Tinfoil Hat – Mind Control and Coercive Psychological Systems

“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.”
– Albert Einstein

Jim Keith notes in Mass Control: Engineering Human Consciousness:

Since the advent of “progressive education” schools have not been intended to educate, but simply to regiment.… Public schooling…does not challenge children to learn or to think creatively, but instead indoctrinates them to conform to their prison-like surroundings.^{1, i}

MattBors.com

The American Dream website exposes numerous examples of heavy-handed treatment, writing:

In the classrooms of America today, if you burp in class, if you spray yourself with perfume or if you doodle on your desk, there is a chance that you will be arrested by the police and hauled out of your school in handcuffs. Unfortunately, we live in a country where paranoia has become standard operating procedure. The American people have become convinced that the only way that we can all be “safe” is for this country to be run like a militarized totalitarian police state. So our public schools are run like prisons and our public school students are treated like prisoners. The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world by far, and our schools are preparing the next generation to either “do time” in the prison system or to live as good little slaves in the Big Brother prison grid that is being constructed all around us. But what our schools are not doing is giving these children the critical thinking skills that they need to live as free citizens in a nation that used to be “the land of the free and the home of the brave”.²

caglecartoons.com

Non Sequitur by Wiley

“What passes for education today, even in our ‘best’ schools and colleges, is a hopeless anachronism,” adds Alvin Toffler in Future Shock.³ PolicyMic writes:

The Republican Party of Texas released its official 2012 platform, with provisions including the repeal of the Voting Rights Act, recommendations for the use of corporal punishment in classrooms, and opposition to the teaching of “higher order thinking skills.”…

Thinking separates man from machine. Critical thinking uses that unique, precious ability to help choose ethical and moral paths. Critical thinking sometimes asks difficult questions that make us squirm, attacks our most hallowed beliefs, makes us angry or sad or excited, and most importantly, leads to more thinking.…

[This] platform rollout is reminiscent of the debate that was conducted in 2010 over the content of Texas’ textbooks, which gives the current situation more context. Because of the large population of Texas, they have an enormous amount of buying power in the textbook industry, purchasing 48 million textbooks annually. Therefore, the very conservative Texas Board of Education has more clout in deciding the content of the nation’s textbooks than almost any other Board across the country.^{4, ii}

Back to School © Bob Englehart

Writing for The Seattle Times, Nancy Montgomery points out that:

Sue Fischer, president of the Association of Washington Educators of Talented and Gifted, says that during the past 15 years, the reading level of texbooks has dropped by two grade levels. That is, what used to be third-grade material is now fifth-grade material.… In other words, textbooks have been “dumbed down.” The result, according to a wide-ranging group including teachers, textbook salesmen, education researchers and government officials, is a more poorly educated student population.⁵

“Average reading and writing SAT scores for high school students declined to their lowest levels while math results stalled in the exam used for admission at most U.S. colleges,” notes Janet Lorin for Bloomberg:

A record 1.66 million students from the class of 2012 took the exam.… The drop in scores reflect the fact that more lower-income students with less access to high-quality education are taking the test, the College Board said.⁶

BBC News adds:

Ruth Lea, policy director at the [United Kingdom's] Institute of Directors said: “This is farcical – we’ve now got endemic grade inflation ⁱⁱⁱ which is making it harder and harder for employers to discriminate between able and less well able students, and the universities are having the same problem. We are deeply pessimistic about this dumbing down – A-levels are no longer the gold standard they were 20 years ago.” ^7, iv

Keith explains how this “has culminated in the all-too-familiar situation of…education today in which the majority of persons graduating from high school are functionally illiterate and ill-prepared for doing anything else than saying ‘yes’ to Big Brother and his telescreens.” ^{8, v} Toffler continues saying that “Nothing could be better calculated to produce people uncertain of their goals, people incapable of effective decision-making under conditions of overchoice.” ⁹

Keith notes that “From the standpoint of the social controllers there are many advantages to keeping the populace stupid, not the least being that the less intelligent a person is, the more susceptible he is to exterior control.¹⁰ Carl Sagan’s wife, Ann Druyan, points out that her husband “knew that if we were to have even a little bit of democracy in this society, as many of us as possible should understand the workings, language, values and methods of science and technology so that we can’t be so easily manipulated.” ¹¹

In 2002, The Seattle Times reported in Malcolm Ritter’s Associated Press report:

Can a nation debate the merits of cloning when fewer than half its adults can give a decent definition of DNA? Can it render good judgment on genetically engineered food when only a quarter can define a molecule? And can Americans assess competing medical claims when only a third show a good understanding of the scientific process? Experts see cause for concern in the latest report card on American scientific understanding.…

