Interesting research has arisen that demonstrates humans become more dogmatic when they are shown evidence of destruction:
In a series of studies, students who were shown pictures of destroyed buildings — as opposed to fully intact or under-construction buildings — responded to queries with more dogmatic attitudes and greater support for military action against Iran, according to Kenneth E. Vail III of the University of Missouri-Columbia, who conducted the studies with a team of researchers from Missouri, Virginia and Colorado.
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Since destruction breeds dogmatism, Vail says, it’s conceivable that visual reminders of terrorist attacks and other violent disasters have shaped the psyche of Americans in the shadow of 9/11. Have we been primed for a confrontation?
“Over the past 10 to 12 years or so, we saw some pretty blatant demonstrations of that tactic,” he says. “Both politicians and the media [tend] to replay and display images and footage from those sorts of events when they’re trying to push various policies and/or military campaigns.”
It appears that humans can be provoked into course of action if they are propagandized with images of destruction. Obviously the war mongers have been aware of this idea for some time as they often use the tactic in order to build support for war. Take Syria for example, it’s obvious that many war mongers are interested in a war with Syria. President Obama has gone so far as to put American troops in harm’s way with the apparent desire to instigate a war with Syria. An Austrian newspaper was caught photoshopping an image with the only plausible reason being to propagandize people against Syria:
VIENNA, Austria — Austrian newspaper publisher Christoph Dichand apologized after Kronen Zeitung was caught using a faked dramatic photograph of a family fleeing Syria’s civil war-torn city Aleppo.
The picture – published in the country’s biggest selling Kronen Zeitung (Krone) newspaper – shows a father cradling a child with a woman in a hijab beside him as they hurry through what appears to be the bombed out ruins of the city. It was being used to illustrate a story on people fleeing the city as government forces clash with rebels.
But sharp-eyed bloggers at the social news website Reddit noticed that while the family image was genuine, the background had been photoshopped.
Considering the findings of the previously mentioned research and the apparent desire of America and many European countries to instigate a war with Syria it’s easy to understand why the image was photoshopped. We return to the fact that states require popular support in order to continue. The overall population of a country far outnumbers the number of goons employed by the state so the possibility of the people rising up and overthrowing the current rulers is always there. In order to prevent this the state feeds up propaganda meant to either instill love of the state or fear of others. If we fear others then it’s easy for the state to justify its existence; it can claim it’s necessary in order to protect the state’s people from the others.
When you see reports of atrocities occurring in other nations ask yourself whether or not the state you live under has a vested interest in warring with the accused state. If there appears to be a vested interest in a war you must dig deeper because you may find out that the photograph showing a bombed out city is nothing more than a fabrication.