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'The Big Lies' Video Series

This is a series of 13 videos that ran here from 8/31/06 - 9/8/06, and I thought I would gather them together in one place.

I'd been thinking how language is being used to reshape perceptions away from reality, even while it is difficult to do in this age of global news, blogs and new cynicism towards authority sources. Government became the most visible example, especially the US administration that prides itself as "staying on message" to teach us to think their way, not necessarily the right way. But civil institutions are at least as guilty, although perhaps not as skillful. Finally I thought of what we learned about propaganda from that master of the art, Goebbels.

Which led to a list of words and phrases designed to pull us away from reality toward someone else's perceptions. The list grew out of control and could have continued. I stopped not because I was running out of examples, I'm sorry to say, but because I wanted to think about something else.

Hope you find the list as instructive as I did, and have your mental guard up...

[ Webmaster's note: The videos have been replaced with written transcripts. Click here for an index to the transcripts ]