In its current form, the survey has been given every two years since 1979 and overall the results haven’t changed much, [senior analyst for the National Science Foundation Melissa] Pollak said.… What bothers Pollak the most is the finding that only about a third of adults showed a good understanding of the scientific process. “This is where science can benefit people in their daily lives,” Pollak said. People get bombarded with claims by psychics and medical quacks, she said, and if they don’t understand about critical thinking and scientific evidence, they can waste time and money. That understanding also helps citizens confront scientific political issues where the media are often content to present both sides of an argument, no matter which side has better evidence, said Shirley M. Malcom, head of education for the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Moreover, experts say, with the spread of technology, workers will have to be able to use it and the critical-thinking and problem-solving skills that should be learned in science classes. There’s another, related concern. How will the United States supply qualified workers for careers in science and technology? Nowadays, the nation leans heavily on foreign help.^12, vi

Heidi Stevenson writing for the NaturalNews.com website notes that it is more the loss of creative thinking than educational level that is the primary concern:

Hardly any of the greats of American history went through much formal schooling. That includes Thomas Jefferson. George Washington. Benjamin Franklin. Thomas Edison. Herbert Melville. Mark Twain. Margaret Mead. Admiral Farragut. And so many more.

Obviously, formal secondary schooling, at least of the type we now have, is not a requisite for learning, creativity, or greatness.¹³

Mary Astor (1930s)

Mark Leyner availed himself “of the Freedom of Information Act and reviewed transcripts of numerous tapped phone conversations Einstein had with actress Mary Astor and with organized crime potentate Meyer Lansky,” in his article for The New Republic. “These tapes, made in the 1930s with an electronic bug placed in the Princeton phone booth from which Einstein did all his “extracurricular” business, reveal an Einstein who was tyrannical, sadistic and venal, a cutthroat, ferociously vindictive intellectual parasite who blithely stole credit for the work of others:”

file number: 2876C-983 – location: Phone booth on the corner of Nassau Street and Murray Place in Princeton, New Jersey. – time: September 26, 1935, 8:45 p.m. – participants: Albert Einstein, Mary Astor

[Einstein's girlfriend actress Mary Astor:] “Y’know, I don’t like this whole arrangement. I conceptualize the warping of time by gravitation, you get the credit. I develop the principle of general covariance, you get the credit. I derive the gravitational field equations that govern the space time curvature, you get the credit. It’s no good Albert. It’s no good.…“

[To which Einstein replies:] “Where are we going here, huh? You want to think about our careers here for a second? (inaudible) Your boss (inaudible) Thalberg – that guy’s not stupid. You think Thalberg wants Mary Astor, physicist? … You think prestige within the scientific community fills seats in a movie house? If that were true, Thalberg and his fat friend Louie Mayer would sign Madame Curie to a contract. Am I right? (inaudible) I’m just saying that I care about you, O.K.? I love you. You know that.”

[And shortly thereafter in another fit of petty jealousy regarding Astor's career as an actress:] “You tell your rehearsal partner to be careful. I’ve got a friend – an astrophysicist from Bern. You know what an astrophysicist can to do someone’s face, Mary? It isn’t pretty.” ¹⁴

“The general population doesn’t know what’s happening, and it doesn’t even know that it doesn’t know.”
– Noam Chomsky

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Notes

ⁱ The Irish Independent reports that grocery giant TESCO has strapped electronic armbands to their warehouse workers to measure their productivity, tracking their actions so closely that management knows when they briefly pause to drink from a water fountain or take a bathroom break.… As surveillance technology advances, companies can increasingly track all aspects of their workers’ time and activity.…

But increased surveillance not only creates a more stressful workplace for workers, it also effects the product, Gilliom points out. For example, nurses are no longer taking the time to get to know their patients because hospitals make more money when more people are hustled through. In the past, nurses had ways to circumvent hospital pressure. Now, electronic tracking of patient movement means that medical profressionals will spend far less time with you when you are sick.
– Tana Ganeva, “Work is Becoming More Like Prison As Some Workers Forced to Wear Electronic Bands That Track Everything They Do (Including Bathroom Breaks),” AlterNet.org, at http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/work-becoming-more-prison-some-workers-forced-wear-electronic-bands-track-everything (retrieved: 26 February 2013).

ⁱⁱ The Texas Board of Education’s responsibilities including establishing the state’s public school curriculum, approving textbooks and managing the state’s permanent school fund.… Six incumbents on the Texas Board of Education will retain their spots on the panel that has drawn attention in years past for ideological battles including over evolution.… An intense fight over how evolution is taught in science curriculum put a national spotlight on the board in 2009. The board ultimately decided that Texas schools would no longer have to teach the “strengths and weaknesses” of evolution. Teachers would still be encouraged to consider “all sides” of scientific theories. The board did see a shift more toward the center after the defeat in 2010 of social conservative Republican Don McLeroy, the former board chairman who believed the Earth was only 6,000 years old and that the Christian influences of the founding fathers are important to studying American history.
– Jamie Stengle, “6 incumbents return to Texas Board of Education,” Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, 6 November 2012, at http://lubbockonline.com/filed-online/2012-11-06/6-incumbents-return-texas-board-education (retrieved: 7 November 2012).

