with all of the qualified Black Republicans that could actually be constructive contributors to the administration, it’s discouraging that not a single Black man has received the nod.
Consider, for example, Senator Tim Scott (R-SC). Tim has several years as a lawmaker, comes from a solid Christian upbringing, and with experience on the Banking and Housing and Urban Development committees, has experience that could help the administration navigate the difficult waters that are likely coming under the Trump tariffs.
Or consider Congressman Byron Donalds (R-FL). Donalds is a firebrand, active on social media, and has financial experience. With all the billionaires in the cabinet, you would think that having a financial analyst would be a useful cabinet addition. Yet, with all his experience and attitude, Byron has never even been given a public glance for a cabinet position.
Clearly, DJT is holding these members back. Perhaps a president doesn’t need someone in a formal cabinet position to be useful for other informal purposes. After all, everyone knows Trump’s love of a good *BBC. He’s designed his entire administration for it. It wouldn’t surprise me to see him take on a much bigger BBC once he takes office.
Okay, enough of that ick. With apologies to Tim Scott and Byron Donalds for their inclusion in this experiment, I must ask: What picture is in your mind, and is it as ick as the implication was intended?
Don the con is more committed to his *Billionaire Boys Club than he is to his kids or his third - immigrant - spouse. This is one of many weaknesses that could be leveraged to expose the naked emperor as a blustering, deranged, lying, cheating, grifting, raping, stealing, etc., fraud.
Remember when Fox News took Joe Biden to task for hugging kids? They took something completely innocuous and turned it into a scandal to sow doubt in people’s faith in Joe’s integrity.
Let’s rewind a moment to see how Fox manipulated their viewers into questioning Joe’s integrity. They started by showing photos of Joe (purportedly) sniffing kids heads. Hey, I don’t know if he was sniffing their heads, giving them a peck on the head, or whatever else. He’s a grandfather; it’s what we do with our grandkids. Nothing scandalous about it, but by spinning it as a scandal Fox has leveraged an emotional element - doubt and disgust - to manipulate.
Fox showed the pictures nonstop for several days, with the rhetoric growing increasingly convicting. “Why is the President smelling kids?” or Laura Shouty Lady’s “It’s so gross that Biden is sniffing kids.” Before long, you could tell exactly who was watching Fox because they were the ones outraged at the imaginary Sniff-gate.
Enter Tucker Carlson and his “I’m just asking questions” schtick. His scripts were tailor-made to plant suggestions to evoke outrage at the scandal of the moment. Nothing was off-limits; integrity be damned as long as brains get turned to mush and people manipulated to spend money on shitty merch advertised on the channel.
All that said, we are not powerless against this manipulation. In fact, their weapon could very well be their kryptonite.
Let’s recap something we know for a FACT is true: Don the Con lies. If he’s breathing, he’s lying. If he’s talking, he’s lying twice as fast. Let’s use his lies to deprogram MAGA.
How do we do that?
Step 1: Agreement
Establish agreement with your MAGA friends. Use either factually true or misleadingly “seems true” statements to form an alliance. Don’t rush this, you’re building trust and that takes time. Remember, we’re in this for results, not for speed.
Step 2: Identify concerns
As you build trust, you’ll learn more about the concerns of the other person. Look for patterns and commonality in which concerns can be grouped. For example, a person may have several related concerns about finances or rights or foreigners, make a note of that.
Step 3: Introduce doubt
Using the concerns as a template, introduce doubt slowly and consistently. For example, if your friend has concerns about foreigners impacting American elections, you might ask them how they feel about Elon Musk, an apartheid South African, buying influence with the administration. If they’re okay with that, redirect to “then the issue isn’t foreigners, as much as its rich vs. poor foreigners?” Challenge them to think beyond the soundbite.
Step 4: The Hook
Once the seeds of doubt have taken root - and you’ll know - plant the suggestion, typically in the form of a question. This gets the person to believe they are forming an original thought, when in reality the thought was never their own. Once reinforced, they may start seeing the world through an entirely different lens.
That’s the point, isn’t it? The lens that MAGA uses to view America is a masterclass in contradiction. Ultra-Christians support a convicted rapist for President. The working poor vote to give more money to billionaires. Lies are truth and truth is “fake news”.
And billionaire’s rockets look like men’s privates. Please tell me I’m not the only one who sees that.
One of my tactics is to feign outrage about "something Biden did" and when the target agrees and shares my outrage, I say "oops, wait...that was actually Trump".
The squirming that follows is a delight to behold.
I've been doing this since November, now that I think about it. A simple conversation about the current news cycle at the time can raise many thoughts.