Is Brainwashing Real Or Just A Myth?

You have probably heard stories about people joining a religion, or a sect, and they suddenly become completely different. They do not think, act or feel the way they used to. We tend to say that they have been brainwashed, but we mean it in an everyday way. But brainwashing is actually real, and there are very specific techniques involved.

Brainwashing has been a thing since the 1950s, but people have been trying to change other people’s minds for much longer than that. It was only in the 1950s that the first systematic attempts were made to develop a method for “reprogramming” human brains in a consistent, efficient manner.

The term brainwashing was started by journalist (and CIA agent) Edward Hunter in 1950. It then continued to be a major theme in novels such as 1984 and films such as The Egg of the Worm . This relationship to fictional stories led many to believe that it was just a fantasy. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

The story of brainwashing

Looking back on the Korean War, people in the United States were often shocked by the behavior of soldiers who returned after being captured. They acted very strangely and had strange ideas. Some defended the communist regime after fighting it. Some people did not even return at all. They simply switched pages.

Edward Hunter decided to study this. He discovered that the Chinese had developed techniques to “reprogram” the mind during the famous Cultural Revolution. They then shared their methods with the Koreans, who used these techniques on prisoners of war.

This is how Hunter discovered that brainwashing is different from torture, although torture can often be part of the process. The main difference is that there is a very specific goal in torture, such as a confession or betrayal of friends and allies. Brainwashing, on the other hand, is about completely restructuring someone’s mind.

How do you “wash” a brain?

It has been found that there are four basic ways to get someone to change their beliefs and attitudes towards the world. These four ways are rational persuasion, suggestion, torture and finally brainwashing.

Persuasion is the only thing that involves a “relationship between equals”. Each of the other three involves a force dynamic. Here are some of the specific mechanisms involved in brainwashing:

• Total control over a person’s communication with the outside world.
• Physical and / or psychological punishment in response to disobedience. The brainwashers create rules of conduct, and if you do not follow them, they will torture you in some way.

• A duty to confess. They do not let you have a private life.
• Reward for obeying. They make you believe that by obeying the person in control, you are saving yourself from pain.
• Dogmatic propaganda, which they will make you look at as 100% rational. The ideas they give you are extremely precise.
• A simplification of intellectual activity. This prevents you from engaging in abstract, critical thinking.
• Giving another person the right to control your life and destiny for “your own good”.

All of these mechanisms benefit from our human need for a sense of security, belonging, and protection. You begin to see and put your life and ideas in another person’s hands as a necessary evil. It’s a way to get some stability and peace.

The role of coercion

Brainwashing would not be possible without coercion. We have a natural instinct to fight against losing our independence and sense of identity. This means that it takes extremely much pressure to get someone to change their behavior.

You break a person’s natural resistance by invoking powerful emotions. At the same time, you also shoot their stress level much higher than normal. For brainwashing to work properly, you need the person to be extremely emotional and stressed. This makes them much more exposed to the pressure.

Unfortunately, the forces that master this technique have mastered it so well that they can push us and shape our thoughts almost without us realizing it. There are many people who voluntarily go through this process, without fighting.

Consumer culture is a perfect example of that. Our connection and dependence on social media is another good example. If you think about it, they both involve brainwashing tactics. They are so effective that people do not even realize it is happening to them. They believe that buying things and sharing their private lives online is a sign of their freedom.