I’ll keep that one in mind. Thanks

Temptation. That’s the word I’d use. I am tempted, seduced, into a dream. A luscious invitation that I fall for.

I did that elsewhere in this thread. Look around. To copy-paste would be gauche.

You stand proudly as an example for us all.

well if it was obvious then nobody would fall for it. thus the need for reflection and conversation

The red scare. The persecution of jews in nazi germany. The persecution of the first dude who suggested that if doctors washed their hands then less people would die of infection. Just say no to drugs. Cigarettes are good for you. And yes, our latest adventures with vaccines.

A good propaganda campaign and our natural urge to conform substitutes for torture in this case.

You could trust the evidence of your own senses and wait till you’re actually sick before reaching for the medicine.

No u

He sees 2 lights but the authority tells him there are 3 lights.

Through torture the authority convinces him to trust the voice of authority over his own observations.

It’s a deep kind of convincing. It is heartfelt and he really does see what he’s told to see. A kind of religious conversion. (“The truth of the state is the only truth, do not trust the evidence of your senses”)

Or something like that.

But ya, they copied it for TNG. Picard got kidnapped and tortured. I forget the actual episode number.

Short term : drugs, opiates

Long term : you gotta get some friends. It’s hard if yr an adult. Fuck. The nicest people around are trades people. Carpenters plumbers painters like that. Get in with them. That’s the best I got. (And avoid engineers. I speak as an engineer from a family of engineers)

Conversation between friends is like puppies playing. Conversation between strangers is a weird mating ritual between scorpions.

Good morning.

You ever see that old scifi movie, “The Omega Man”? It’s kinda like that.

I’m too lazy to provide sources at the moment. Maybe peruse this thread.

I think that you are a true believer in the midst of a society filled with true believers. As incapable of controlling the vector of your thoughts as a pebble embedded in a glacier. As certain of the truth as a medieval zealot. If the tv told you to cut off your feet you’d do it today and chuckle at what fools those other guys are. No thanks.

It’s a pretty obvious concept. And triple obvious if you’ve seen those two examples to which I referred. The central point is of course the concept, not anything that happened in my life. Replace “me” with “people in general”. Because it is very common. And then we pause and reflect and think about how this functions in our own lives and society in general and we have a nice discussion.

No I mean authoritative you ungrammatic donkey

By “I” I mean “people in general”. I worded it for poetic oomph.

It’s the concept that’s important here. The concept of taking authority over the evidence of your own senses.

As portrayed in those two examples I gave.

And then you think, " Gosh how am I doing this in my own life?". And then we reflect and discuss.

So that’s deeply, nightmarishly fucked up, right?

No, there are techniques for dismantling that programming.

Yes, you know the truth. And everybody around you knows the truth. And all of the right authorities agree with you. And this is all completely logical, obvious, right and scientific. And anybody who thinks otherwise is wrong, bad and insane.

It’s an old story.

Thanks