ⁱⁱⁱ In general, the highest academic grade inflation is in the lowest achieving schools.
– M. Donald Thomas, Ph.D. President Emeritus, School Management Study Group and William Bainbridge, Ph.D. President, SchoolMatch Corporation, Columbus, Ohio, “Grade Inflation: The Current Fraud,” at http://schoolmatch.com/articles/ESRJAN97.htm (retrieved: 5 June 2012).

^iv Friends TV show, Scene: N.Y.U. Paleontology department, Ross is putting up the grades on the message board.
Burt: (another professor) Wow! It looks like you were very generous with your grades this semester! (Ross frantically starts to change some as a female student, Elizabeth, approaches.)
– “The One Where Ross Dates a Student,” Friends, 9 March 2000, at http://www.fanfr.com/scripts/saison6/friendsgeneration2.php?nav=script&version=vo&episodescript=618 (retrieved: 26 August 2012).

^v Between 21 and 23 percent of the adult population or approximately 44 million people, according to the [1992] National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS),…can read a little but not well enough to fill out an application, read a food label, or read a simple story to a child.… Another 25-28 percent of the adult population, or between 45 and 50 million people,…can perform more complex tasks such as comparing, contrasting, or integrating pieces of information but usually not higher level reading and problem-solving skills.… Literacy experts believe that [these] adults…lack a sufficient foundation of basic skills to function successfully in our society.
– “Facts on Literacy In America,” Literacy Volunteers of America, at http://www.literacyvolunteers.org/about/faqs/facts.html (retrieved: 2008).

^vi Some 20 percent of Microsoft’s engineers are of Indian origin.^*
– “Bill Gates joins AIDS fight in India,” Yahoo! News UK & Ireland, 11 Nov 2002, at http://uk.news.yahoo.com/021111/80/dedtr.html (retrieved: 2002); See also Reuters, “Microsoft investing in India’s future; Boosting education, partnerships, software development,” MSNBC News, 12 Nov 2002, at http://www.msnbc.com/news/833934.asp (retrieved: 2002); and “Microsoft to Invest $400 Mln in Indian Projects,” Reuters, 12 Nov 2002, at http://reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=technologynews&StoryID=1720244 (retrieved: 2002).

^* Morgan Stanley estimates the number of U.S. jobs outsourced to India will double to about 150,000 in the next three years. Analysts predict as many as two million U.S. white-collar jobs such as programmers, software engineers and applications designers will shift to low cost centers by 2014.
– “U.S. Companies Moving More Jobs Overseas,” Netscape News, 27 Dec 2003 (retrieved: 2004).

Related links

¹ Jim Keith, Mass Control: Engineering Human Consciousness (Lilburn, GA: IllumiNet Press, 1999), pp. 28, 29.

² “19 Crazy Things That School Children Are Being Arrested For In America,” The American Dream, at http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/19-crazy-things-that-school-children-are-being-arrested-for-in-america (retrieved: 26 June 2012).

³ Alvin Toffler, Future Shock (Toronto: Bantam Books, 1988, 1970), p. 398.

⁴ Megan Malloy, “Texas Republicans 2012 Platform Opposes Critical Thinking and Supports Corporal Punishment,” PolicyMic, 1 July 2012, at http://www.policymic.com/articles/10551/texas-republicans-2012-platform-opposes-critical-thinking-and-supports-corporal-punishment (retrieved: 6 July 2012).

⁵ Nancy Montgomery, “Dumbed-down texts too easy, too simple, too boring, critics say,” The Seattle Times, 3 March 1996, p. A1, at http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19960303&slug=2317134 (retrieved: 5 June 2012).

⁶ Janet Lorin, “SAT Reading, Writing Test Scores Drop to Lowest Levels,” Bloomberg, 24 September 2012, at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-24/sat-reading-writing-test-scores-drop-to-lowest-levels.html (retrieved: 2 March 2013).

⁷ “Results ‘a real achievement’,” BBC News, 17 Aug 2000, at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/education/883484.stm (retrieved: 5 June 2012).

⁸ Keith, Mass Control, p. 24.

⁹ Toffler, Future Shock, p. 417.

¹⁰ Keith, Mass Control, p. 24.

¹¹ Ann Druyan (Carl Sagan’s wife), interview with Pete Brady, “Carl Sagan: Visionary Scientist; World-renowned teacher, author and scientist found that cannabis helped him to fully explore the cosmos,” Cannabis Culture #32, Aug/Sep 2001, p. 45.

