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Part Two-Disinformation as a Black Propaganda Tool
Black propaganda has been used since time immemorial by Governments, companies, groups and individuals as a cost effective and quick way of nullifying and destroying an enemy. After all, wars costs billions and can crash an economy, so this is a very good option, costing millions, even thousands and it can sometimes be as effective as sending in the tanks. If you are a morally impotent individual or a sociopath this is essentially how you would look at it.
Black Propaganda is by no means the only techniques of Intelligence but it is one of the most important as it can be used with little risk to the Intelligence person and this series of blogs is about PR and Propaganda. This blog is on the subject of the use of information in Black Propaganda. I hope you will think, examine and question things more after reading this article. Every medium of mass communication is full of the type of activities I am about to describe and I hope you will start to see it clearly after reading this.
Definitiions
The words fact, opinion, data and Information are often misunderstood words. These are the definitions:
Fact: Something that exists or is true because it can be observed, proved, or corroborated using other related facts.
Opinion: Something that someone thinks or believes to be true that may or may not be supported by evidence or actual observation.
Data: Information that is organised into a useable form that may or may not have been corroborated.
Information: Things presented to a person to think about that or may not be fact.
There are 2 problems with information and date. One is an old problem, and the other is very much a 21st century problem. Both problems are related to sources of the data.
Firstly, intelligent people tend to believe what they read or are told if it is from a reliable source. Unintelligent people tend to believe ANYTHING they read without any form of thought. A lot of people are quite robotic.
If you were to survey the general public you would find that doctors and scientists are considered reliable sources of information and facts, as well as people like heads of charities, religious people like priests , vicars etc. People tend to believe what such people say, even when it is obviously false or pure opinion.
Secondly, there is the problem of information overload:
There is a specialist term called “noise”. Organisationally, this means that an area is in a state of constant confusion as it is bombarded by constantly changing situations and data with no one putting in any organisation. The internet, frankly, is one huge, unrestrained ball of noise with a thousand viewpoints and opinions about every subject under the sun. This is extremely useful to the Black Propagandist as people cannot sort out truth amongst all this confusion. Noise is important for the black Propaganda person. Often a person trained in this area will hide his activities by deliberately spreading large amounts of information that the masses cannot accept. Often there is such a proliferation of opinions and viewpoints on a subject that the general public just switch off, they are overwhelmed by the “noise”, if there is any truth in there it gets drowned out by all the different opinions and extreme views. People just switch off mentally and go back to watching Heroes or eating burgers.
Disinformation, of course is simply the spreading of false information about someone or something in order to create an unfavourable perception of them in the eyes of others. It is different to “misinformation” as this is just passing out wrong information. In the word “disinformation” there is a statement of intention and premeditation. This is something very important to the Black Propagandist.
So if you are researching on the internet, or anywhere else for that matter, don’t accept what you are reading.
a) If you are being asked just to accept something because a particular book or “expert” says so, but there are no corroborative facts to check out and there is nothing that fits with your personal experience, then move on to another website or book. Don’t just buy something because someone says so or a book says so, and I mean ANY book, or ANY expert.
b) Don’t trust experts, always question, always distrust, experts are not as impartial as you might think (more on that in another blog).
c) If the information you are studying contains extreme and alarming accusations without any evidence or evidence that can be corroborated, then ignore it.
d) Research the sources of information and opinions. Often you find that they have a financial or malicious interest in the matter. This is a sure sign of black propaganda.
If you do this you might be able to avoid the black propaganda and lies that have proliferated on the internet.
Alan P. Cook
18th April 2009
This article can be freely copied and added to any website but please copy in full, show the name of the author and include a link to my personal writer’s website as follows: Alan P. Cook's Online Writing Community If you do this you will not be in violation of copyright.
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