Why framing is important: In politics, sometimes the facts don't matter

[rfranklin]

From NPR:

July 13, 2010 New research suggests that misinformed people rarely change their minds when presented with the facts — and often become even more attached to their beliefs. The finding raises questions about a key principle of a strong democracy: that a well-informed electorate is best.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128490874&f=1014&sc=tw

The lesson that can be learned is that Goebbels style propaganda which manipulates public opinion is much more effective than calmly reasoned presentation of the facts. This is a lesson that Fox News and the Republicans have taken to heart--and it is why, as a minority they can control the direction of the debate virtually every time.

[OHdem10]

1. Important to realize the facts do not matter. If facts mattered

the Republicans would have lost the election.
They simply create their own reality.

[Jackpine Radical]

2. Let me put it thus in evolutionary terms:

This wise old elder is sitting around the campfire talking about saber-toothed tigers and how to make the best kind of arrowheads to deal with them. Suddenly the tribal idiot bursts onto the scene screaming that he just saw a big saber-tooth while he was out taking a leak, and he thinks it's following him.

In this instance, your survival may depend on your listening to the idiot instead of continuing to listen to the dispassionate lecture. Your brain's natural emergency mechanisms will override the cortical overlay that mediates dispassionate cognition. This is a highly adaptive trait in a saber-tooth world, but not in a world that requires complex mental processes to arrive at the right answer for survival.

The Republican strategy depends on activating the Saber-tooth fight/flight mechanisms and keeping them activated. This keeps people in an irrational, angry/fearful state, and shuts down their thinking apparatus, making them perfect pawns for the Republicans. The last election once again proved the value of this technique.

Fox News has nothing to do with news. It has everything to do with activating the viewers' adrenaline and cortisol production.

[elleng]

3. Goebbels:

If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.

http://thinkexist.com/quotation/-if_you_tell_a_lie_big_enough_and_keep_repeating/345877.html

[w8liftinglady]

5. wow...just wow. Goebbels lives.

[elleng]

9. Yes, w8, been saying this here often,

'they' adopted his propaganda techniques and have used them successfully for many years, Dems never responded.

:(

[w8liftinglady]

4. it kind of reminds me of the Middle Ages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Ages

[Poboy]

6. We all know this, or at least the more savvy of us do. Yet the 'lets be reasonable'

crowd chops us off at the knees when we actually need to ramp up the rhetoric.

We are under ATTACK. Fucking mayday already.

[elleng]

11. We always have to be reasonable, its the way we are.

We should have learned to 'ramp up the rhetoric' as suggested by Professor Lakoff, and apparently rejected by Dems.

http://berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2003/10/27_lakoff.shtml

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

7. Politicians + Truth = oxymoron

And, usually, an ex-politician looking for work.

[socialist_n_TN]

8. This is why KO is one of the MOST important............

voices on the left. And Ed Shultz. Not because they lie, but because they speak the TRUTH with PASSION! In 21st Century politics, PASSION is more important than anything, even truth. Yes, I hate it too, but it just IS.

Now as leftists, I'm not saying we should ignore the truth. Because the truth is what sets us apart from the Nazi style of propaganda. But what I AM saying, is that we have to speak this truth with PASSION because the passion is what will get through to the masses and allow them the actually SEE the truth.

[rfranklin]

12. But, even that is not sufficient...

The argument that you want to have is the one that you frame in terms of the beliefs that the majority already has.

For instance, if you spread the idea that illegal immigrants are getting all the tax breaks, suddenly the majority of people who are convince that most of our problems are because of illegal immigrants would be against the tax breaks.

[groundloop]

10. Home Run... I was thinking about this the other day after having a conversation with a tea-bagger

She was telling me we should adopt the "fair" tax, and I tried explaining why the ultra wealthy would benefit far more and therefore are pushing for such a scheme. Useless conversatin, she was already drunk on Fox News Coolaid - I guess we all need to carry a flashy graph or chart around to make our point with about taxes.

[rfranklin]

13. That has always puzzled me... they are more concerned about one welfare cheat...

which exist more in their minds than in reality than the billionaires who bribe our elected officials to rig the system.

[Igel]

14. It's axiomatic, however, that such people don't believe themselves misinformed.

In fact, they usually consider themselves better informed than others.

I could also add that it's a human trait, but I figure those who think they know better would disagree and just become more set in their beliefs.