¹² Malcolm Ritter (The Associated Press), “What we don’t know about science could fill books,” The Seattle Times, 19 June 2002, at http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=20020619&slug=science19 (retrieved: 5 June 2012).

¹³ Heidi Stevenson, “So-Called Education Intentionally Dumbs Down Americans,” NaturalNews.com, 11 May 2008, at http://www.naturalnews.com/023215.html (Retrieved: 5 June 2012).

¹⁴ Mark Leyner, “Einstein calling; A genius brought down to earth,” The New Republic, 21 November 1994, 211(21); See also Highbeam Business, at http://business.highbeam.com/4776/article-1G1-15867020/einstein-calling-genius-brought-down-earth (retrieved: 24 February 2013).

See also

Kevin Crosby, “Cloning,” at http://www.skewsme.com/cloning.html (retrieved: 5 June 2012).

Karla Murthy, “Is ‘capitalism’ a dirty word?” PBS.org, 14 May 2010, at http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/culture/is-capitalism-a-dirty-word-2/718/ (retrieved: 23 September 2011).

“Big Bird in the Presidential Debate: Mitt Romney advocates cutting funding for Sesame Street, PBS,” The Washington Post, 4 October 2012, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/decision2012/big-bird-in-the-presidential-debate-mitt-romney-advocates-cutting-funding-for-sesame-street-pbs/2012/10/04/f7f280ba-0e1f-11e2-bb5e-492c0d30bff6_story.html (retrieved: 4 October 2012).

Emily Cadik, “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up: Republicans Opposed to Teaching Critical Thinking,” burntorangereport.com, 6 July 2012, at http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/12453/you-cant-make-this-stuff-up-republicans-opposed-to-critical-thinking-in-education (retrieved: 6 July 2012).

Alexandra Alper and Lizbeth Diaz, “Analysis: Mexico’s much-needed education reform faces hurdles,” Reuters, 26 February 2013, at http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/26/us-mexico-education-idUSBRE91P0WU20130226 (retrieved: 4 April 2013).

Related videos

“Miss USA 2011 – 51 Delegates Interview (Q2 – Evolution taught in school),” Grand Slam Beauty Pageants video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkBmhM0R2A0 (retrieved: 11 April 2013). (Watch it here)

“Americans are NOT stupid – WITH SUBTITLES,” eroncoelho video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJuNgBkloFE (retrieved: 15 July 2012). (Watch it here)

“Idiocracy [introduction],” foxhomeent video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icmRCixQrx8 (retrieved: 21 November 2012). (Watch it here)

“What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains [Epipheo.TV],” epipheo video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKaWJ72x1rI (retrieved: 10 May 2013). (Watch it here)

“RSA Animate – Changing Education Paradigms,” theRSAorg video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U (retrieved: 7 October 2011). (Watch it here)

“What most schools don’t teach,” CodeOrg video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKIu9yen5nc (retrieved: 26 February 2013). (Watch it here)

“US schools declare war on kids,” RTAmerica video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-dbbX847g4 (retrieved: 10 July 2012). (Watch it here)

“The Deliberate Dumbing Down of America,” NealF video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZJoCfgAEuE (retrieved: 13 October 2012). (Watch it here)

“The Daily Show with Jon Stewart – Don’t Mess With Textbooks,” video at TheDailyShow.com, http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-march-17-2010/don-t-mess-with-textbooks (retrieved: 15 July 2012). (Watch it here)

“‘Unschooling’: Home learning the future of US education?” RussiaToday video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us_oN8C6Ezg (retrieved: 16 September 2012). (Watch it here)

“A Scientist Visits A Creationist Museum,” SkepticStream video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1xUiuZvUuw (retrieved: 7 July 2012). (Watch it here)

“Creationists Pollute Young Minds at Museum on Nightline,” xrayman7040 video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D8AeiAamjY (retrieved: 7 October 2011). (Watch it here)

“Mitt Romney on spending cuts: ‘I like PBS, I love Big Bird’,” The Washington Post, 3 October 2012, video at WashingtonPost.com, http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/decision2012/mitt-romney-on-spending-cuts-i-like-pbs-i-love-big-bird/2012/10/03/bb0e06e0-0dc7-11e2-a310-2363842b7057_video.html (retrieved: 4 October 2012). (Watch it here)

“TEDxTeen – Jacob Barnett: Forget What You Know,” TEDxTalks video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uq-FOOQ1TpE (retrieved: 25 November 2012). (Watch it here)

“MiB The Best of The Best…. With Honours! Scene,” Bonuswullie video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w67dhHLUK3M (retrieved: 11 May 2013). (Watch it here)

“Mary Astor in TRAPPED BY TELEVISION (1936) Full Movie,” The Video Cellar video at YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Cp-l1gJilo (retrieved: 11 May 2013). (Watch it here)

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